Sessional_Paper_1948 — Page 48

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to go to meet essential expenditure. There is a natural anxiety among senior men who find it impossible to supplement by savings pensions which will become subject to United Kingdom income tax.

METHOD CHOSEN

183. Using the patterns of expenditure revealed by the Statistical Officer's surveys and extracted from the budgets, we ourselves invited an officer of the Finance Department to prepare a series of type budgets in consultation with members of the Almoners' Department, the head of the Relief Section of the Medical Department, and the case workers of the Social Welfare Council. For food expenditure the basis taken was of quantities which were priced according to figures supplied by the Price Controller: other expenditure was assessed according to the expenditure pattern revealed by the Statistical Officer's surveys and by our own analyses. The information derived in this way was obviously less reliable and revealing than what would have been derived from well compiled cost of living indices, but it was the best available. Having already made suggestions for the revision of salaries to meet what we regard as a conservative estimate of money values in the next few years, we got from these type budgets an indication of what men need to meet their essential expenditure estimated on a basis of rigid economy. We recognise the weakness of our method and offer the results only as something that may serve until properly digested statistics give an incontrovertible basis for periodical revisions of this allowance.

ALLOWANCES TO BE PAID ON BASIC SALARY, NOT ON TOTAL EMOLUMENTS

184. We have considered whether high cost of living allowances should be paid on total emoluments including expatriation pay or on basic salaries only. In order to maintain equality of treatment of local and expatriate officers we recommend that as in the case of deductions for Government quarters basic pay alone should be taken into account.

DIFFERENTIATION ACCORDING TO FAMILY STATUS

185. For officers drawing revised basic salaries in excess of $149 per month we recommend that high cost of living allowance should be paid according to the following rules:-

(i) Married men, widowers or widows with one or more dependent children should receive 100% of the standard cost of living allowance for their salary group.

(ii) Married men with no children should receive 80% of the standard

allowance.

(iii) Widowers and widows without children and unmarried officers

should receive 60% of the standard allowance.

(iv) While the Commission does not, in general, favour the employment by Government of married women, especially those whose husbands are in Government service, in cases where it is necessary to employ such married women on account of their special qualifications or suitability or lack of qualified single women an allowance at the rates laid down in (iii) should be paid to the wife even though the husband is also drawing an allowance at the rates set out in (i) or (ii).

(v) A dependent child for the purpose of high cost of living allowance-

should be interpreted as meaning a son under the age of 18 or an unmarried daughter under the age of 21.

SCALES OF HIGH COST OF LIVING ALLOWANCE

186. It is stated above that we have concluded that the standard of living of the lowest paid grades of Government servants actually is higher now than before the war. The coolie who before the war was paid $13 a month now is paid, in Government service, a total of $101.50. He is still badly housed, but no increase of pay would immediately help him in that respect, for accommodation does not yet exist. His additional pay goes very largely into a more varied and ampler dietary. Though we have shown reason for increasing the basic pay of workers in this class we are satisfied that there is no ground at present for increasing their total emoluments. These men have been paid in addition to basic pay, a high cost of living allowance first granted in 1941, a small rent allowance and a new high cost of living allowance which has gone under the name of a "Rehabilitation Allowance". As this allowance is paid at the rates laid down by the Labour Office, by the shipyards