§ Order of the Day for the Second Beading read.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLLMy Lords, under this Bill Scottish teachers will be required to contribute 5 per cent. of their salaries towards the cost of their pensions. The Bill, in short, does for Scotland precisely what the corresponding English Bill does for England. Your Lordships have already passed the English measure, and I will therefore refer only very briefly to two respects in which this Bill differs from the English Bill.
In the first place, the Scottish Bill is partly an enabling Bill. While the Bill specifies the amount of contribution to be levied, the circumstances in which contributions will be returned will be left to be detailed in the scheme to be framed under Clause 2. In this we are simply proposing to follow the procedure adopted with success in connection with the Education (Scotland) Act, 1908, and, later, in the Scottish Superannuation Act, 1919. Clause 4 has no corresponding provision in the English Bill. It is, however, a purely formal financial provision for the payment of certain annuities purchased 1021 under the Elementary School Teachers (Superannuation) Act, 1898.
There is only one further point of which I need remind your Lordships. The Burnham scales do not apply to Scotland, and consequently any questions which have been raised regarding those scales have no bearing on the present Bill. In Scotland a minimum scale of salaries was fixed under the Education (Scotland) Act, 1918, but there was no understanding as to the duration of those scales, which axe open to revision at any time. I beg to move.
§ Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Duke of Atholl.)
§ On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the whole House.
§ Then (Standing Order No. XXXIX having been suspended) it was moved, That the House do forthwith resolve itself into Committee.—(The Duke of Atholl.)
§ On Question, Motion agreed to.
§ House in Committee accordingly: Bill reported without Amendment.
§ Bill read 3a, and passed.