HC Deb 12 November 1948 vol 457 cc1939-52
Mr. Manningham-Buller

I beg to move, in page 2, line 24, to leave out from "notice" to "requiring."

With the permission of the Committee, I think it would be convenient to discuss at the same time the following Amendment—in line 27, to leave out from "notice" to the end of line 30, and to insert: for medical examination and further requiring him to state in writing within such period and to such authority as may be specified in the notice of his present occupation and any reasons there may be of a compassionate nature why he should not be recalled for service. (2) If a person served with such notice fails to comply with it, or if a person is passed on medical examination fit for service and, in the opinion of the appropriate Service Authority, his occupation is not such as to render it more in the national interests that he should not be recalled for service or the grounds of a compassionate nature are not such as to warrant his release from or the deferment of his liability to recall, the appropriate Service Authority may cause to be served on him a notice stating that he is recalled for service and requiring him to present himself at such place and at such time (not earlier than the third day after the service of the notice) and to such authority as may be specified in the notice; and, subject to the provisions of this Section, he shall be deemed to be recalled for service under this Act as from the said time (hereinafter referred to as the time of recall'). The Committee may recollect that during the Second Reading Debate we were told that the War Office would adopt the system of marrying a list of vacancies for these Service pensioners with a list of the Service pensioners, and the point was made that while it was no doubt a very good thing to try to fit the round service pensioner into the round hole, at the same time the machinery under the Bill then, and as it now stands, did not provide any opportunity for the Service pensioner to make representations about his recall, such as the National Service man has under the National Service Act. The object of these Amendments is to provide some machinery of that sort.

Under this Bill there is, in the event of an emergency, no provision for the recall of these Service pensioners by Proclamation. No matter how great the emergency, as I understand the Bill there is no power to say by Proclamation that all Service pensioners must report back to their depôts. This is to be—and a great point was made of it during Second Reading—an individual recall after consideration of the available employment in the Services. What I seek to do by these Amendments is to ensure, in the first place, that the War Office do not recall for service at the time of an emergency persons who are not at that time medically fit for the employment for which they are wanted. A Service pensioner may also be drawing a disability pension, in which case the War Office may know what his medical category is at the time.

But take the case of a man who has been retired on pension for some time, and has reached the age of 59; although he may have had no physical incapacity at the time of retirement, all sorts of changes may have taken place in his physical health between the time of his retirement and attaining of the age of 59. It would surely be a waste of time to recall an individual on a three-day notice from his home and to bring him to his depôt for medical examination only to find that because of his age he was unfit for the job for which he was wanted. Therefore, the first step this Amendment seeks to secure is that before a Service pensioner is recalled a notice is sent to him requiring him to submit himself for medical examination. He might be required, if his home was in Aberdeenshire, to submit himself for medical examination at the depôt in Aberdeen. That would not be far from his home, and no one would consider that to be unreasonable.

Let us pursue what would happen after the medical examination had taken place at Aberdeen. The War Office would then get a report of his medical condition at that moment. They would be able to judge from that whether or not he was fit for the particular post for which they wanted him. If they came to the conclusion that he was fit for that post, then, under this Amendment, they would serve upon him a further notice, which would be a notice of recall. All that this Amendment does, so far as medical fitness is concerned, is to introduce a preliminary notice before the notice of recall.

Mr. Bellenger (Bassetlaw)

Would not the point be covered by the words, in lines 26 and 27, "and to such authority"?

Mr. Manningham-Buller

I do not think the right hon. Gentleman is right. If he looks at Clause 3, he will see that it specifies only one notice, and from the moment a man reports, in conformity with that notice, to the authority specified, he is deemed to be enlisted. The man would have to be discharged if he were found medically unfit. My proposal avoids this procedure of deeming an unfit ex-Service pensioner to be re-enlisted. But my Amendment does not stop there.

I have dealt only with the medical angle, but there is also this point to be considered. The War Office will not know the occupation the ex-Service pensioner has taken up. They will not know what position in industry he may have reached during the years of his retirement. They will not know whether or not he is running a one-man shop or business. They will not know his circumstances, or whether they are of a compassionate nature. Under this Bill, all they do is to serve a three-day notice upon him, and then, if he does not obey the notice, he is treated as an absentee. We had some talk during the Second Reading of a provision being made through some other Ministry to find out what was a man's occupation, and what were his compassionate circumstances. But I see the grave danger of creating too much machinery with too many Ministries involved.

