THE OTAGO DAILY TIMES Monday, February 9, 1942. THE SOCIAL SECURITY FUND

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24836, 9 February 1942, Page 4

THE OTAGO DAILY TIMES Monday, February 9, 1942. THE SOCIAL SECURITY FUND

If the explanation, sc-called, which I has been given by Mr Parry, Minister of; Social -Security, respecting the payments of monetary benefits from the: fund under his control, was intended to be a reply to our observations oh the -subject,: it • was as evasive as any that might have been given by Mr Nash himself and was singularly lame. It was pointed out by us that, according to the figures quoted by Mr Nash shortly before .his departure for the United States, the expenditure on monetary benefits charged against the Social Security fund for the first nine months of the financial year was not only smaller than in the corresponding period of the preceding year—and Mr Parry admits that this conveyed an erroneous impression—but was actually less than the amount of expenditure; that was shown by the Abstract of a Government publication, to have been incurred in the first seven months of the current year. For this reason we suggested that the figures quoted by Mr Nash might be rejected as unreliable. Mr Parry employs a familiar but somewhat discredited formula in the effort to explain away i the fact that the figures are irreconcilable. " This apparent discrepancy," he clumsily says,;" can be accounted for. by an adjustment i with the ? imprests for the months in question, and when 'these* 'outstanding imprests are disseetecLit will be shown that, in fact, the*expenditure on monetary benefits has increased as anticipated.'.' W#ena Minister speaks/of "outstanding imprests/" it is impossible to, contradict him because, nobociy outsidejthe l State, departments that are particularly concerned is in a position to know the extent to which imprests are outstanding. Biit the Government Statistician, who is responsible for the. information provided in the ..Abstract of Statistics, can Only haye. obtained from these departments the figures of the expenditure from the ■ Social Security fund that are supplied in this publicatiOh. And this raises an interesting point upon '■'; which the Minister may or may not feel himself called upon to comment. It is whether the extent to which imprests are outstanding is taken into consideration when the figures that are published in the .Abstract of Statistics are; given to the> Govern-. Went Statistician for insertion.; in, that official record; The question is not merely, as Wr Parry would make out, one of an accounting adjustment. It is whether 4he quarterly public accounts present an . record of; the state of, the various lime at whieh they are issued. .'. ■"" ! ' .