Evening Post. THURSDAY, AUGUST 2, 1923. PENSIONS AND EARNINGS

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 28, 2 August 1923, Page 6

Evening Post. THURSDAY, AUGUST 2, 1923. PENSIONS AND EARNINGS

In addition to providing bigger pensions for incapacitated men, the War Pensions Amendment Bill aims at assisting those men whose earning power is reduced by war disabilities. The economic pension, which is provided for, is really the old supplementary pension under a new name; but it is to be made available upon a more generous scale. This will meet, in a measure at least, those instances of hardship which, more than anything else, have moved the returned soldiers to press for revision of the pensions scheme. A scale pension does not suffice. A soldier who has lost an arm or leg is under much heavier disability if he formerly followed a manual occupation than if he were engaged in clerical Work. The loss does not greatly reduce his earning capacity as a clerk, but it makes him almost worthless as a labourer. It was to overcome this inequality that the- Government and other bodies promoted schemes of re-education and made repatriation grants to establish men in new callings. The success uf that work is attested by the great number of partially-disabled men who have resumed positions in civil life and have done well. But it was not to be expected that such methods would provide for all needs. Some men have remained for whom suitable places in civil life have not been found. The economic pension, sympathetically applied, will mitigate the hardships of such men and their dependants.

It is further proposed to appoint a pensions appeal board. We doubt very much whether such a board will grant much more to pensioners and applicants than they have received hitherto. A special appeal board was set up some time ago, and though it heard many appeals the proportion granted was very small. Even doctors differ among themselves, and possibly there could be no wider field for difference than in determining, live years or more after a soldier's discharge, whether the disability fi-om which he suffers is the result of war service. The right of appeal, however, will help to remove a sense of injustice which an applicant may entertain if his application is rejected by the Pensions Board ; and it will provide an additional safeguard against injustice. The public, we are sure, desires to sec justice done to the soldiers, and will not grudge the cost. The soldiers themselves ask' for bo move than justice for their suffering corm'adea, aad the only

difference of opinion that can arise is upon the best means of meeting claims fully and fairly. The Bill now submitted will, we hope, go a long way towards removing this cause of difference.