HC Deb 23 April 1934 vol 288 cc1498-503

The enactments providing that the weekly rates of benefit shall be increased in respect of certain dependants Shall be amended as follows:— Where a widower entitled to benefit (not being a person entitled to an increase of the weekly rate otherwise than in respect of dependent children) has residing with him a person in the capacity of housekeeper, the weekly rate shall be increased by eight shillings.—[Mr. Hicks.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

9.39 p.m.

Mr. HICKS

I beg to move, "That the Clause be read a Second time."

The purpose is to insure payment of dependant's benefit, as in the case of a daughter acting as housekeeper after the death of the mother. The present Act defines housekeeper as: A female person who is residing with the claimant for the purpose of taking care of his or her dependent children and is fully or mainly sustained by the claimant. It has been held to include the claimant's mother, grandmother or daughter. The new Clause provides for repayment of dependents benefit in the case of a daughter acting as housekeeper to her father in the case of the mother dying, and those who understand working class life will realise the importance of the proposal. It is a case of keeping the home together when the wife has departed. The home may consist of the husband and wife and daughter, and the daughter may be in employment earning her own living. The wife dies. In such tragic circumstances the father is left in a difficulty. He may ask his daughter to come and be his housekeeper or he may break up his home, built up with care and energy and sacrifice, and go into lodgings. In that case his daughter would have to go into lodgings and become acquainted with all sorts of strangers who previously had not come into her life.

I suggest that the claim we are making, that the daughter in such a case should be entitled to dependant's allowance is unanswerable. She will have to give up her job, because I suggest that housekeeping is a full-time job. She cannot go out to work and look after the home. To maintain a home clean and neat, and respectable and comfortable, to do the cooking, is an art, it is not a job which anyone can do, and it is a particularly important job. I appeal to the Minister to recognise the value of the Clause in keeping the home and family intact. I know of no greater act of statesmanship than to keep the family together. It is the unit in our social life upon which the whole superstructure is built, and I suggest that we are justified in making the claim that in the case I have suggested the dependant's benefit should be allowed. It is only proper and just. Indeed, it seems to me that to labour an argument of this character before the Committee is somewhat of an insult. The justice, propriety and honesty of the proposal should commend itself without much discussion and, therefore, I hope the Government will accept it.

9.42 p.m.

Mr. HUDSON

You, Mr. Chairman, have selected the second out of three new Clauses, each of which suggest an increase of benefit in respect of a further adult dependant. Hon. Members who have read the report of the Royal Commission will remember that they gave a long list not merely of existing dependants in respect of whom dependants benefit is payable, but also a list of 14 additional classes of dependants in respect of whom it may be argued on grounds of hardship that they also ought to be included. The Royal Commission pointed out, and I think rightly, that hardship was not the test, that contributions were paid on a flat rate in respect of a man's immediate family, a man and his wife and children, and it is only as a result of a gradual weakening of that principle that the idea of dependant's benefit crept in. The Royal Commission went through the matter very carefully and gave a list of dependants in respect of whom they recommended that benefit should be paid, and that particular list included, I think, the very dependant in respect of whom the hon. Member is moving a new Clause. But the Royal Commission at the same time recommended a drastic cutting down of existing dependant's benefit and the cutting out of the claimant's father and his step-father, of the claimant's younger brothers and sisters, half-brothers and half-sisters and step-brothers and stepsisters, all of wham are at present included. On balance my right hon. Friend came to the conclusion that the simplest, and, on the whole, the best course to pursue was to leave the list as it stands at present, not to make the two additions recommended by the Royal Commission and not to make the excision which the Royal Commission recommended on page 255 of its report. As the Royal Commission went into the matter very fully—hon. Members will see the arguments set out in detail on pages 251 and 258—I will not weary the Committee by going into the matter further, but will merely repeat that we have decided to leave the list as it is.

9.47 p.m.

Mr. KIRKWOOD

I wish to support the new Clause. I do not think that the Parliamentary Secretary has replied at all to the arguments in favour of the Clause. He merely told us about the Royal Commission. I ask the Committee to realise what the new Clause means. We are appealing for an unemployed man with a family who has lost his wife. That represents a tragedy. It is a terrible thing for any man to lose his wife. It is awful for an unemployed man with children to lose the mother of those children. We are living in the midst of this sort of thing, and we are trying to bring it before the Committee as we see it. Probably the widower has a daughter who is working. She may be the eldest of the family, and she may be earning £l or £2 a week, which is a great monetary help to the family in time of need. On the loss of the mother the father is forced to bring the daughter home. He has not only lost his wife but has lost an income of 8s. a week, and that loss is aggravated by the daughter's loss of her income.

