The Injured Workman
The Government's proposals for the treatment of industrial injuries will command as wide approval as the Social Insurance Scheme as a whole (of which the new proposals are an integral part) has already done. The existing practice, with the mass of litigation or the unsatisfactory lump-sum payments arising out of it, is swept away, and the injured man gets fixed benefits under the general Social Insurance Scheme—though this section of it will be separately administered. The Tate for temporary incapacity is 35s. a week for an adult man, with 8s. 9d. for a wife and 5s. for a first child, as against 24s, for a single man and 4os. for a married man under ordinary sickness benefit. These are flat rates, payable irrespective of what a man's earnings may have been, but they are on a scale higher than all but a fraction of workers would get under the present system. In cases of total or prolonged disability there will be medical assessment, as in the case of war injuries, of the degree of disablement, and pensions granted from 4os. a week (with los. for a wife and 7s. 6d. for the first child) downwards. Employers will no longer have to insure against workmen's compensation risks, and a mass of vexatious controversy over payments will be obviated. These are notable proposals and deserve unqualified welcome.
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