Left. No. 76, What they say about the Beveridge Report
1943-01 1943 1940s 8 pages ing that incentive to effort is not destroyed by an excess of security. Several practical measures are included to this end. Nevertheless, there are half-apologetic passages in the report which suggest that Sir William Beveridge himself is conscious of the danger, yet cann...
| Institution: | MCR - The Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick |
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| Language: | English English |
| Published: |
[London : Controversy Pub. Co.]
January 1943
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/10796/C5A3F654-15FC-469E-9876-51537D61E83B http://hdl.handle.net/10796/8EE471BF-D15B-4D34-ADB0-606A7971678E |
| Summary: | 1943-01
1943
1940s
8 pages
ing that incentive to effort is not destroyed by an excess of security. Several practical measures are included to this end. Nevertheless, there are half-apologetic passages in the report which suggest that Sir William Beveridge himself is conscious of the danger, yet cannot see the way out. He claims that his plan is "one to secure income for subsistence on condition of service and contribution and in order to make and keep men fit for service." That may be so; but the society he would build is very much a "safety-first" society. If the Beveridge plan had been in existence 100 or 150 years ago it is certain that the British race would not have spread itself so adventurously and beneficently over the far corners of the globe. What we see emerging from the pages of the report is the pattern of a society constructed, as Hazlitt said, "into a machine that carries us safely and insipidly from one end of life to the other in a very comfortable prose style." Let us pursue security by all means, but let us also beware of its excesses. Judgment on a scheme of this magnitude cannot be formed hurriedly. It will need to undergo mature consideration both in Parliament and in the country before anyone can attempt to pronounce how far and in what respects it should be hailed as a blueprint for the national future. The Industrial Life Offices' Association, the Prudential Assurance Company Limited, and the National Conference of Industrial Assurance Approved Societies, in a statement issued shortly before the Report was published: Since practically the whole of the working-classes have effected insurances to meet the cost of funeral expenses and the varying financial burdens which death imposes upon the surviving members of the family ... a State death benefit on the lines of the T.U.C. proposal would ... be redundant. Moreover the proposals advocate that the cost should be met by the State 50 per cent., the employers 25 per cent., and the insured persons 25 per cent. The working-class population have shown their willingness to maintain this form of insurance voluntarily without any charge on the State or industry, and it is difficult to see what justification there would be for damaging well-conducted private enterprise in order to impose these fresh burdens on the taxpayers and employers. Dealing with the approved societies, the statement said the only material criticism made against the approved society system was the variation of benefits given by industrial societies. This could be met by adjustment within the fabric of the present scheme. A bureaucratic scheme, based on local offices, would be an ineffective substitute for a home service scheme where ill-health and sickness were involved. Another criticism was that the proposal would react unfavourably on the livelihood "of some 88,000 men" employed in the business, of whom nearly half are now in the forces. "They will come back to find that State interference has made their livelihood less remunerative and their future less promising." 8
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| Physical Description: | TEXT |