CLAUSE 20.—(Payment of pensions in certain cases in respect of the insurance of persons ceasing to be insured.) (Hansard, 8 July 1935)

§ Mr. RHYS DAVIES
I beg to move, in page 16, line 44, to leave out "sixty," and to insert "four."
For clarity I will read the first few sentences of this Clause. Where a person who immediately before the beginning of a free insurance period had been continuously insured as an employed contributor for a period of not less than two hundred and eight weeks and by or in respect of whom not less than one hundred and sixty contributions had been paid ceases to be insured at the end of that free insurance period, but it is proved to the satisfaction of the Minister …. We are trying by this Amendment to reduce the qualifying number of contributions from 160 to 104. We are moving this to cover the cases of unemployed people who might not be able to establish the qualification of 160 contributions, but who might be able to qualify by requiring them to have made only 104 contributions. This Bill is designed to help the unemployed person and we think, therefore, that the Minister might look favourably on this proposition.

§ Mr. SHAKESPEARE
I am glad that the hon. Gentleman did not demand that there should be no qualifying condition or test for the person who enjoys the benefit of the Clause. We have tried to adopt what has been a well-established principle of choosing a test which shows that a man is looking in the main to insurable employment for a livelihood. With too low a test, though it may look generous, you are really admitting people who are not looking to insurable employment for a livelihood at all. The 93 test chosen is 160 contributions during four years of insurance. That was adopted a long time ago by the Consultative Council as a fair test. It was not challenged by the hon. Gentleman when he was in office, and it is being continued now. The Committee will see that it is a generous test, because it means that one of these employed contributors who has had only 160 contributions in the four years will get two and three-quarter years of pensions cover. The Committee will see that we have chosen a fair test and that we are carrying on the qualification long accepted in insurance practice.

§ Mr. G. HALL
I beg to move, in page 17, line 8, to leave out "twelve months," and to insert "three years."
This Amendment deals with a very small but a very important point, and I would plead that it should be accepted. The persons referred to in the previous Amendment were qualified by being in insurance for four years and having 160 contributions, and the Clause reads: if within twelve months of ceasing to be insured he attains the age of sixty-five, an old age pension, and if within that period he dies, a widow's pension and an orphan's pension shall, whether he has or has not during that period again become insured. … The purpose of this Amendment is that the 12 months referred to in the Clause should be extended to three years. I do not know that there would be very many persons who would be affected as a result of this, and it does seem reasonable that a person who has been insured for that period, and who is within, say, a year of the period of receiving old age pension or between, say, 62 and 65, should be entitled to his pension; or, in the event of his dying, that his wife or children should receive the widow's or orphan's pension. There cannot be much money involved in making this concession, and for these reasons I ask the right hon. Gentleman to accept the Amendment.

§ Sir K. WOOD
The Clause as it stands at present gives pension protection for 2¾ years to persons in the category referred to after they have ceased to pay their contributions. I think the hon. 94 Gentleman will recognise that this is a very substantial concession in view of the relatively small number of contributions which can have been paid. I think it will be realised by hon. Gentlemen opposite that it will be impossible to contemplate a provision so much outside the insurance principle altogether.

§ Sir K. WOOD
I beg to move, in page 17, line 22, at the end, to insert: Where a person has become entitled to an old age pension by virtue of the provisions of this sub-section he shall, for the purposes of the Pensions Act, but not for any other purpose, be deemed to have been insured continuously from the end of the free insurance period aforesaid until his death. This Amendment is to meet a point raised in the course of the previous debate, and it secures that the position of the wife or widow of a man who becomes entitled to old age pension under the special provisions of the Clause shall not be prejudiced by the fact that he has ceased to be insured before he obtains that old age pension. The effect of the Amendment is to put the wife or widow of such a man in exactly the same position as the wife or widow of a man who became entitled to an old age pension under the ordinary provisions of the scheme. I think that meets the point raised on the Second Reacting, and no doubt the Amendment will be accepted.