H—9

The main provisions of these amendments provided for the payment of a mother's allowance of 30s. a week to wives and widows of ex-members of the Forces and Mercantile Marine and stabilizes the rate of pension for each child at 10s. a week. During the year the Department received 14,619 applications for pensions. Of these, 9,531 were lodged by ex-servicemen in respect of their own disabilities, the balance of 5,088 being made up of claims by dependants, applications for economic pensions, and war veterans' allowances. The following -is a summary of the disabilities from which ex-service personnel were suffering at the time of application for pension :

The War Pensions Boards dealt with 85,209 cases during the year ended 31st March, 1947, made up as follows : (1) Claims for pension on account of disablement .. .. .. 8,223 (2) Claims for economic pension .. .. .. .. .. 3,409 (3) Claims for dependants'pensions .. .. .. .. .. 1,722 (4) Cases submitted for renewal and review .. .. .. .. 52,166 (5) Cases submitted for reconsideration and reinstatement .. .. 6,256 (6) Cases where the question of entitlement was considered in respect of personnel discharged from the Forces on medical grounds, but who did not lodge claims for pension .. .. .. .. 4,567 (7) Claims for war veterans'allowances .. .. .. .. 2,600 (8) Sundry claims and reviews .. .. .. .. .. 1,213 (9) Cases adjourned for further consideration and decision .. .. 5,053 85,209 During the past year there has been a considerable drop in the number of applications for disablement pensions, this being accounted for by the fewer discharges of unfit personnel from the Forces. While there should from now on be a sharp drop in fresh applications, which this year numbered 9,531, as against 19,306 for the previous year, many applications for reinstatement of former grants and review of existing grants continue to come to hand, and the War Pensions Boards have in consequence been required to consider almost as many disablement cases as formerly.

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Class of Disability or Disease. Type of Service. Overseas. New Zealand. Total. (1) Infections and infestations (2) Nervous system (3) Eye, ear, and nose (4) Circulatory and blood systems (5) Metabolism (6) Lungs (7) Breast (8) Digestive system (9) Generative system (10) Gunshot wounds and accidental injuries to bones, joints, and soft tissues (11) Skin (12) Aveolar tissue . . . . (13) Tumours and neoplastic growths .. . . (14) Malformations (15) Amputations (16) Urinary tract (17) Sundry minor disabilities I 280 1,101 1,510 322 61 723 2 758 70 2,329 509 15 34 28 147 117 148 17 149 222 125 19 144 2 134 21 360 88 3 10 15 7 13 48 297 1,250 1,732 447 80 867 4 892 91 2,689 597 18 44 43 154 130 "196 8,154 1,377 1 9,531