EARL OF BIRKENHEAD

Taranaki Daily News, 8 July 1929, Page 3

EARL OF BIRKENHEAD

GIVING UP A PENSION.

TO RELINQUISH £5OOO A YEAR.

London, May 28. The Earl of Birkenhead, speaking at Banbury on Saturday night, was criticising the Labour Party, and said: “I am not going to run the coal mines.” A voice: You don’t want' to, with £5OOO a year pension. Lord Birkenhead: Why should not I have a pension? If I gave up £30,000 a year in order to assume public office, why should not I be entitled to a pension? 1 will at this moment say I am the only one of those who have received a pension who, in effect, does not intend indefinitely to receive it. I am the only one I know in the British Empire who is giving up in three months a pension of £5OOO a year. In an interview, Lord Birkenhead, referring to his speech, said: “I said exactly what I meant. Beyond that I cannot discuss the matter.”

When Lord Birkenhead resigned in October last from the office of Secretary for India the question of his pension rights as an ex-Lord Chancellor was raised in the House of Commons. Sir Thomas Inskip, Attorney-General, replied: “Lord Birkenhead has authorised me to say that in the course . of time he will be undertaking new duties, and will receive in connection with them emoluments which substantial. He proposes to receive the pension to which he is entitled during the period of transition from his old duties to his new duties, and he anticipates that that period will not be prolonged.” Referring to “the period of transition” in °a letter, Lord Birkenhead wrote: “That it will not be unduly protracted is rendered probable by the fact which I only recall because it is so long ago, that during each year of my law office I voluntarily returned many thousands of pounds of my income to the Treasury.” In the same letter he wrote: “I do not choose at a moment of national financial stringency to accept a pension from' the State so long as I am able to earn my living in Other ways.” Lord Birkenhead’s appointments received since he resigned are: Chairman, Greater London and Counties Trust; director, Imperial Chemical Industries, Tate and Lyle, sugar refiners, and Johannesburg Consolidated Investment Company.