HOSPITAL SUBSIDIES

Dominion, Volume 19, Issue 165, 9 April 1926, Page 4

HOSPITAL SUBSIDIES

REFUND CAUSES STRANGE POSITION Palmerston North, April 8. While discussing hospital maintenance estimates to-day the chairman of the Palmerston North Hospital Board (Sir Janies Wilson) voiced a protest against the compulsory refund to the public account of £B(>t 18s. 9d. in accordance with the provision of the Act for scaling down all sulxsidies to maintain a Dominion average of a £1 for £l. The position, the chairman explained, was that if at the end of the year the Government found it had paid out too much in subsidies, al) hospital boards were obliged to refund certain amounts which were estimated on a capital basis. The Palmerston North Ixiard, as it so happened, had only received Ils. in the ■pound, so when the, £BOl was repaid thw actual Government payment would only bo 13s. in the pound, al though the Act stated fiat tho lowest subsidy payable to boards would bo 14s, in the £l. Tho position was most unsatisfactory. The board agreed io protest to il> Minister and also to bring the matter l>efo."C the Hospitals’ Association.