It is to overcome that difficulty that I have sought in this Amendment to keep the power of decision—and we must bear in mind that this is a recall in an emergency—solely in the hands of the appropriate Service authority. If the Amendment is adopted, the first notice served upon the Service pensioner would tell him that he had to submit himself for medical examination. It would go on to say: "You must also state in writing, in such time as may be specified in the notice, your present occupation, and also if there is any reason of a compassionate nature why you should not be recalled for service." It may be that it would be more convenient for him to give that information when he goes to Aberdeen for medical examination. The point I desire to stress is that by the Amendment we should get the information from the Service pensioner before his recall. Those who were in the House during the war will remember how difficult it was to secure deferment of his call-up for any man however serious the case might appear to be upon compassionate grounds, or his recall once he was deemed to have been enlisted.

All that the Service authority would have to consider is: is his occupation such as to render it more in the national interest that he should not be recalled, and are the grounds put forward by him of a compassionate nature such as to warrant his release or the deferment of his recall? The authorities will be the judges of that matter. There will be no other authorities involved, so that the time allowed in arriving at a decision should not be long. Power is given in Subsection (2) of the Amendment to serve a notice of recall in three circumstances. If the man fails to comply with the first notice and does not submit to medical examination, it is not right that he should escape after not complying with the notice. If he does submit to medical examination, and is found fit and it is in the national interest that he should be recalled, and he will be. If compassionate grounds are put forward asking for postponement of recall, power is given to the authorities to postpone it. By the Amendment, we have precisely the same machinery as is contained in the Bill. As the Under-Secretary of State has pointed out, the last bit of the Amendment is a complete copy of the last lines of Subsection (1) of the Clause.

I hope I have made clear the object of this rather long Amendment. It appears to have considerable force behind it. Some very general observations were made by the Minister who wound up the Second Reading Debate, but on a matter of this sort, dealing with retired pensioners, there is a great deal to be said for putting into a Statute the conditions for their protection and for their benefit, rather than leaving them to assurances which, however much one may desire to carry them out may, in the course of time, get overlooked and buried by other matters.

3.30 p.m.

Mr. M. Stewart

I am grateful to the hon. Members who put down the Amendment, because it makes possible further consideration than we gave on Second Reading to the questions which have been developed by the hon. and learned Member for Daventry (Mr. Manningham-Buller). If I understand him correctly, the Amendment has two main objects. It is to provide an opportunity for the pensioner to make representations why he should not be called up, such as the National Service man can make. Its second object is to prevent the waste of time and inconvenience caused to everyone by calling up a man who, for medical, occupational or compassionate reasons, should not be called up. I submit to hon. Members who are concerned over this Amendment that we shall be able to achieve those objects, and perhaps more simply, than by the method suggested by the Amendment.

In the first place, with regard to medical reasons, as I explained when this Bill was debated on Second Reading, we shall have the list of jobs and the list of men who are to fill them. Therefore, a pensioner will be informed long before any emergency arises or may arise that if there is such an emergency as would bring the provisions of this Bill into operation, he would then be recalled for a particular purpose. When he is told that, he will also be asked to keep the Service Department informed of any material change in his medical fitness that would make recall, and recall for that occupation, unsuitable. Therefore we shall have continuous information as to his medical fitness and that, of course, without any prejudice to the fact that he would be medically examined on recall. That would cover the case where a man developed a disability in a matter of a few days and which might not be revealed until he was actually recalled.

Now as to occupation. As we undertook, we have gone into this matter further, and I can inform the Committee that the view of the Ministry of Labour is that they are not concerned with the general exemption of these men. It must be remembered that their numbers are small and, by reason of their past life and experience, they are men of whom we may reasonably say that the Service Departments have perhaps a greater claim on their service in time of emergency than anyone else. However, there are cases where some of these men are in the employ of other Government Departments, in particular, the police. What we propose there is that when we are compiling the lists of jobs and men, and before we send an intimation to any man saying, "In an emergency you will be recalled for this job," we shall have cleared with any Government Department by whom he might be employed that it would be in the national interest so to recall him. Further, if he is not employed by a Government Department but is in private employment or is self-employed and manager of his own business, when he receives the intimation that in emergency he would be recalled for a job, he will be asked whether he wishes to make any representations on grounds of employment or, if his employer wishes to make any representations, it is open to him to do so, and we could examine the matter immediately.

Similarly, if after he had first received the intimation, some time later his conditions of employment changed and he felt then that he ought to make representations to us, it would be open to him to do so. I think the House will he encouraged to take a more favourable view of the procedure I am describing if I mention that this possibility of making representations about one's employment is open to reservists, and that we have found that this machinery works satisfactory in the case of the Army reservist. Thirdly, with regard to reasons of compassion, once again it is open to the pensioner to notify the Service Departments concerned in advance of any compassionate reasons that might make it improper or unsuitable for him to be recalled.

