The Dominion. THURSDAY, OCTOBER 8, 1908. SUPERANNUATION SCHEMES.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 322, 8 October 1908, Page 6

The Dominion. THURSDAY, OCTOBER 8, 1908. SUPERANNUATION SCHEMES.

"We are glad to note, from a reply given by the Prime Minister yesterday to a question in the House, that the police force is to be spared the serious wrong that the Government proposed to inflict upon it through the Public Service Superannuation Bill. This measure proposed to abolish the Police Provident Fund and to bring the police into the general Public Service scheme. During .the past nine years the police have maintained their fund without any assistance from the Government. It is now in credit to the extent of over £30,000, although' the annual disbursements have reached the sum of £6574, and it has actually saved .the Government a sum of £18,000 which otherwise would have had to conle from the public purse in compensation to retiring officers. What the Government proposed, almost without notice to the police, was that all their assets and liabilities should be transferred to the general fund, and this on such terms as amount almost to an act of spoliation. The police contended that contributors to their fund should be placed in the same position as other civil servants by having their payments returned to them with interest, Tho Government should, in justice, do more than this, and refund the £18,000, with interest, which the fund would have received if the Government had paid into it a sum equal to what would have been required for retiring allowances. There was another injustice in the new proposal. The policeman cannot enter the force at as early an age as that at which a civil servant can begin his career, and it is obvious, therefore, that, he cannot obtain tho full benefit of the general scheme, by ' serving forty years, unless he remains in the force until he has reached a more advanced age than that at which most civil servants can retire. If anything, tho reverse ought to bo tho case, since very few men in the 'forco can sorve as long as a civil Ecr-

vant. The nature of his work prevents him doing so. It is true that tho new proposal prescribed a slightly higher maximum for tho retiring allowance, but, as was well pointed out by the Christchurch police, " that would not do any good if a man could not serve sufficiently long to become entitled to draw it." Yet another injustice was the increase in the rate of contributions by men who joined the Provident Fund between tho ages of 35 and 50, since, as was pointed out in the circular we reprinted yesterday, all these men have already contributed an amount which with future payment at original rates will be considerably in excess of the total amount to be paid by civil servants of the same age and salaries who now come under the Bill. For tho present these and the other injustices in the Bill are averted, since the Prime Minister has stated that he will ask the House to drop tile clauses relating to the policc, in order that the subject may be maturely considered hereafter. There is another aspect to the matter, however. Why should the Government desire to bring,the police into a general scheme at all? The Provident Fund is apparently in a stable condition, and it might advantageously be left alone, not only because it is sound, but because the police force is in many respects different from the rest of the Civil Service. To say that thero should be one scheme for all public servants is merely to give a quite arbitrary opinion. There is a special reason why the police scheme should remain separate from the general scheme. The police scheme is not unsound, and the general scheme certainly is. At any rate, the evidence given by Me. Morris Fox before the Public Accounts Committee was not of a kind to make the general schemc any less unattractive to the police than it was. The Bill provides for the payment of a subsidy amounting to £30,000 a year to assist the contributions of the contributors to the superannuation scheme. Mr. Fox made it clear that that sum is only sufficient for the present. No provision is made for the responsibilities of the State in future years. The amounts paid in subsidy will bo " increased, probably, each year automatically, as the necessity is shown by actuarial valuations. In all probability they will increase yearly for some time." Mr. Fox said that increases will bo required, but he could not givo any idea of what the probable increase would be at the end of even tho first triennium. All that can be done, apparently, is to make a triennial investigation, and readjust the, subsidies. The subsidy of £30,000 to tho Public Service Fund, said Mr. Fox, will -probably " get up to over £60,000 " in ten or fifteen years. The whole position was summed up in the simple " No " returned by tho • actuary to Mr. James Allen's question: "Does the State .make any provision for its responsibility in regard to a pension thirty years hence 1 " The Government, in short, is going blindly ahead without knowing more about tho future, or giving to the young contributor any better guarantee that he will draw his full pension when he retires, than that the country may meet its large unknown liabilities when' the time comes. Parliament is not competent to discuss the question actuarially, but it can at least say, whether an undertaking involving very great liabilities should not be made indubitably sound to begin with.