Surely as reasonable men we ought to try to ameliorate such terrible conditions. I appeal to the Minister, because we are not making much headway with his understudy. I hope the Minister will not harden his heart like Pharaoh of old. This is a very serious matter for the unemployed man. Owing to circumstances over which a man has no control the daughter gives up her occupation and looks after the home, and looks after her brothers and sisters and father, and we ask that she should have the same payment as was made to her mother.

Mr. HUDSON

The hon. Member is labouring under a slight misapprehension as to the existing law, because in the case that he is outlining the widower is entitled to draw an adult dependant's allowance for the daughter who comes home in those circumstances to look after the children. [Laughter.]

Mr. KIRKWOOD

That is perfectly true, but he who laughs last laughs longest, and hon. Members opposite have laughed too soon. Only where there are children in the home does the law apply; it is not applicable where there are no children.

Mr. HUDSON

The hon. Member was arguing the case where there were brothers and sisters.

Mr. KIRKWOOD

It is essential that the home should be kept up instead of the man having to go into lodgings. We have known of many such cases. I have in mind the case of a man who simply gave up his home and went to the model lodginghouse. Hellish conditions—that is what they are. They are the conditions that you impose on the working-class in your own country, not on Germans or Jews but on your own fellow-countrymen. When this tragedy happens and a man gives up his home and goes to a model lodging-house, invariably he cannot be got out of the place. He loses all self-respect. It is to safeguard against that, to safeguard our race that we make this appeal. But the appeal is evidently falling on deaf ears. Hon. Members opposite are too much tied up with themselves, quite content, because they are well fed and well clad and well slept and well housed. The folk of whom we are speaking in our appeal are in the opposite condition.

There are two sets of individuals in this matter. There are the individuals who have everything, to whom I am appealing. That is the difficulty. They are people who know nothing about the awful struggle that the workers have in order to eke out a miserable existence. Time and again we have appealed to this House to ease those conditions. We are told by the highest authorities in the Government that things are getting a wee bit better, that we have got round the corner, that trade is improving, that we have a great year in front of us. The atmosphere is that which the Cabinet have been responsible for creating. The Secretary of State for the Dominions, the one and only one, told us distinctly on the wireless on Saturday night that all was becoming well and that we were the greatest country in the world. Who will deny it when he has said it? I come here to-night, the victim of that atmosphere which has been created by the Government. Surely the Minister of Labour is not going to turn down the Dominions Secretary and the whole Cabinet by saying that he cannot give any concessions, that what they have been saying is not true but that we must allow things to drift on as they are drifting at present and allow this section of the community to go further down in the scale.

9.56 p.m.

Mr. J. REID

Schedule 2 contains a number of items in respect of which the Statutory Committee will be entitled to make up their minds at their leisure, as to whether alterations should be made or not in the framework of the present legislation. The Schedule, in particular, contains a provision that the definition of "dependent child" may be altered or varied by the Statutory Committee at a later stage without further legislation. It is obvious that a dependent child is not the only type of dependant in respect of whom some extension may be required as time goes on, and I therefore ask whether it would not be possible to include all dependants as well as dependent children in that provision. This is a matter about which, as we have been told, the Royal Commission found great difficulty. It is a question which requires more detailed consideration than we can give it. I suggest therefore that an alteration might be made which would enable the Statutory Committee to make a comprehensive decision covering the whole of this complicated subject matter.

Mr. HUDSON

Of course, the Statutory Committee has the power to recommend, if they see fit, an alteration in the specific rate of benefit in respect of dependants and, speaking subject to correction, I think also in the definition.

Mr. REID

Yes, but has the Statutory Committee the power to vary the definition of a dependant other than a dependent child. Obviously, it is no good altering the rate of benefit. What we want to do is to entitle such people as housekeepers to come into the scheme as dependants. What is required is power, not to alter the rate payable to people already in the scheme, but power to extend the definition of those covered by the scheme. That power is partly in the Bill, because it already enables the Statutory Committee to extend or contract the definition of "dependent child." Why should a similar power not be given with regard to all other dependants?

9.59 p.m.

Mr. HUDSON

My impression is that the Committee can do so, but we shall be discussing the Schedules to-morrow, and between now and then I shall get the best advice I can, as to whether my impression is correct or not. I am nearly sure that it is within the power of the Statutory Committee to consider this matter and to recommend an addition to the category of adult dependants if they see fit to do so. I do not wish to be taken as pledging myself but as I say I shall go into the matter before the Schedule comes up for discussion and let the hon. Member and the Committee know the result of my inquiry.

Question, "That the Clause be read a Second time," put, and negatived.