I submit, then, that the procedure we have in mind does meet the objection which the hon. and learned Member for Daventry mentioned in moving the Amendment. There is the possibility of making representations. The example of the reservist shows that this is not merely an empty form of words: it is something that can be done. The procedure we envisage provides a safeguard against the calling up of people who, for any of the reasons mentioned, it would not be suitable to call up. I think that what we have in mind is preferable, because the Amendment will require us, when the emergency is upon us, to send out a succession of two notices instead of one and to raise these medical, occupational and compassionate questions within the immediate time of the emergency; whereas by our procedure these questions can be settled at what is surely the time when they ought to be settled, in the months—or, we may all hope, years—before the emergency arises.

I submit, therefore, that we can achieve the purposes suggested in the Amendment more simply by the procedure I have outlined. It is comparable to the procedure which applies in the case of reservists. It is for those reasons, and not because of any wish to be uncooperative, that I express the hope that the Amendment will not be accepted.

Brigadier Head (Carshalton)

I think the Under-Secretary will agree at the outset that the general intentions of the Amendment are unexceptionable. Perhaps the solution would not be an ideal one, for it is never easy, without a more intimate knowledge than is available to us here, to draft an exact solution to an administrative problem. The Under-Secretary will probably agree also that my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Daventry (Mr. Manningham-Buller), by his efforts in this Amendment, would make a first-class G.3 in the "A" Branch. The explanation of the Under-Secretary does give reasons for an alternative solution and I, for my part, do not intend to speak against the hon. Gentleman. His reasons seem to be valid ones, holding out the prospect of an evasion of any undue waste of time or journey or public money in getting people from "A" to "B" because of any muddles during the call-up stage.

The Under-Secretary mentioned briefly the question which arose earlier of people in reserved occupations in civil employment, and the rival claims of the Army and their civilian employers or other Government Departments. What he said sounded to me a possible satisfactory solution, but nevertheless I still have certain fears of conflicts over these men. Let us not forget that the main reason why the Army will want these men is that they are good, capable, long-service men who will be of value in posts of responsibility or for instruction. It is exactly these men who will be most desired in all forms of civil employment or in Government Departments. Although the Under-Secretary said that the Ministry of Labour were not in conflict about the general question of holding these men, a very high proportion of them are likely to be of the very type which the civil employer or Government Departments will want to retain.

My real fear is that when the recall is circulated an unexpectedly high proportion of these men will be wanted by their civil employers or Government Departments. Have these employers and Government Departments the absolute right to say, "We would like to keep him"? If not, who will give Solomon's judgment? My fear at the moment is that when the man is asked for, the Government Department or civil employer will want to retain him and we will be up against the difficulty of finding someone to give Solomon's judgment. Even after his second statement, I was not quite clear how the Under-Secretary proposes to deal with that problem. However, as far as I am concerned I consider we have prospects of a satisfactory solution to this problem.

Mr. Manningham-Buller

I make no apology for having put down the Amendment. It has enabled the Committee to have a valuable and interesting discussion on points which will be of great importance to the Service pensioner. I felt in the course of the Second Reading Debate, that the position of the service pensioner had not received adequate attention. Now, because of that Debate and the fact of this Amendment having been tabled, the Service Ministries have given very careful consideration to this problem and I welcome what the hon. Gentleman has told us about it. From what he said, the machinery is very satisfactory and is flexible. Looking at it as critically as one can. the only danger I feel is that there may be so many Service pensioners who want employment in time of emergency that they will be concealing from the Army what is the degree of their medical unfitness and we may have, as at the beginning of the last war, a lot of Service pensioners coming back wanting employment and wanting to play their part for their country. Someone will have the unpleasant task of telling them that they cannot be employed. I do not think that is a very big danger, and, in view of the assurance of the hon. Gentleman, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

I beg to move, in page 2, line 38, to leave out Subsection (4), and to insert: (4) Every notice served otherwise than by registered post shall require the person upon whom it is served to acknowledge receipt thereof within such time as may be specified in the requirement; and if acknowledgment is dot received the Service Authority may cause a further notice to be served on him by registered post and may by that notice direct that the former notice shall be deemed never to have had effect. (5) A person who fails to comply with a notice shall be liable to be apprehended and unless he has some reasonable excuse punished in the same manner as a person enlisted in the regular forces or the regular air force according as he was an Army pensioner or an air force pensioner. As the Clause stands, the notice as a result of which a man shall be deemed to be enlisted can be sent by ordinary post. It will be recollected that on the National Service Bill there was considerable discussion of the dangers of following such a procedure. It is the experience of all hon. Members that letters get delayed in the post. During the Debate on the National Service Bill, more than one hon. Member reminded the House of occasions upon which a perfectly innocent person, sitting quietly at home and thinking no evil, was suddenly marched off under military escort and treated as a deserter, having been deemed to be enlisted by means of a letter he never received.

