WORK DEFENDED.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20363, 21 July 1934, Page 31 (Supplement)

WORK DEFENDED.

Administration of Fund for Unemployed. “ BOARD DOING ITS DUTY.” (“Star” Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON, July 20. The work of the Unemployment Board was defended by the Minister of Employment (the Hon. Adam Hamilton) in the House to-day after critics had registered their opposition to certain phases of the administration of the unemployment funds. Among other things critics strongly complained that wealthy firms and prosperous farmers were securing unemployment funds as subsidy on wages they paid. “The Board is doing its duty, carrying out its job with the money Parliament has set aside, and doing it very well,” said the Minister. Mr Sullivan (Avon) : I understand the Government accepts full responsibility for the position in Christchurch? Mr Hamilton’s answer was to repeat that the board had to administer a certain sum of money which was set aside for the purpose, and the Government would take the responsibility for what happened. Mistakes would occur, and he had admitted one in connection with a Christchurch police case, but where mistakes could be proved they would be put right. The member for Avon had made his attack on the introduction of sustenance payments. Taken Oft Their Jobs. Mr Sullivan: These men were "working for local bodies who were prepared to-keep them at work, and you deliberately take them off their jobs and practically starve them. The Minister: After all, very likely the work was not useful, and it may be that it was just work for work’s sake. Mr Semple (Wellington East): That does not justify starving them. The Minister went on to suggest that the attack was not against sustenance but the rate of it, and he took it that critics would prefer the No. 5 Scheme to sustenance. If they took a vote of the House or the country on this question of payment for no work done he did not think the vote would go in fa-our of paying just as much as if work had been done. Thus it meant lesser payment where there was sustenance.

Mr Fraser (Wellington Central) : Does that mean that they have not enough when they work and they are half starved when they do not work? The Minister: The board is administering a fund, and when the year ended on March 31 it had only ten days’ allocations left as a surplus. It is legitimate criticism to attack the method of distribution. If the board is given more money it could distribute more, but last year we finished with only one to two weeks’ allocation left.

The problem is that we have 50,000 men unemployed, and Parliament sets aside four and a half millions. We want to make the best use of that for the benefit of the men. If local bodies and local people find work—the board does not find work—you can make rise of the funds, but if there is no useful work it comes down to sustenance.

Mr Sullivan: Three hundred men have been deliberately taken off work where they had been for months. The Minister: If the work is not approved we take them off, but I .do not mind looking into any complaint the member brings up. Mr Hamilton said the problem centred around the B2 men, in respect to whom there was doubt whether they were hospital cases or Unemployment Board cases. If the local authority could find useful work for them they could go to it.

Mr Hamilton repeated that no conclusion was reached that sustenance should be substantially less than payment for work done. If the amount specified in the Act was paid the cost would be nine millions.

Later the Minister emphasised the point that the subsidy scheme, which meant half the funds being provided by the employer, was the cheapest thing administered by the board. In the attack on Scheme 48, said Mr Hamilton, the discussion had' not centred around the principle but was concerned over the people who used it. The scheme was for the purpose of inducing farmers to clear bush or dig drains and to carry out any useful work which they otherwise could not do. The board found half the money and the farmer the rest. Mr Langstone: Can it help hardup farmers who have no money to spend? The Minister: We subsidise so as to stimulate men with money to spend it. The criticism is not against the scheme, but against wealthy men itsing it. Mr Lee (Manukau) : Ves. to paint hotels. Most Useful. The Minister declared that the 4B scheme was a most useful scheme, because it meant doing work full time, and the men were generally satisfied. Mr Semple (Wellington East) : Should not the Minister discriminate between wealthy men and the struggling farmer. The Minister: lam not disagreeing with the hon member. It is more a political objection than an economic one. It is not much use asking a poor man to find half the money when he has not got it. We stimulate someone -with money to spend it. The subsidy scheme is one which keeps our finances as sound as they are. Mr Hamilton admitted that most schemes could be abused, and nothing hurt him more than to hear that people using the schemes ought to do it all with their own money. Mr Semple: Surely the Minister can not justify Mr Riddiford taking money out of the unemployment fund? The Minister: Just a minute. We say if he pays £1 we will put in another one, and we say he is helping us. If we could get more 4B works going we would have more useful work going. We say that instead of helping them they are helping us. A member: How much does the scheme cost ? Not Enough Applications. The Minister: I will obtain that information for you. We think actually that we never get enough applications. If there are objections we don’t mind dropping it, but such a course definitely would not be in the interests of the fund.

Dealing with the building subsidy scheme the Minister stated that under the arrangement the fund provided only £1 as against the £9 subscribed by the applicant; in other words those using the scheme supplied £4,000,000 as against the board’s cash outlay of £400,000. “If there is a better scheme,” he added, “let us have it. If we were to adopt the scheme advanced by the Trades and Labour Council —and I am not criticising it at the moment —our fund would not stand as soundly as it does at present.” Mr Hamilton said the Opposition might attack the Government and the board, but they should remember that the taxpayers, who were providing the fund, were closely watching the administration of that fund. If legitimate complaints were made the board would make every endeavour to remedy anomalies or injustice. The opposition would find it a difficult task to administer the fund, and if it wanted to achieve office it would be well advised ot abandon its idea of abolishing the board. What the Cost Would Be. Mr Hamilton predicted that if sustenance allowances were made on the scale set out in the original enactment, £2 14s 6d per week to a married man with four children, for example, the cost would be about £9,000,000 a year. (Labour dissent). Mr Sullivan (Avon) : The alternative would be to provide real work at standard rates of pay. Mr Fraser (Wellington Central) : A million more would do it. The Minister: No. Immediately the new* sustenance rates were applied the registration figures would go up by about 20 per cent. Mr Sullivan: Do you stand for the payment of 23s a week to a married man with five children, in Christchurch. The Minister: Under the sustenance payments he should be receiving 26s sustenance, 6s family allowance and free milk, which would represent another 4s. Mr Sullivan: The total income is 23s and 5s which one child brings in. The Minister: There must be some other earnings then.