§ SIR JOHN COLOMB (Gt. Yarmouth)I beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether he can give any assurance that Her Majesty's Government recognise the paramount claims of seamen, soldiers, and marines to consideration in any legislation in connection with old-age pensions or compensation for injuries, and are fully alive to the evils of the existing system, which leaves the provision of adequate relief of helpless sufferers by war to public subscriptions, the amount of which so largely depends upon the popularity of a war.
§ MR. A. J. BALFOURI am unwilling to give any final or definitive reply to my hon. and gallant friend, but he will perhaps bear in mind that the funds which have been subscribed from time to time by the public have up to the present time been amply sufficient, and much more than sufficient, to deal with the widows and children of soldiers engaged in South Africa, and there is in addition under our existing system compensation to invalids.