With a desire to cure that, we have put down this Amendment. We have not made it essential in all cases to use registered post. The reason for that is that certain arguments were adduced from the Government benches as to the practical difficulty and inconvenience of sending a large number of registered letters at the same time. We have sought to get over the difficulty by ensuring that the letter shall be sent in such a manner as to require an acknowledgment and only in the absence of such acknowledgment shall registered post be used. This is in order to prevent the risk of a person being treated as a deserter when he has no intention of acting as a deserter. It is no reflection on the Post Office to say that many letters go astray. No doubt that risk will continue for many years and while it exists it is desirable to protect even a small number of men from the degradation of being hauled away as deserters.

3.45 p.m.

I hope that the Under-Secretary will not say that if they are so hauled away as deserters and hauled before a court martial they will be able to establish their innocence by proving that they did not receive the notice, because that is not a reply. It is no consolation to a man who has first of all been subjected to the adverse local publicity of being taken away in this way, and who has been submitted to the strain which being put on trial before a court martial or any other court involves, to be told that he is acquitted, when he has been put into that position through no fault of his own but because of the fault of the Post Office. We think that this Amendment holds the balance quite fairly between the protection of the admittedly very small number of individuals whom it will concern and the convenience of the Department. Because we believe that we have found a practical solution to a matter which has been discussed in other contexts on more than one occasion, we ask the Government to accept this Amendment.

Mr. John Hynd (Sheffield, Attercliffe)

I would like to ask the hon. Member whether he really seriously considered this proposal before moving such an Amendment? Does he not realise that if this Amendment were adopted, and it was known that a registered letter would follow the customary notification, as in the case of Income Tax, very few people would take the trouble to acknowledge the first notification, and would await the final notification, either because it would cause a little more delay or on the off-chance that it would not arrive. Does the hon. Member think that that would meet the point which he is trying to meet, and with which I think everyone sympathises?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

I think that the hon. Member takes an unduly low view of the sense of public spirit of Service pensioners. What he suggests is that this Amendment would give an advantage to such people as desire at least to postpone the fulfilment of their obligations to the latest possible legal moment. I do not share his view on this matter. The people with whom we are here concerned are about as patriotic a section of the community as can be found. In the nature of things all of them are men who have given many years of loyal service to the Crown and the country. I do not believe for one moment that there is anything at all in the hon. Member's suspicions about this section of the community, and I hope that the Under-Secretary will make it perfectly clear, when he replies, that he takes a higher view of the character of these men than his hon. Friend apparently does.

Mr. M. Stewart

The hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) drew an analogy between the pensioners whom we can recall under this Bill and the National Servicemen, at least in regard to the procedure which is proposed. It will enable the Committee to grasp the point at issue more easily if I suggest at the outset that the real analogy lies not in a comparison with the National Serviceman but with the reservist, and even more with the naval pensioner, who has been subject to this liability to recall, under Admiralty legislation, for nearly a century.

What is the nature of the recall of a reservist? Two things happen. I am now speaking of a general call-up of the Reserve. A Proclamation is necessary to make the reservists liable to recall. Then, in addition, a notice is served individually on each reservist. In the case of a partial mobilisation there is not, of course, a general Proclamation in advance, but certain reservists have an individual notice served upon them. The two cases are very similar indeed, and we have found that the procedure which is suggested in the Bill is the procedure which has worked satisfactorily in the case of reservists and in the case of the naval pensioners.

Of course, and here I most heartily agree with the hon. Gentleman the Member for Kingston-upon-Thames, we are greatly helped in all these matters of procedure and recall and throughout the entire working of a Measure of this kind by the fact that we are dealing with men whose sole intention is to co-operate with us in getting the necessary job done with as little delay and formality as possible. I ask the Committee not to insert in this Bill procedure which is really operated when we are considering not these men, but National Service men. The machinery of recall is not to be administered by the Ministry of National Service, but by the Service Departments who are familiar with the mechanism for the recall of reservists. There is, therefore, administrative convenience in the use of machinery with which Service Departments are familiar rather than machinery with which they are not.

