Page:The Working and Management of an English Railway.djvu/49

 The Society is managed in the same way, and by the same committee, as the Insurance Society. It has upwards of 23,500 members, with an income from all sources of £21,000, and an accumulated balance of nearly £40,000, the amount paid to members in the shape of benefits, under the various heads, during the year 1888, being upwards of £18,000.

The "London and North-Western Pension Fund," also for the benefit of the wages staff, was established as recently as 1883, and has therefore been in operation less than six years. Its object is to provide a retiring pension for members after they attain the age of 65, or for such members as, having reached the age of 60 years, are no longer able, by reason of failing health, or impaired energies, to continue at work. There are two classes of members, and a man on entering the service may elect to join either one class or the other. First-class members pay 2d. per week, to secure a pension on retirement of 10s. per week, while second-class members pay 1d. per week, and are entitled to a pension of 7s. per week. The Company contribute nearly £5,000 per annum to the fund, which is administered by the same committee as the Insurance and Provident Funds.

With a view to consolidate the two Funds, and thus enable them to be worked for the greater advantage of the members, arrangements have been made, as from the 1st January, 1889, to amalgamate the Provident Society with the Pension Fund. New members entering the combined society, who were not previously members of the former Provident Society or Pension Fund, upon attaining the pension age will not, on leaving the service, be entitled to receive a retiring gratuity, but will