WAR PENSIONS

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 63, Issue 270, 25 August 1943, Page 4

WAR PENSIONS

GENERAL INCREASES PROPOSED ONUS OF PROVING DISABILITY INTRODUCTION OF THE BILL. (P.A.) WELLINGTON, August 24. The increases in war pensions and allowances mentioned in the Budget are provided for in the War Pensions Bill, introduced in the House of Representatives to-night. It also provides for increases in respect of the following: certain specific disabilities, war veterans’ allowances, cases of total blindness, and in cases where two or more serious disabilities have been incurred. There is also authority for payment of pensions in respect of children over 16 years whose education is being continued.

Explaining the Bill, the Prime Minister (the Rt. Hon. P. Fraser) said that the improvements had the unqualified support of the Returned Services’ Association’s Dominion executive, with which the Government had conferred. The measure was. a consolidating Bill and would take the place of the former War Pensions Act. A brief memorandum to the Bill stated that it was designed to replace existing legislation relating to war pensions, and to replace it with a scheme that would be of general application, irrespective of whether the grounds for pensions had arisen in respect of past, present, or future wars, or in respect of service in the New Zealand forces in times of peace. The total disablement pension provided under the Bill for a former serviceman will be £3 a week, the present rate being £2. The economic pension is increased from'34s 6d a week to 35 s. The allowance for a disabled man’s wife remains as at present at £l, and that for each child is increased from 10s to 10s 6d a week. The New Rates. Under the new rates unmarried and married former servicemen will receive pensions as follows, the present rate being in parenthesis:— Unmarried man: £4 15s (£3 14s Gd). Man with wife: £5 15s (£4 14s 6d). Man, wife, and one child: £6 5s 6d (£5 4s Gd). Man, wife, and two children: £6 16s (£5 14s 6d). In the case of a soldier’s widow without children the statutory pension is increased from 30s to £2, and the economic pension from 17s 3d to 20s, making a total of £3 weekly, compared with the existing rate of £2 7s 3d. The total pension for a widow with two children is increased from £3 14s 4Jd to £4 16s weekly as follows, the present rates being given in parentheses -. statutory pension, 50s (40s); pension for two children, 2ls (20s); economic pension, 25s (14s 4Jd). These rates relate to privates in the Army and corresponding ranks or ratings in other services. Where the rates of pensions payable under the existing legislation to commissioned ranks and their dependants aro in excess of the new rates payable to those of non-commissioned rank and their dependants, no increases are provided for. Percentages Increased. The fourth schedule to the Bill sets out the percentage of full pension payable in respect of certain specific disabilities. A number of increases in the percentages has been made. For example, the percentage of disability for amputation of the right arm through the shoulder joint, which w r as previously assessed at 85 per cent., has been assessed at 100 per cent. Amputation of a leg through the hip joint, previously assessed at 00 per cent., has now been assesed at . 100 per cent. Various other percentages have also been increased. The maximum rate of clothing allowance payable to those former servicemen who have to wear artificial limbs or other artificial appliances has been increased from £8 to £l6 per annum, while the maximum allowance payable in respect of an attendant has been increased from £3 to £5 weekly. The rate of pension for orphaned children lias also been increased from 15s to 20s a week.

The question of attributubility is also dealt with in the Bill. It is laid down that the onus of proving that the disability is associated with war service shall not bo on the claimant, and the War Pensions Board and the War Pensions Appeal Board aro to give claimants full benefit of all presumptions in their favour.

Tho war votorans’ allowance is increased from 30s weekly, plus tho 5 per centi. bonus, to 3i2s 6d weekly for the veteran himself, while tho 5 per cent, bonus, previously payable in rospect of wives and children, has now been included in the allowance. Pensions to members of the Emergency Reserve Corps have been increased in the same manner as war pensions to former servicemen. Provision is made for increased pensions to be paid in eases of total blindness and also in cases where two or more serious disabilities have been incurred. Similar adjustments and increases in pensions and allowances for members of the Mercantile Marine are provided for in the War Pensions and Allowances (Merctntile Marine) •Amendment Bill, which was also in-

troduced and read a first time. Detention allowances, according to the tonnage of the shin in which the men were serving "when detained, have also been slightly increased