LegislativeiAssembly

social assistance, tuberculosis assistance, mother's allowances, old age assistance or disabled persons allowances. Henceforth all these pension plans will be transferred and put under the General Welfare Assistance Act, which is based on need in the family whereby the needy people in our Province can receive much greater financial assistance. This assistance will be. shared fifty per cent by the Province and fifty per cent by the Federal Government.

Now this, Mr. Speaker, is where I would like to direct a few figures to my honourable friend and colleague from the Second District of Prince, who during his Draft Address thought that there were people who were not quite as well off under the Canada Assistance Plan, and I would like to show him or tell him first that those people who receive Disabled Person’s Allowances, the maximum they could re- ceive under that Act was $75.00. By transferring them to the General Welfare As- sistance Act we can give all those we transferred more than $75.00; $100.00, $125.00 or more if the need is there.

L. George Dewar: Will you permit a question? Hon. M. Lorne Bonnell: Yes, Sir.

L. George Dewar: Under the previous legislation there was nothing barring the gov- ernment here from providing over $75.00 or any amount which, under social assis- tance, be shared with Ottawa.

Hon. M. Lorne Bonnell: Under the previous legislation, the Disabled Person’s Al- lowance Act, the maximum was set by the Federal Government at $75.00 per person and if you paid more than that, you could pay $1,000.00, you paid that out of Pro- vincial funds. $75.00 maximum set out in the Act for Disabled Person’s Allowances, the same with the Old Age Assistance Act and the other acts. By transferring them to General Welfare Assistance we are no longer handicapped by that amount of $75.00. We can now give them $100.00, or $105.00, $175.00; $150.00 if the need is there.

L. George Dewar: You could not give a person social assistance over and above the amounts set out there and have it shared with Ottawa.

Hon. M. Lorne Bonnell: The Social Assistance Act, what I was talking about was the Disabled Person’s Act. Now you are talking about the Social Assistance Act. The Social Assistance Act previously was an Unemployment Insurance Social Assis- tancc Act, and it was only those on unemployment that could receive assistance. So you put the Social Assistance in the mans name to show he was unemployed.

L. George Dewar: Yes, but if he was disabled he would qualify for disabled pension, he would have to be unemployed.

Hon. M. Lorne Bonnell: He could qualify for Disabled Pension in the past, but he didn’t qualify under the General Social Assistance Act, he qualified under the Dis- abled Persons Allowance Act.

L. George Dewar: Yes, but there was nothing to prevent you from giving him Gen- eral Social Assistance on top of that.

Hon. M. Lorne Bonnell: Social assistance on top of that?

L. George Dewar: Yes there was nothing preventing that.

Hon. M. Lorne Bonnell: Well as far as I understand, if he qualified under one, he could qualify under the Disabled Person’s Allowance Act for $75.00. If that was the case he was already receiving a pension and would not qualify under the Unemploy- ment Assistance Act as well. You could not receive two pensions from the one

government.

L. George Dewar: I understood that a person could get Social Assistance on top of his pension if the need was there under the old system.

Hon. M. Lorne Bonnell: Previously it was Unemployment Assistance, now it is need. And may I state further that the Mother’s Allowance Group previously got $75.00 per month for a mother and the first child, with $5.00 for each additional child. So a mother with two children got $80.00. Under our present legislation a mother with

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