CLAUSE 9.—(Obligations as to employment of quota of registered persons in substantial staffs.) (Hansard, 1 March 1944)

§ The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour (Mr. Tomlinson)
I beg to move "That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said Amendment."
It would be for the convenience of the House if, in dealing with this Amendment, I also referred to the other Lords Amendments, as they are all drafting Amendments which are made necessary by the introduction of the Reinstatement in Civil Employment Bill. Clause 9 of the Disabled Persons (Employment) Bill, which imposes obligations on employers to employ a quota of registered disabled persons, refers in Sub-section (3) to certain Sections of the National Service (Armed Forces) Act, 1939, to the National Service Act, 1941, and to Regulation 60DAA of the Defence (General) Regulations, 1939. The effect of the Reinstatement in Civil Employment Bill will be to repeal, either in whole or in part, the various provisions referred to in Clause 9 (3), and it is therefore necessary to substitute for those references a reference to "any Act, whether passed before or after the passing of this Act." If the first three of the proposed Amendments are made, Clause 9 (3) of the Bill will then read as follows: 1438 Sub-section (2) of the section shall not apply to a person taking, or offering to take, into his employment at any time a person whom apart from that sub-section it would have been his duty to take into his employment at that time either—

(a) by virtue of any Act, whether passed before or after the passing of this Act; or

(b) by virtue of an agreement to reinstate him in his employment entered into before the date appointed for the coming into operation of sub-section (2) of this section."

The fourth Amendment on the Order Paper, which is an Amendment to Clause 12 of the Bill, is consequential upon the making of the first three Amendments.

§ Mr. Lionel Berry (Buckingham)
I appreciate the point made by my hon. Friend in trying to cover the Reinstatement in Civil Employment Bill, but he has taken it a good deal further than that in making this apply to any Act which may be passed in the future. When an employer re-engages or engages further members of his staff, if the proportion of disabled in the total number becomes less than his quota he must engage disabled persons and not fit persons. But there are three cases where exemption is granted. In the first case the Minister may give a permit to allow a fit person to be engaged; in the second, if an employer has already made a contract with the employee at the time before this Clause becomes operative he is entitled to engage that employee, notwithstanding the fact that his quota is not made up; and, in the third case, he is not bound, as it stood in the Bill originally, where he has a duty of reinstatement under the National Service (Armed Forces) Act, 1939, or the National Service Act, 1941, or Regulation 60 of the Defence Regulations, 1939.
It seems to me that when the Government substitute for that a Clause which says that any Act, whether passed before or after the passing of this Act, "under an Act passed before" must refer to all the specific Acts mentioned, but the reference to any Act passed afterwards 1439 leaves the law little scope. There is the possibility that we may find that the very people we are trying to help by this Bill will be penalised as a result of this Amendment. We cannot visualise what future legislation may be put before the House, but we know that there must at some time be a Bill dealing with the whole question of demobilisation and that in that Bill we shall have to have certain Regulations regarding employment. As I see it, any such Regulations binding employers to engage people under the terms of that Bill would place such people in a prior position in the list over the disabled persons whom we are considering under this Bill. It is obviously quite impossible for the House in the future, every time a Bill comes up for discussion, to bear in mind that all Regulations are automatically binding on disabled persons under the Act of 1944. We should be doing a disservice to disabled people if we accepted the Amendment in its present form, because it goes further than the intention of this House or the Minister. Therefore, I ask the Parliamentary Secretary whether he cannot overcome this difficulty in some other way than by leaving the whole question so open and so free as it is in the present Amendment.

§ Mr. Tomlinson
I think my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Mr. Berry) has anticipated difficulties which we have not contemplated could possibly arise. Obviously, you cannot pass an Act of Parliament which calls upon the employer to do two absolutely contrary things, and if this Amendment were not made it would be calling upon him to do something under Acts of Parliament which are here defined, and which are to be changed by the passing of another Bill which is being considered to-day. The effect of this would be to nullify his action under this Bill. My hon. Friend suggests that the wording which has been substituted in the Lords Amendment goes further. But it only goes further in that it covers all Acts which are contemplated in this way. Just as it will be necessary to watch the passing of legislation in order to see that it does not contravene legislation which is already on the Statute Book, to the detriment of the people who are being catered for, so it will be whatever language is introduced here. It would call for the intro- 1440 duction of an Amendment every time to deal with a particular Act of Parliament. I think my hon. Friend may be assured that we are as anxious as he is to defend the people with whom he is concerned. If his fears should be realised at some time in the future it will be as easy to bring forward an Amendment to meet that situation as it would be to meet the contemplated difficulty now.

§ Commander Sir Archibald Southby (Epsom)
I would like to ask the Parliamentary Secretary whether his concluding words mean that the idea which underlies this Bill—that priority should be given to disabled men over everybody else—is really in the mind of the Government and that if the proposed Amendment would have the effect of removing that priority then the Government would at some future date introduce legislation which would restore that priority? What the House wishes to do is to give priority to the men who have been disabled in the service of their country over everybody else as regards employment. If the Amendment would open the gate and remove that priority it should be resisted, but if it means that should that be found to be the case the Government would then restore priority to disabled men, then I think we would agree that it should go through.

§ Mr. Tomlinson
If the Amendment meant what was meant by the hon. and gallant Member for Epsom (Sir A. Southby) not only would we not have put it down but, had it been put down, we would have resisted it. It means that the man stands in exactly the same position as before, except that we are insuring for a contingency should it arise.