In the House of.Commons on Thursday, November 10th, the Unemployment
Insurance Bill was read a second time: We fear that unless the Government modify it before the Committee stage is reached the country will be committed to a quite unnecessary wrangle. The Blanesburgh Committee, on whose recommendations the Bill Is based, issued a unanimous Report. That was a gift of the gods which does not come often to harassed politicians. It might have been supposed that the Government would thankfully accept it and contentedly remove the subject of Unemployment Insurance from the field of controversy. But not so. The Government -have departed in more than one respect from the Report. It is quite true that they had an excellent excuse for being cautious about the finance of the Bill, as the optimistic assumptions of the Committee have not so far been fulfilled, but surely it would have been easy to promise in an addendum to the Bill that when the actuarial assumptions were fulfilled the financial recommendations of the Committee would be bodily adopted.
Previous page
