HC Deb 15 May 1958 vol 588 cc624-31

Notwithstanding provisions in any other Act a local authority may with the approval of the Secretary of State make a scheme to give services or grants to voluntary organisations providing amenities which in their view contribute to the physical and psychological wellbeing of ageing and handicapped persons.—[Mr. Hoy.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Mr. James Hoy (Leith)

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

I hoped to cover this point in the Standing Committee, but after considerable discussion the Chair thought that the whole thing was out of order. The Chair having given that Ruling—you will know the Scottish Committee well enough, Sir Charles, to know that we would not come into conflict with the Chair—we accepted it. I thought that in the circumstances the best way to deal with the matter was to put down a new Clause on recommittal.

This will not involve the Government in any considerable expenditure. By the expenditure of what one might regard as a small sum of money, the Government could do infinite good; indeed, in the long run, my proposal might save money, something which might appeal to the Government. In the Standing Committee I used the example of an elderly people's club in my constituency which has done much good during the past two years. It is the type of club which might well be emulated in other parts of Scotland.

It came about after a campaign dealing with tuberculosis. It was felt that the campaign was very successful among elderly people and that we might do something further for that section of the community. A band of workers was gathered from all sections of the community, including doctors and members of co-operative women's guilds, and the club was brought into existence.

Since that day, at least 100 elderly men and women have met every day and have had a three-course lunch for 1s. This is a service which is not provided in any other part of Scotland, but it has proved of great benefit to that section of the community. All the work undertaken is done voluntarily.

The arrangement is that the food is supplied to the club by the Edinburgh Corporation, which receives payment from it, although I should not like it to be thought that this is merely a business deal. The club is grateful for the co-operation of the corporation and its officials. The food is taken to the club, which is manned by voluntary workers from the women's guild under Miss Sinclair, who has given great service to the old people of Leith. The service has brought not only good health but companionship to many people to whom it had been denied.

In addition, the club has set up a chiropody service. A chiropodist attends to the old folk for a merely nominal sum. Other services include advice and the completion of forms, and so on, all undertaken in the club. One great drawback, however, is that there is no place to meet, other than during the lunch hour. We are indebted, and we should put it on record, to the local Co-operative society for granting these premises free of charge for the last two years.

Many people have had a hand in the growth of this club and as a consequence more than £2,000 have been raised—none from the local authority and none from the Government—in an endeavour to build a permanent club for the continuation and extension of these services. Here is a record of voluntary service in this sphere which is unsurpassed. The very fact that such a considerable sum has been raised is a proof of the earnest of these workers to continue to do this work.

The Government could help to make the plan for the permanent premises a reality. If those permanent premises could be established, no doubt someone will have to be engaged on a full-time basis. All we are asking in the Clause is that in that case a local authority should be empowered to make a grant towards the running expenses of a club of that kind to see that these voluntary services are maintained.

What I want is an assurance that these people will be encouraged to carry on with their work and that the Government will do nothing to prevent it being carried through. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will not only pay lip-service to the work being done, but accept the new Clause, because I am certain that in that way we can best render a service to the elderly.

Mr. Cyril Bence (Dunbartonshire, East)

I support the new Clause and what my hon. Friend the Member for Leith (Mr. Hoy) has said about a very important aspect of local government work, especially today, when, in some of the small communities, and even in some of the larger ones in the distant parts of Scotland, especially in the west, much voluntary charitable work is done by people of the sort to whom my hon. Friend referred. However, the people who are doing this work are finding it increasingly difficult to provide money as well.

Some people I know recently attended a meeting of a handicapped children's association. They were teaching those children and adults who had passed out of the hands of the education authority, since they were between the ages of 15 and 30. Those handicapped children and adults were being taught knitting, sewing, basket work and weaving. At the meeting, the people doing that work were asked to pay an annual subscription towards the cost of the work they were doing—there was equipment to be bought and appliances to be paid for, appliances used by the handicapped to encourage them to get their limbs back into use.

These people were giving their time—and I know some ladies on Clydebank who are giving as much as 20 hours a week in service to handicapped children and adults—and were also being asked to provide money. The local authority has been very generous within the limits in which it can be generous, but that generosity is not sufficient. When they see people doing very good charitable and voluntary work in our society, some of them trained nurses who help in their spare time, the Government should do what they can to assist.

Only last week I attended a function at Kirkintilloch where, at a cost of £300, raised from a sale of work and a grant from the National Playing Fields Association, some volunteers have built two tennis courts, a bowling green and a putting green with their own labour. The estimated cost of what they have done is £2,000. That was voluntary labour. The Government should go a very long way to encourage people in that sort of work.

In Clydebank, we have three fine voluntary organisations, one similar to that which my hon. Friend mentioned, the Women's Voluntary Service, and the Association for Handicapped Children. They are doing a tremendous amount of good work, but it is very hard for working-class housewives not only to put in a great deal of hard work, but to provide money, very often even though their husbands only have low incomes.

Recently, some of these ladies were asked to provide a trolley shop service in a hospital. They agreed to do so, but they did not have a trolley, and it was suggested that there should be a whip round among these ladies to buy a trolley for the service which they were to provide. That sort of thing is a bit hard. The Government should encourage local authorities to help in matters of that kind by giving them power to help recognised voluntary organisations who can do so much to help the handicapped.

