OLD-AGE PENSIONS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume 23, Issue 47, 23 November 1899, Page 10

OLD-AGE PENSIONS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM.

CAT.DIXAL VAUGHAN ON THE SCHEME.

On Saturday, September 30, Cardinal Vaughan received a deputation at the Ar.hbisbop's House representing a 'national committee of organised labour,' trade-unionists and friendly societies, which has set itself to advocate the cause of a free State pension for every one of 5s a week on reaching f>."> years of age. The deputation consisted of the following : Messrs. F. H. Stead, F. Rogers, (organising secretary), Browning-hall, Wai worth ; G. Barnes (Amalgamated Society of Engineers), J. Maddison (Ironfounders), Gibbs (Amalgamated House Painters and Dec )rators), Coffey and Knecht (Book-binders'), Gillman (Vellum-binders), Isaac Mitchell, Glasgow (Federated Trades) ; G. Moores, Editor Wage- Earners' Weekly ; and Miss Bonfield (Shop Aasibtants). Mr. F. H. Stead introduced the deputation, and explained tl.at the national committee of organised labour was a body composed of distrct committees appointed at conferences which have been held by Mr. Charles Booth in seven of the chief industrial centres of Great Britain. These conferences had approved the principle that every aged person in the realm should be entitled to receive from the State a free pension on attaining a given age. In supDort of this cause they appealed especially to the leaders of religious life in this country, and they ventured to approach his Eminence, as the head of the Catholic Church in this country, asking him to hear the case of the superannuated workers. THE CARDINAL'S HEPLY. His Eminence, in reply, said he felt most strongly that adequate and proper provision must be made for the aged poor. The aged poor among the working classes of this country should not be compelled to resort to the workhouse. He felt that it waß impossible with the wages paid at th» present day, and with the human needs that were recogni-ed on all sides, to save money out of the weekly wage to form an adequate support for old age. Men should in every kind of way be encouraged to save for old age, by all means ; but he mainline 1 that, taking the population as it is, it was impossible to lay down as a universal law that every man himself must make the provision. Nor would he discriminate too closely between the deserving and the undeserving poor. He gathered, however, from the deputation that they endorsed absolutely and entirely Mr. Charles Booth's proposals. Now, he wanted a good deal of converting upon those particular proposals. His difficulty was this. Why should the State provide a pension for thofe who did not require one 1 Why should an enormous sum of money be found by the taxpayers for people who were in comfortable circumstances? He feared that would render the object which they had at heart impossible of realisation. The idea of including every man and woman, rich and poor, unc?er the scheme had been adopted, it seemed to him, in order to get rid of certain difficulties which would present themtelves. It was v. question whether it \va3 not making a much larger difficulty to overcome than those which it was sought to remove by this wholesale apportionment of pensions to rich and po r alike. lie knew it was said that a p-rson when he came to (>."> need not take the pension. But he might, and a vast numb r probablf would If they had a legal right to £13 or £14 a year they would probably exercise that right and take the money, whither tney needed it or not. Now that was entirely opposed to the principle on which the Poor Law had been founded. To put thf> case upon the ground that every man because he was 65 had a claim in justice to rec<-ive a pension from the State was to bring forward a principle wbiuh it would be very hard indeed to prove to be correct. Would it not be possible to beg'n by paying that every man or woman of (55 who would apply to the workhouse and could show that he or she was in need of assistance t-hould be pensioned at once in his or her own home, and should receive 7s or 10s a week ? If that were found to work well, as he was sure it would, would it not be easy then to go a step further ? Thus by piecemeal legislation they rniglit bring about a settlement of this immense topic nior ■ rapidly than it would come about if they asked for a universil old-agp pension scheme. He felt more strongly than he could say the obligation which they were under to unite with their working brethren and to assist them by every means in their power to make their live* happier and brighter, to gi?e them more time for themselves for the cultivation of their minds and the practice of their religion, and especially to remove from them that horrible nightmare of i-orrow and of suffering in old age coming from destitution. It should never be forgotten in this country, which lived by its manufactures, that the population was being used up before its time. Men and women were used and thrown ande. He could not understand how any person connected with trade, inanufacUrns, and oomnier. c could be deaf to the claim which the aged working men and women of the country had upon them. He thanked the deputation heartily for the information they had laid before him. and if they could clear up his difficulties and persuade In in th it Mr. Chane-s Ji iota's scheme w<ia really a workable scheme he should bo mly fr>o glad to support it Mr. F. U. Stead, while thanking his Eminence for his sympathetic statement, remarked that it would be a formidable undertaking to convert a Cardinal Cardinal Vaughan : Cardinals have a very open mind and are always ready to be converted to the truth. After a few remarks from others present the members of the deputation cordially thanked hid Eminence for his courtesy and the deep interest he had taken in the working classes.

To be grateful for benefits received is the duty of honest men— one of the sins that most offendeth God is ingratitude.