}
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At least two of us did so elect.
We enclose a copy of the
letter sent to one of these two officers and a copy of his
reply, showing how he relied on the sterling statement of his
pension.
9. We were thus, during the whole of our careers, led to
believe that "dollar" widows' pensions would be paid at 3/-.
Now, when it is too late, we are told for the first time in
36 years that they are to be paid at whatever may happen to
be the current rate of the day. If we had had any reason at
any time for suspecting any such variation of the promised rate,
we should probably, and indeed almost certainly, have asked for
permission to contribute on a different principle, so as to
entitle us clearly to a 3/- rate for the payment of the pensions,
and this request could hardly have been refused. We make this
point without prejudice to our contention below that we did in
fact for part of the time contribute on a basis which positively
entitles us to the 3/- rate.
10. It is not our purpose here to emphasise the hardships
involved for the prospective widows affected, though in three
given cases, assuming a current rate of 1/3, the reduction caused
by the change would be £140, £150, and £250 per annum respectively.
To put the matter in another way, the total amount to be received
by the widow would in the first case be reduced by 23%, in the
second case by 33%, and in the third case by 37%. In two other
cases, the pensions being wholly dollar pensions, would be re-
duced by 58% from £127 to £53, and from £131 to £55. Further,
the pensions so reduced are to become subject to the variations
in the value of the dollar, and the unsuitability of a fluctua-
ting pension is obvious. The dollar officer himself in a ster-
ling country, on leave or pension, was never left to the mercy of
dollars at the current rate of exchange, a condition in which it
is now proposed to place his prospective widow.
11. Another objection to the proposed rule is that it would
differentiate between two classes of widows, according as their
pensions first became payable before the 1st June 1938, or first
become payable on or after that date, though the obligation of