HC Deb 05 August 1913 vol 56 cc1432-3

(1) So much of Sub-section (5) of Section 8 as requires the payment of fifty contributions between two periods of disease or disablement in order to prevent the one being treated as a continuation of the other shall cease to have effect.

(2) At the end of the same Sub-section the following provision shall be added—

"Where by virtue of Sub-section (1) of Section 11 of this Act a part only of sickness benefit has been paid to an insured person, he shall for the purposes of this Sub-section be treated as having been in receipt of sickness benefit for a period bearing the same proportion to the whole period in respect of which such part benefit was paid to him as that part bears to the whole benefit, and the period so resulting shall be deemed to have been continuous and to have expired on the last day of the incapacity in respect of which the partial benefit was paid."

Dr. CHAPPLE

I beg to move to add at the end of the Clause, as a new Sub-section— (3) For the purposes of the provisions of the principal Act and this Act, relating to sickness benefit and disablement benefit, a person shall be deemed to be incapable of work if either—

  1. (a) he is unable to work; or
  2. (b) he is, although able to work, yet so unfit for work that he ought not to work in the interests of his health, whether bodily or mental;
and any reference in these provisions to incapacity for work shall be construed in a corresponding manner. Under the principal Act disablement has to be absolutely complete. There are many instances of partial disablement. For instance, a man may be able to lead a healthy life in the absence of work. There are many people who suffer from chronic diseases apart from having a dislike for work, and who are susceptible to hemorrhage and epilepsy which makes them partially unfit for work, and they would not come under the provisions of the principal Act. There ought to be some provisions for disablement due to chronic disease or susceptibility to disease induced by an ordinary occupation. My Amendment would make the Clause clear and enable certificates to be given to those whose health would be injured if they followed their ordinary employment.

Amendment not seconded.