NATIONAL SUPERANNUATION SCHEME

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22201, 18 September 1937, Page 20

NATIONAL SUPERANNUATION SCHEME

TO TBTM EDITOB Ot TUB f«I8S. Sir, —The Rt. Hon. M. J. Savage has intimated that a national health and superannuation scheme is going to be passed by Parliament without giving the electors of the Dominion a chance to say .whether they favour the scheme or not. In my opinion the Prime Minister will not be displaying the best judgment if he does as he has indicated. There are some outstanding {acts which it is as well to keep in mind in a democratic community. One is that the Coalition Government asked thj electors in 1931 to give it a blank cheque duly signed. The request was granted, and the privilege thus given abused. It extended the life of Parliament by one year without having previously received permission to do so from the electors. The latter, evidently not considering the blank cheque covered that item, gave the Government the order of the boot. Now, can the present Government sensibly contend that it has a majority of the people behind it in introducing a contributory scheme for superannuation, or a classified health scheme. There are thousands who will say no. A Labour Government introducing such a scheme stultifies itself by that very act, because it would be merely bolstering up the present capitalistic system. . , - ~ What is more in keeping with the obj,eptive of the New Zealand Labour Party is a universal pension scheme, applied to all on reaching the retiring

age, and. without the recipients having to contribute directly. The health scheme should provide for the socialisation of the medical profession. The medical officers should be paid according to their success in preventing disease. Medical attention should be provided free, and the whole should be paid out of the general taxation. The present Government was elected on an anti-Coalition vote, and not because the electors had been converted to Socialism, or to the planks of the Labour Party's platform. Anyone who thinks otherwise is merely labouring under a delusion and is in for a rude awakening. Obviously it would be good policy to hold over the national health and superannuation scheme, place it before the electors, and, at election time, we shall find out what they think about it, and other things.—Yours, etc., HIRAM HUNTER. September 17, 1937.