HKK 233/1
CONFIDENTIAL
17 March 1978
#KK 23411.
K.
Sir Murray MacLehose
⚫ - MAR 1978
GBE KCMG KCVO
Government House
HONG KONG
INDE
17.5.2011
19
THE GREEN PAPER ON SOCIAL SECURITY
1.
8. ૪
The
Thank you for your letter of 14 February to Donald. Government Actuary's Department have sent us a copy of their Report on the proposed voluntary Sickness, Injury and Death Benefit Scheme. Ï know that much remains to be done, and that the Report only provides preliminary comments, however I think that a few of its points are worthy of mention.
2. Firstly, I see that it recommends against allowing both employers and employees to contract in or out of the Scheme. It also states that as the Scheme is "a modest one", employers could arrange for additional benefits for their workers. This sounds sensible.
3.
I was also interested to see that actuarial advice is against increasing the benefits, but confirms that there is scope to extend the period during which benefits would be paid. This would seem fair, particularly since the Actuaries have been obliged to make several conservative assumptions where information has been lacking. Since they recommend that employees' contributions would effectively form a provident fund, it is logical that the employers' contributions alone would have to finance the benefits payments. Finally,,I think that the proposal to set up some sort of machinery to investigate dubious claims is important.
4. I know that you will want to study carefully the Government Actuary's Department's Report, but I would be grateful for your comments as soon as possible. Hugh Cortazzi has called a meeting with the Actuary for the 22nd to discuss their reaction to the Green Paper and it may well be that we shall address you further on this.
CONFI DENTI AL
JA B Stewart
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