"The Digger."

Digger (Invercargill RSA), Issue 4, 9 April 1920, Page 8

"The Digger."

FRIDAY, APRIL 9, 1920. PENSIONS FOB OISABSLMT^ WHAT JUSTICE DEMANDS. The Christchurch Conference decided to press for a pension of a minimum standard of £3 15s per week for total disability. Exactly what this was intended to mean was not clear but it voices a general disconterit among ex-soldiers with the present pension scale. This discontent is shared by the public generally and has been shown also in Parliament. It is clear that the timo is ripo for final consideration of the question. The Act at present in force provides for pension for total disability. Now broadly speaking the disability suffered by the incapacitated man is of two kinds : a.-— Physical, viz., suffering and general inconvenience. b.— Economic, viz., the disability which is due to loss of earning- power or inability to follow a chosen career. Let us now take some typical cases to illustrate the necessity for assessing a soldier's disability on this basis. 1. — A clerk a,nd a professional pianist have each lost two fingers on the left hand. The clerk has suffered pain and some slight inconvenience. The pianist has also suffered these but he has further lost liis occupation which proba'bly represented years of labour. Under tlie present system the economic disability of tlie musicians is recognised by possible vccational training from the Repatriation Department and a possible extra £1 per week from the Pensions Department. 2. — A surveyor's drauglitsman married with two children was before the war in an assured po.sition earning £11 per week. At the war he lost his right arm, was badly smashed up and is slowly dying as a result. The utmost that the State can provide is a pension of £6 per week for the family. This amount is the equivalent of about £4 at the pre-war cost of liymg. In this case in addition to dying as a result of his injuries the soldier's income has been reduced by 60 per cent., and the State says it cannot do more. Cases of this kind might be cited indefinitely. The cnidity of the present system of pensions arises from the follow ing facts : — a. — Any given injury is assumed by the law as it stands to have resulied ia

identical "Disability." As has heen shown the real disability depends very largely on the occupation of the individual. b.— Each individual pensioner is assumed to have some particular (but unspecified) earning capacity at some average (but unspecified) occupation and his pension is adjusted accordingly. To some extent vocational training provides alternative employment for incapacitated men but this is effective in most cases to only a very limited extent in restoring pre-war earning power, and in cases of real total disability does not apply to all. It is obvious that the departments of pensions and repatriation are both dealing inadequately and inequitably witli the economic disability which is the much more important part of his disability in nearly every case. The true responsibility of the state is thus ostensibly dealt with by two departments but is fully discharged by neither. The first essential of an efficient scheme of pension administration is that the functions of the two departments, which will deal with physical and economical disability respectfully should be clearly defined. The Pensions Department should confine itself to the physical disability pturely and a schedule of pensions for particular injuries would he largely applicable. Its work would then become much more simple and the assessment would be relatively automatic. The Repatriation Department should have exclusive and exhaustive control of the economic factor in every case. Vocational, functional, and general educational training should be included under its administration. In some cases therefore a disabled solaier wonld be drawing a pension in respect to physical disability only, in others possible economic disability only — but in many cases in respect to both.