Of the presidential addresses at the sectional meetings we can
only briefly mention that of Sir H. Llewellyn Smith, the Permanent Secretary of the Board of Trade, on insurance against unemployment. Excluding from insurance the unemployment due to personal misconduct and exceptional personal deficiencies of all kinds, he sketched out a national scheme of insurance which should be at once compulsory and contributory, the contributions of the trades affected being supplemented by a State subvention and guarantee, while the benefits should be proportional to contributions, and should not exceed a maximum appreciably lower than ordinary wages. The scheme should further be based at first on a large group of trades specially suited to the experiment ; it must aim at encouraging the regular employer and workman and dis- criminating against casual engagements ; and it ought to co-operate with and not discourage existing voluntary associa- tions which provide unemployment benefits for their members. Such a scheme, in Sir H. Llewellyn Smith's opinion, was actuarially possible, though he admitted that it presented grave, though not insuperable, administrative difficulties.
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