The Unemployment Insurance Bill which came before the House of
Commons for second reading on Wednesday notoriously does not correspond in important respects with the recommendations of the Blanesburgh Committee. There is some excuse for this, as the financial expectations on which the recommendations were based have not been realized. When the text of the Bill was issued we hoped that the Government would give an undertaking to make their truncated scheme fully correspond with the Blanes- burgh recommendations when the Unemployment Fund had reached the necessary point of recovery. That, at least, ought to be .done. But the latest figures of the Fund show that the pace of recovery has been so satis- factory that many people feel that it would be reasonable to relieve both employers and employed of their excessive contributions even sooner. In six months the liability has been reduced by more than £2,000,000 and the October figures will show a still more rapid rate of decline. The present contributions are a heavy drag on industry. If the employers' contribution were reduced to 6d., £4,000,000 a year would be saved in working costs ; and it might well be that the impetus to trade would help the Fund as much as it is helped by the present high contributions.
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