The Committee will realise that this Bill comes into operation only in time of emergency, and it is therefore desirable that all the provisions should be as speedy in working as possible. We may place ourselves in a difficulty if we insert into a Bill which deals with the Army and Air Force pensioners a large variety of administrative safeguards which are not in the comparable Bill which deals with naval pensioners. Part of the purpose of this Bill is to align Army and Air Force pensioners with the naval pensioners, and it would therefore be undesirable if in the process of this Bill we created differences in the procedure between the Army and Air Force pensioners on the one hand and the naval pensioners on the other.

What is to happen when these pensioners are recalled? First of all, a letter will be sent. Let us suppose that that notice of recall is not complied with. What will be the regular next step? It will be the sending of a registered letter.

Mr. Manningham-Buller

Then why not accept the Amendment?

Mr. Stewart

I think there is something in this point that if the law says both an ordinary letter first and then, if that fails, a registered letter shall be sent, there is the possibility of confusion arising in the mind of the man as to what is the precise notice of recall and what is merely a warning in advance. There is also the possibility of a letter by ordinary post being sent and being received, and there being clear evidence that it was received. and that the recipient has no intention of complying with it. Such a case is extremely unlikely to occur with the kind of men of whom we are speaking, but if it could not conceivably occur there would be no need for any penal provision at all in this Bill, and hon. Members will agree that that is not the case. We might have a situation where a letter by ordinary post was received, and was known to have been received, and it was also known that the recipient had no intention of complying with it.

Mr. Manningham-Buller

If that were known in advance there is nothing in this Amendment to stop a registered letter being sent in the first place.

Mr. Stewart

I do not think the hon. and learned Gentleman has taken my point. We might send an ordinary letter, and discover that the letter had been received, and that the recipient had no intention of complying with it. Under his Amendment we should then be required to follow it up with a registered letter in view of the man's non-compliance. What we do, in fact, propose is that in every normal case if the ordinary letter is sent and not complied with, we should send a registered letter, and if after the registered letter has been received, and there is still no compliance, it would be the duty of the police to make inquiries. But they would be under instructions not to attempt to make an arrest, unless of course they found the man in circumstances—such as if he were embarking at a port—to make it clear that he was endeavouring to avoid his liability. The police will report on the circumstances which they found and only then, if it was clear from those circumstances that it was the proper thing to do, would an escort be sent to fetch in the man.

I ask the Committee not to overload this Bill with provisions which have not been found necessary in dealing with the analogous classes of the naval pensioner and the reservist. I ask hon. Members to realise the effect of the ordinary letter on the recipient. It should be remembered that he has been previously warned that he may receive a letter of this type. He will be aware that a Proclamation is in existence and that friends of his, old Service comrades, have received such a letter. If he does not receive one, almost certainly he will make inquiries. If he is away on holiday and comes back and finds a letter which may have been waiting for a month, he will go immediately to the authorities and explain the circumstances. I do not think that the Committee will suggest that in those circumstances any penal action would be taken against him. I submit that, important as are the objects which the supporters of this Amendment have in mind, those affected will be properly safeguarded by the procedure. Again, I express the hope that this Amendment will not be pressed.

Mr. Manningham-Buller

I regard the hon. Gentleman's answer as extremely unsatisfactory, though I appreciate that he done his best. Let us consider what the Bill means. Any Service pensioner will be deemed to be recalled from the time specified in a letter posted by ordinary post—it may be in Whitehall—without the letter ever being received by him. It may be that he does not get the letter until the time specified in it as the time of recall. If he does not get the letter in time to act in accordance with the instructions contained in it, he will be absent without leave. It is all very well for the hon. Gentleman to say that the police will be told to do this or that. If the man does not comply with the notice, automatically he is an absentee. If the hon. Gentleman makes inquiries he will find that there were quite a few cases in the last war of people being court-martialled as absentees whose defence was, "I never received the letter calling me up." In those cases the answer which came from the prosecution was, "It does not matter whether you received it or not; under the statute it is deemed to have been posted and you are deemed to be enlisted from the time when it was posted."

The hon. Gentleman has not been entirely frank with the Committee. The form referred to is the one used under the National Service Act, 1939. It was only because of the Debates and controversy over the National Service Act, 1947, that the form was altered in both Acts. The provisions of this Amendment so ably moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) are exactly the same as those of an Amendment put forward—Ithink my memory is correct—by the Government in view of what had been said from these benches during consideration of the National Service Bill, 1947. I attach very little weight to the argument about how difficult it will be if we send an ordinary letter and we know that the man is possibly seeking to depart.

It being Four o'clock, The CHAIRMAN left the Chair to make his report to the House.

Committee report Progress; to sit again upon Monday next.