SOCIAL SECURITY FUND

Southland Times, Issue 24160, 24 June 1940, Page 4

SOCIAL SECURITY FUND

MORE THAN £12,240,000 SPENT FIRST YEAR OF SCHEME Revenue of the Social Security Fund for the financial year ended March 31, the first year of its operation, totalled £9,519,793. It was made up as follows: Charge on salary and wages, £5,557,811; other incc le, £2,613,348; company income, £658,374; registration fees, £636,077; miscellaneous, £27,595; penalties, £26,588. In the estimates for the year these items totalled £9,254,125. A subsidy of £2,000,000 from the' Consolidated Fund and the previous year’s surplus of £809,000 brought the total estimated revenue to £12,063,125. Social security benefits, together with war pensions, required the expenditure of £12,247,313. War pensions, which accounted for £1,777,035, were not included in the estimates. The cost of administering the scheme, which was estimated at £459,725, is not stated in the figures for the year, which are included in the latest issue of the Abstract of Statistics. Payments for social security benefits were made as follows, with the estimated figures in parentheses: Age, £6,542,296 (£6,910,000); widows, £790,644 (£1,010,000); Maori war, £ll2l (£1500); miners, £93,250 (£99,000); invalidity, £944,359 (£1,050,000); family, £266,918 (£700,000); orphans, £14,974 (£30,000); emergency, £27,918 (£100,000); unemployed and sickness, £728,148 (£508,000); hospital and mental hospital, £777,966 (£738,400); maternity, £282,684 (£306,500). Two other items in the estimates were medical, £lOO,OOO, and pharmaceutical, £50,000. The number of persons receiving benefits continues to increase. As at March there were 93,651 in receipt of age benefits, 11,769 invalidity, 11,012 family and 10,147 widows. Unemployed benefits totalled 4053, against 3995 in February.