HC Deb 14 February 1938 vol 331 cc1661-3

Lords Amendment: In page 4, line 34, after "under" insert "the foregoing provisions of."

10.3 p.m.

Mr. Butler

I beg to move, "That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said Amendment."

This Amendment looks rather more technical, but is, like the last one, an effort to clarify the position. The House will remember that Clause 4 of the Bill, Sub-section (1) gives the power to reborrow in the event of the Unemployment Fund not being in a position to meet its liabilities owing to reserves having been used in redemption of debt. That is a position which we do not wish to arise. I do not wish to go into the whole controversy of the Bill at this stage nor would it be in order, but I would remind hon. Gentlemen opposite and other hon. Members interested in this Bill that it is that with which Clause 4, Sub-section (1) deals. If hon. Members who are interested in the subject will look at Sub-section (3), they will see that this new Amendment inserts the safeguarding words, "the foregoing provisions of this Section," therefore, confining the operation of Sub-section (3) to the foregoing provisions. These are Subsections (1) and (2). Before these words were put in Sub-section (3) which has reference to the proposal to create terminable annuities—hon. Gentlemen opposite will remember the description of them given on a previous occasion—might have been taken to apply to all the Subsections of this Clause. That would have been undesirable because Subsection (1) is a much bigger financial operation. This Amendment limits the application of Sub-section (3) to the foregoing Sub-sections and does not refer to Sub-section (4) which is more in the nature of a temporary transaction in the form of bookkeeping. If the House will look at Subsection (4) they will see that such a complicated and wide procedure as the creation of terminable annuities is inadvisable in cases where moneys have to be repaid as a result of the Unemployment Fund being insufficient to meet its liabilities under Sub-section (4). Therefore hon. Members will see that this is a wise provision and in fact clarifies the provisions of the Bill in this respect.

Mr. Speaker

I would point out that although this Amendment makes the meaning of the Clause clear, it seems a technical and Privilege Amendment.

10.5 p.m.

Mr. Lawson

The House will now understand what I meant when I said that this was a complicated Bill. The Parliamentary Secretary has given an explanation which, although it was quite accurate, will not have made this matter very simple to the House. Having spent a very painful hour going through these Amendments to see what they are all about, I can appreciate his position. It is true, as he said, that on this and the previous Clause there was a good deal of contention in the House when the Bill was before us. This is the Clause, with the other Clause, for which the Bill was originally brought before the House. The previous Clause deals with the question of the payment of the debt. The principal Act lays it down that the debt had to be paid by instalments under certain conditions within a certain period. The fund is in such a condition that the Minister had to bring in a Bill to give himself the right to take some of the funds at his disposal for the repayment of the debt in excess of what is laid down in the principal Act. We had very strong objections to that, but, as the hon. Member said, we should not be entitled to enter into a discussion of that matter to which we objected at the time.

Under this Clause 4, in case the Statutory Committee overpays itself from the money at its disposal, so that there is a shortage of funds with which to meet the obligations to those who contribute towards the fund, it is made clear in very explicit terms how that money is to be paid into the fund and under what conditions it is to be returned. I gather from what the Parliamentary Secretary says that if the words, "The foregoing provisions of," were not put in, the conditions would apply to the whole of the four Sub-sections instead of to three. Therefore, the Amendment is a safeguarding Amendment to keep the first three Sub-sections clear of the fourth, which deals with the fund in a different way and under separate conditions. We have no objection to the Amendment.