The Opunake Times. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 1896. OLD AGE PENSIONS.

Opunake Times, Volume V, Issue 215, 25 September 1896, Page 2

The Opunake Times. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 1896. OLD AGE PENSIONS.

The Government is very fond of boasting on every occasion that the civilised world has its eyes on the legislation passed in New Zealand with a view to copying the .same. In the circumstances it would be interesting to know whether the New South Wales or the New Zealand scheme of the Old Age Pensions was first published, as there is such a striking similarity between the details of the two measures that there is every good reason to believe that one has been copied holus bolus from the other. The report of the Select Committee of the New South Wales Parliament set up to deal with the question, shows (for that colony) the cost at £1,400,000 to provide an old age pension for all persons in the country above the age of sixty, but that a scheme providing pension for all persons above sixty who have been fifteen years in the colony, and have an income of not less than £SO a year, could be worked for £90,000. The committee therefore commend the adoption of the modified plan, and propose to provide the necessary money to sustain the fund by making some causes of poverty assist in the amelioration. With this object in view they recommend the legalisation of the totalisator, on which a tax of 3£ per cent will give £35,000 per annum ; the revenue for billiard licenses, £8000; fines for drunkenness and breaches of the Licensing Act, £6000; entertainment and sports tax, Id per ticket, £BOOO ; 2 per cent donation from the revenue received on wines and spirits, tobacco, opium, and cigars, £22,000 ; saving on cost of 25 per cent of the inmates now in asylum, £II,OOO. Holding that a man or woman who had assisted to develop the resources of the country and paid taxes for 15 years is as deserving of consideration as a soldier or a sailor who fights for his country. The committee recommend that the pension should be a free gift from the State as a right (not as a pauper dole) without contributions of any kind. Under this modified scheme every person would be entitled to 10s per week, while married couples would be granted 15s. A system of invalid pensions is also proposed, under which a sum of 10s per week would be paid to all persons sick or infirm, provided the recipient subscribed a shilling per month for a period of five years to the invalid fund, worked through the medium of some friendly society.