It does not matter what legislation we have at the centre, or which party is in power, no legislation or administrative organisation at the centre will ever replace what can be done voluntarily within the community, or what can be done by human contact and association with handicapped people and with the aged, to make their lives a little happier.

I shall be very surprised if this new Clause is turned down, especially in view of the hon. Gentleman's background. There is every justification for accepting it, because we all want to encourage those who are prepared, in their middle years, to give up some of their leisure to help to ease the suffering of our unfortunate brothers and sisters.

4.15 p.m.

Mr. J. N. Browne

I believe that with the new Clause the hon. Member for Leith (Mr. Hoy) was also discussing his Amendment to my right hon. Friend's Amendment in Schedule 1, page 16, line 18, since his new Clause gives powers and his Amendment provides for contributions by local authorities to voluntary organisations to count as relevant expenditure.

The new Clause is unnecessary, because powers already exist to make grants to voluntary organisations providing services which contribute to the physical and psychological well-being of aged and handicapped persons. Briefly, I will quote the sections of the National Health Service (Scotland) Act, 1947, which enables local authorities to make arrangements, with the approval of the Secretary of State, for the prevention of illness, the care of persons suffering from illness or mental deficiency or the after-care of such persons. These are very wide powers and are used, for example, for chiropody services for the old, to which the hon. Member for Leith referred.

Under Section 27 and 28 of that Act, the local authority has power to help voluntary organisations to provide many services, such as domestic help, which includes laundry services, and so on. All expenditure by local authorities on these services is "relevant expenditure" under paragraph 2 of the First Schedule.

Turning to the National Assistance Act, 1948, under Sections 29 and 30 the local authority can make arrangements through voluntary organisations for promoting the welfare of handicapped persons, the blind, deaf or dumb and others substantially and permanently handicapped by illness, injury, or congenital deformity. From the point of view of grant, the development of these services for handicapped persons under Section 29 of the National Assistance Act, will, because of the way the Bill is framed, now be treated as "relevant expenditure" under paragraph 10 of the First Schedule so far as it exceeds such expenditure incurred before May, 1959. That development is now grant-aided. Where the local authority, under Section 30 (1), which is embraced by Section 29, employs a voluntary organisation under a scheme as its agent such expenditure is also "relevant expenditure" and ranks for grant.

Now we come to services that are not grant-aided. Under Section 31 of the National Assistance Act, a local authority may contribute to a voluntary organisation providing or including in its activities recreation or meals for old people. That was the type of organisation to which the hon. Member for Leith referred. This contribution is not now grant-aided and is not "relevant expenditure" under the Bill. The hon. Member will appreciate, however, that the Bill as now amended—and when we include a later Amendment to Schedule 1 which proposes to give grant to local authorities who contribute to voluntary organisations providing residential accommodation—goes at least some way, although I admit not all the way, to meet the wishes of the hon. Gentleman.

So far as grant-aid under the National Assistance Act is concerned, the hon. Gentleman will appreciate that paragraph 10 of the First Schedule of the Bill goes a long way further than the present position. We cannot count as "relevant expenditure" all the grants that the local authority now gives without grant-aid; nevertheless, under general grant, expenditure by local authorities on grant-aid to voluntary bodies will be taken into account so far as it is referred to in paragraph 10 of the First Schedule as amended by a proposed later Amendment. The hon. Gentleman will remember that there is nothing to prevent a local authority making payments or continuing such aid as it now gives, and local authorities under general grant conditions will have greater freedom to increase their payments.

Mr. James McInnes (Glasgow, Central)

I appreciate the hon. Gentleman's difficulty in trying to explain the differences between those services which are not grant-aided and those which are grant-aided and, on the other hand, the power of local authorities to give grants themselves. There is considerable doubt among local authorities about their precise powers in these matters. Will the hon. Gentleman, apart from what is incorporated in the Bill, make available to hon. Members details of the powers possessed by local authorities in this field, not necessarily in respect of grant-aid, but with what they themselves can do in the matter?

Mr. Browne

So far as powers are concerned, the local authority has power to make contributions to voluntary organisations over a very wide field indeed. It would be hard to find a voluntary organisation to which local authorities cannot contribute. So far as taxpayers' aid is concerned, under the National Health (Scotland) Act that is "relevant expenditure". Although we have extended the National Assistance Act in two directions even since the Bill was brought in, and although I am sure that we would like to if we could, we do not feel that we can grant-aid all types of payments made by local authorities to various organisations.

Mr. Hoy

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for at least attempting to explain the different forms of assistance under the various Acts. The point that he made about assistance in providing living accommodation is, of course, in no way connected with the new Clause that I have moved. That is a quite distinct and separate point.

On the question of the supply of food to elderly people, it is difficult to understand what the hon. Gentleman has been saying in view of the fact that recently, because of an increase in the price of food, this had to be borne not by the local authority, but by the old people themselves. I had hoped that the hon. Gentleman might have gone a little further today, although I am prepared to admit that certain adjustments have taken place. I hope that through discussion of this proposed new Clause voluntary associations, together with the local authorities, will be better aware in future of what powers they possess.

In the circumstances, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Motion.

Motion and Clause, by leave, withdrawn.