ENEMY ACTION CLAIMS. (Hansard, 12 March 1924)

§ Mr. HARMSWORTH

I wish to raise the question in order to obtain a reply from the Treasury as to their attitude to the last Report on the compensation of the victims of air raids and bombardments. It will be generally agreed that the question has been going on long enough. It is five years since the end of the War, and it is time the whole question was wound up and it was definitely settled what the people are to get. Already some of those who were to receive compensation are either dead or have removed to other localities. Some to whom the money would have been extremely useful, if it had been paid, have given up all hope of receiving it. A large number of the claims went through considerable pruning, and those eventually assessed and audited amounted to just over £7,000,000. In this last Report we understand that those who have gone through the pruning, whose claims have been audited, are to receive only a percentage of the money owing to them. Surely it depends on what is the attitude taken up on this question? Is it a question of charity or duty to the victims of the air raids from bombardment? I think that it is a question of duty, and not charity at all, and it is time that the House recognised that this money is due to these people; it is a moral obligation that must be fulfilled and the money paid. We need not discuss the question whether it is necessary to appoint a Royal Commission.

2505 These claims might have been paid without appointing a Royal Commission, because that is merely a method of shelving the discharge of these obligations. We have had two Reports from Royal Commissions, and it is this last Report on which I require a reply. My constituency was very much affected by these bombardments. The part of East Kent which I represent was subjected to many bombardments and air raids because enemy aeroplanes passed over East Kent both coming to this country and going back again, and very often they let fall the bombs which were not expended upon the Metropolis. Consequently, there was a tremendous amount of damage, directly and indirectly, in the Isle of Thanet, and no doubt the same thing applies to other parts of the country. That part of the country was just as much in the front line as those in France, and those subject to these terrible bombardments should have their case considered from that point of view and with all sympathy. We should have a feeling that we have a duty to perform towards these people.

There are several points in this Report which I should like to raise. I suggest that it is very unsound to penalise the non-insured. There was during the War a fund that was called the Government Anti-Aircraft Insurance Scheme. The amount paid into the Exchequer in 1918 from my district in this way was about £10,000,000. I do not think anyone has yet discovered what became of that money which was paid in mostly from East Kent. At any rate, the Government having made a fairly large profit out of its insurance scheme, the people in that part of the world think that in return their claims should be very sympathetically considered. As to those who did not insure, do the Government take the point of view that it was entirely their own fault, because the Report rather censured those who failed to insure; or do they take the view that those who did not are in a similar position to that of many people in regard to Income Tax?

A number of people through not understanding the incidence do not apply for the money which they really could get back if they put in the right forms, and I suggest that many people, not through negligence, may have failed to apply for insurance and we should not censure them 2506 for that, but consider their case just as sympathetically. I asked a question in the House quite recently as to the amount that was being paid in my part of the country, and the answer of the Board of Trade was that the names are classified in geographical areas, and that the time and trouble involved in ascertaining the information would not be justified by the results. The answer also drew attention to a statement in the Report that in the case of the Government Air Raid Insurance experience showed that certain zones were within striking distance of enemy aircraft, and zones were carefully fixed in view of the dates and localities of the raids.

As the last Report deals with zones and geographical areas, the Minister could easily get me the information as to how much those claims amounted to and how much it is intended to pay. Another matter on which there is considerable feeling is that of belated claims. The Report says of them: A very large number of fresh claims have been received, and continue to be received, which it is impossible to excuse or admit. It adds: A great many came from seamen or their dependants and very few from sufferers from air raids. It also states that the lateness was due not to ignorance or lack of opportunity of knowing of the compensation scheme, but to scepticism about the utility of a claim and indifference and unwillingness to take trouble.

Is not that rather sweeping? I do not wish to criticise the Royal Commission, but I think it should have considered this matter with more sympathy and from a quite different angle. Many people were unaware until very late that they could make claims. I am sure hon. Members have had a vast correspondence on the matter. I know it is difficult enough for anyone who has had experience of it, but some of these people are absolutely at a loss with these forms, and it is for the Ministry to realise that the sending of these belated claims is not because people do not want the money or have neglected to ask their Member to do something for them, but because they do not understand how to do it. Probably months afterwards their Member has written and 2507 told them how to apply and they have then sent in their claims late. Although the Commission is an official body, perhaps not with a great deal of sympathy, it is for the Government to show that sympathy and not to sit behind the fence of the Commission and say, "This is the Report and we must abide by it." I think the Government is morally bound to satisfy these claims in full.

I admit that there is, roughly, £2,200,000 owing, but is it suggested that we should wait for the other £2,000,000—because I understand it is only a payment on account—until the reparations come from Germany before the remainder is spent? Of course, the reparations may be forthcoming from Germany; it is for this House to see that they are. By the time, however, that Germany pays some of these people may be dead. For it is five, six or seven years since some of these claims were originally sent in. If these people do not receive their money it will be perfectly useless to keep on raising the question in this House as time goes on, and I think we here and now ought to settle the whole matter, and, if the Minister cannot give us a decision, he should promise that we have time for discussion later on, when he gives us his policy on the whole matter. I think that when the Commission was first appointed it should not have been tied down to the sum of £5,000,000. It should have been able to fix, possibly, the sum of money that it thought would be sufficient to meet these claims. It is so tied down to a definite sum of money, and it is not the fault of the Royal Commission that it is only suggested that these claims should be paid in part. They had no other course. They had only a certain sum of money given them, and had they been told that extra money would have been provided they would have said that the claims should have been paid in full. It is up to the Government to say whether the money can be provided, and if the House looks on it from the point of view of an obligation to those who suffered in the War and a duty which we owe to them quickly and not in five or six years hence, these people will be paid in full.