Manawatu Evening Standard. MONDAY, JUNE 10, 1929. THE SUPERANNUATION FUNDS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLIX, Issue 162, 10 June 1929, Page 6

Manawatu Evening Standard. MONDAY, JUNE 10, 1929. THE SUPERANNUATION FUNDS.

The statement made by the Prime Minister at Auckland that there was, in addition to the deficit of £577,000 in the Consolidated Fund for the year ended March 31st last, a further deficit of £1,600,000 in the superannuation funds needs serious attention. Since their inception, the State has paid into the three funds (public service, teachers and railways) the sum of £3,469,400, the employees’ contributions during the same period (that is to 31st March, 1928, last year’s figures not being yet available) being £7,214,6U0. If to the State payments, which of course come out of the taxpayers’ pockets, the similar payments made in respect of the National Provident Fund and the maternity allowances, etc., paid to members of the fund and to approved friendly societies are added, the total payments made by the State are increased to £4,174,716. When Sir Joseph Ward speaks of the superannuation funds showing g deficit of £1,600,060, exclusive of the railways superannuation fund, we may take it that, actuarially, the funds are unsound and need replenishing to that extent. But if that is the case, why haven’t the facts been made public before? And why are public servants now being superannuated after 40 years’ service, when so many of their number remain capable of several years of useful service? Under the old arrangement, the retiring age was 65 years, but it is possible now for men who entered the service at 14 or 15 years of age to retire at 10 years below the old age limit, and, in so retiring, they become a direct charge on the superannuation fund, which to-day must be carrying- a good number of exservice employees who have been compulsorily retired at the expiration of their 40 years of service. Apart from the extra loading placed upon the superannuation funds by the new procedure —it may be remembered it was urged upon the late Government by”the Public Service Association there are bound to be cases in which the compulsory retirement of civil servants in this way

operates harshly in that, falling back on the superannuation funds, they have to manage on a considerably reduced income and, in many cases, are forced to take up some other occupation to supplement their income. In that case they come into competition with men and women engaged in similar occupations to those they held in the public service, and, by crowding the market, inflict injury to their fellows. It has been argued that, after 40 years’ service, a man is entitled to rest, and that he should be superannuated. But, at 54 or 55 years of age, he has still many years of usefulness before him, and may, indeed, be nearing- the higher grades in the service where he would be entitled to an increase in his emoluments, which his compulsory retirement deprives him of, and he is retired upon, say, two-thirds of the salary he formerly received, or, possibly, an even smaller amount, which not only savours of', but inflicts actual hardship on the superannuated official. From the public servant’s standpoint compulsory retirement after 40 years’ service would seem, therefore, to be less satisfactory than it appeared when it was first urged upon the Government.