THE AGED POOR.

Auckland Star, Volume XXII, Issue 238, 7 October 1891, Page 2

THE AGED POOR.

(To the Editor.)

gr R( —l am obliged to your correspondent, Mr D. Aitkon, for further ventilation of this subject. Ib will well bear it, for if there ia one blot on our modern colonial civilisation it is our indifference nob only to tho comforts, but the bare wants of the poor, tho aged of both sexes. And if our present system continues, we shall need to enlarge our homes for the destitute, which would be now bub poor places but for personal gifts. I cannot claim to be a woman, but I claim to be one who mourns " man's inhumanity to man," and of most of its,who content ourselves with a few trifling subscriptions ab long intervals, and who never venture to visit the afflicted in the hospitals or asylums. Wo want a refuge for the destitute and homeless where they may get at least a bed and a meal, and I have written repeatedly on the same subject in vain. There is something radically wrong when wo cannot do something of h more practical character to cope with tho miseries of the poor. When" Sir Harry Atkinson introduced his proposal of a national insurance it was ridiculed, bub the German people are putting this system into practice, and there can be no doubt that it would cause a better feeling of independence among the poor, while it would lessen and in time Ido away with tho vast charitable institutions which are and will be increasingly needed. Would a labouring man miss 2d per weok from his wages? Yet this Bum would, if paid ab an early age, entitle a man of 60 to a pension of £20 per annum (all classes paying the tax, rich and poor, the former nob needing the pension, v.'hilo tho inevitable deaths prior to tho maturity of the annuitant would go to swoll the fund). I am informed in Germany the vory small payment paid by the labouring man (in a country where wages arc low) is paid by the employer and deducted from tho -.vages of tho employee, who is only liable to pay when in employment. There is no doubt if some such system could be introduced into these young colonies, it would result in becoming a great boon fco the larger class, of poor colonists, and a thousand times better for their v/olfaro than the various land axil anti-poverty fads, which now or at any timo will never bring any relief to the unfortunate aged poor.—l am, etc., H CM AN IT Y.