Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Pensions and National Insurance – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 22 June 1964.
The Minister knows that he is under an obligation under the Act, which provides for a quinquennial review, to look at problems of this kind and to make an investigation. Has he any reason to doubt the estimate which has been given by many people who have made competent researches into this matter, and repeated by a well- informed correspondent in The Times newspaper last week, that the number of people who are living below the standard set by the Assistance Board, and that means dire poverty, is 750,000 and possibly even one million? Has he any reason to doubt that? If that is anywhere near the truth, does it not indicate that there is a need for a radical revision of our existing arrangements?