PENSIONS BILL

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVI, Issue 123, 24 April 1936, Page 6

PENSIONS BILL

TO COME DOWN THIS SESSION. Per Press Association. WELLINGTON, April 23. “I can definitely say that there will he a Pensions Bill this session, but it cannot come before the House until the financial position of the country is ascertained in the ordinary way,” said the Minister of Pensions (Hon. W. E. Parry) in an interview to-day. “The Bill is in process of completion and the Government aims to make our pensions system as nearly uniform as possible and planned to cover in their operation a period of three years, but until such time as the financial position is really ascertained and other important questions affecting the people of the Dominion that are crying aloud for adjustment are considered it is just impossible to say at the moment how much of a ‘bite’ from the Exchequer we can take for the first instalment of the Government’s pensions policy to be embodied in the Bill now under way.” The Minister said there were many people whose circumstances made them in great need of pensions, and it was only right to deal with these cases receiving no State help at all before dealing with cases of people already receiving pensions.. The Government would decide wliat instalments of its pensions legislation could be made during the first session.