OLD AGE PENSIONS.

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 2643, 28 August 1906, Page 4

OLD AGE PENSIONS.

Wellington, August 23. In his report, the Registrar of Old Age Pensions (Mr J. E wan Smith) says: Toe principal event of the year was the passing of an Act which increased the maximum pension to £26, the immediate result of which was not only an enlarged expenditure, but also a marked addition to the number of participants. On the 31st March last the number of pensioners on the roll stood at 12,582, being 812 more than at the close of the previous year, and 194 less than for the 1902 period, when the record nnmber (12,576) was on the roll line Maori pensioners numbered 667. Although the number of pensioners had increased, the Registrar notes with satisfac- . tion that the percentage of pensioners to the population eligible by age and residence had not gone up. Of the 12,582 pensioners on the roll, 10,398, or 82 per cent of the whole, were in receipt of the full pension of of £26. Male pensioners are more numerous than females by 1,930, and seventy-two is the age of the largest number—l,l6B Europeans, seventy-three being the next, with 1,112 pensioners. The number of new claims made during the past year was 3,027, as against 1683 received during the previous year. Of this number, 2073 were granted, 690 rejected, and 892 awaited investigation. The Maori claimants during the year numbered 125. The total number of claimants from 1898 to March 31 last was 28,662, of whom 21,846 were .admitted. The cost of administration for the past year was £4758. The percentage of the total cost of administering the Act to the gross payment of £1,428,372 was only 1.67 per cent.