Page:The Working and Management of an English Railway.djvu/43

Rh taught to regard their employers as their best friends and advisers, as should be the case in every department of labour where proper relations exist between master and man.

Several funds or societies have been established in connection with the Company's service, in order to enable every member of the staff to make prudent provision against the results of accident, sickness, death, or old age, and a brief description of the working of these societies, which, judging from the success which has attended their operations, may to some extent be regarded as models of their kind, may not be without interest.

The first, and in some respects the most important, is the "Superannuation Fund Association," which was also the first established, having been in existence since 1853, and is for the benefit only of the salaried officers and clerks of the Company, its object being to provide each contributing member with a superannuation allowance on his retirement from the service at the age of sixty years, or at any earlier period should his health permanently fail, provided he has been at the time of his retirement a paying member for ten years.

There is also a payment to the member's representatives in the event of his death before superannuation. Membership is compulsory upon every servant of the Company receiving a monthly salary, and is in fact made a condition of entering the service, with the proviso, that no person is permitted to become a member after the age of 26 years.

The members' contributions amount to 2½ per cent, per annum upon their salaries, deducted monthly from their pay, but the Company contribute, in respect of each member, an amount exactly equal to his own