Scheme step closer

Press, 15 October 1976, Page 17

Scheme step closer

The Government’s super-| annuation scheme came a| , step closer to reality on Wed- , nesday evening, when the] , second reading in Parliament] I of the Social Security Amend-] . ment Bill was completed. I The Opposition continued -[its fight through its final; , [speaker. Mr T. J. Young] rl (Hutt), who asked the Government to reconsider. But ■ the Government won a divir I sion, when the vote was put. • 40-24. | Mr Young attacked the Government’s intention to phase out extra benefits to i age beneficiaries, and he > asserted that the bill bore no . relation to the pamphlets > circulated by the National 1 Party at election time last ■ j November. i Funeral benefits now available to widows on the death of their husbands, up to a maximum of $l5OO, were eliminated by the bill except in certain special cases, Mr Young said. The measure would put an [extra tax burden on young , people, he said. ] “Already we know that the

Government intends to raise charges to pay for the introduction of this measure." The Minister of Social Welfare (Mr Walker) said that the scheme would cost SI7M in 1976-77, SI37M in 1977-78. and $242M in 1978-79. These figures had the support of the Treasury, and inflation had been taken into account in their calculation.

"In opposing this legislation. the Labour Party is showing its contempt for people by putting political expedience before the people’s needs,” Mr Walker said.

Refuting a claim by the Opposition that the bill was the most discriminatory in the history of New Zealand welfare. Mr Walker said that the scheme’s benefits were available to everybody, as of right, at the age of 60 years.

“Labour’s scheme discriminated against women, against the intellectually handicapped, and the sick,” Mr Walker said.

“It made the poor poorer and the rich richer.” he said. Labour had asserted that

beneficiaries would be worse off under the Government scheme than under the present age benefit. Mr Walker said, but on election day last year, age beneficiaries were receiving the equivalent of 53.5 per cent of the average wage rate. When the Government’s scheme was introduced in February next year, the married rate would be 60 per cent, and would later rise to 80 per cent. “How can people sav that they were better off under Labour?” Mr Walker saidIn reply to Opposition assertions that the scheme was nothing more than a glorified taxable benefit, Mr Walker said that by paying out a specific percentage of the average ruling wage rate, benefits were being taken out of the political arena. Among those to benefit from the scheme would be “good mothers staying at home to look after their children,” Mr Walker said. He accused the Labour Party of being “anti-family” foropposing it.