PEOPLE'S SAVINGS

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 53, Issue 3830, 6 November 1936, Page 7

PEOPLE'S SAVINGS

NO END TO INDIVIDUAL THRIFT NATIONAL SUPERANNUATION AND COLLECTIVE SAVING. I “ When I was a lad,” said the Prime Minister in a recent statement to the Labour Party’s newspaper, the "Standard,” “I was advised by my teachers, by my parents, by everybody, to save my money. I have lived long enough to realise that the money I received was in payment for my services, and should be used for the exchange of services with other people. “This scratching, scraping, starvation system of individual saving strangles the economic freedom and well-being of a nation. We have got to stop that. We must save as a nation, and our savings will take the form of universal superannuation and national health insurance.” This statement was the basis of fuller explanation made by the Prime Minister in an interview m Wellington, on Wednesday. “I have not said at any time that when the prgoramme of the Labour Government has baen completed the need for individual saving would be ended,” said Mr Savage. “The Labour Party is not opposed to individual saving, and if the records of savings were searched it probably would be found that thousands of supporters of Labour are well to the front in the practice of thrift. “Moreover, the savings of the people are in no danger at all under the Labour Government,” added the Prime Minister. “Our policy is to build, not to destroy. We mean to use the savings of the people plus the public credit for the development of national assets, thus bringing about a state of affairs in New Zealand that will enable the people to buy as well as to produce. “My plain statement is this,” continued Mr Savage. “The average individual has no hope on this side of the grave of saving sufficient to keep him in reasonable comfort in old age without some financial support. This fact must be realised, and in the face of incontrovertible truth we must establish a system of collective saving for the purpose of providing superannuation which will be universal in its application. If there is a better idea hidden somewhere, I should like to see someone unearth it.”