HC Deb 15 August 1916 vol 85 cc1627-8
11. Mr. ANDERSON

asked the Financial Secretary to the War Office whether his attention has been drawn to the case of Private Arthur Flint, King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry, belonging to Sheffield, who, after witnessing his friend's head blown off by a shell in the trenches, became mentally unbalanced and was sent back to England; whether he is aware that, after being put in various hospitals, he was placed in Wakefield Asylum and discharged from the Army on 9th January, 1916, as no longer fit for war service; that he has not received his arrears of pay; that nothing is being paid in respect of him at the present time; that his parents are contributing towards his maintenance in Wakefield Asylum; that repeated applications to the War Office have met with no response; and that the Chelsea Commissioners have intimated that the man is not entitled to a pension; and whether he will cause full and immediate investigation to be made?

Mr. FORSTER

Inquiries are being made into this matter. I will write to my hon. Friend as soon as possible.

Mr. ANDERSON

What is the position of men who are mentally unbalanced by what they have gone through in the War when they are sent to the asylum—do they and their dependants continue to receive some measure of financial assistance from the War Office?

Mr. FORSTER

I have already explained that matter. Where the man has a pension the local authority, if he is sent to the county asylum, claims a certain proportion of the pension to cover the cost of maintenance, and any balance that remains goes to his dependants.

Mr. T. P. O'CONNOR

Does not the right hon. Gentleman think that it is rather hard that the wife and children of a man who loses his reason by being in the War should be penalised?

Mr. FORSTER

Yes, Sir; but the hon. Gentleman must remember that the pension is issued primarily to keep the man himself, and, that being so, if the asylum authorities insist upon a certain payment being made on account of the man's maintenance, then that naturally and necessarily becomes the first charge upon his pension, but the Government, acting for the State, recognises that there is a duty to provide for the wife and children, and that is done by means of the Statutory Committee, which gives a supplementary pension in each case.

Mr. KING

In this case where a man is discharged from the Army and is in the county asylum, is there not a considerable charge on the rates for his maintenance?

Mr. FORSTER

Where the man is pensioned that is paid out of his pension.

Colonel YATE

Does the man always get a pension on being discharged from the Army? I had a case the other day of a man whose people were called upon to pay half-a-crown a week towards his maintenance in a lunatic asylum.

Mr. FORSTER

If I caught the hon. and gallant Gentleman correctly, that applies to another case altogether.