Industrial Injuries (Hansard, 17 November 1958)

§ 12. Mr. D. Jones
asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance whether, in the light of recent decisions concerning relief staff on the railways and the peculiarities of the terms of their employment in relation to their risks of injury by accident whilst travelling on the highway to their temporary places of employment, he will consider revising the regulations relating to eligibility to benefit under the Industrial Injury Acts.

§ Mr. Boyd-Carpenter
This is a matter not of regulations but of express provisions of the Industrial Injuries Acts. These provisions are now well settled, and I have no proposals for legislation to amend them.

§ Mr. Jones
Does the right hon. Gentleman not recognise that it is a question of interpretation of the Act? This class of person—railway relief staff—frequently has to travel long distances over the highway to carry out the instructions of his employer. A recent case was that of a relief crossing keeper at Hastings, ordered to relieve at Rye, starting at 6 o'clock in the morning, for which he was allowed two and a half hours' walking time. His only means of getting there was either to walk or cycle. He cycled to his job, lost his life in the process and his widow has now been denied industrial injury benefit. If I bring other cases to the Minister's notice will he look at them?

§ Mr. Boyd-Carpenter
As the hon. Member rightly says, this is a matter of interpretation. Parliament in its wisdom has placed that interpretation in the hands of the statutory authorities. The case that the hon. Member has in mind was considered and decided by the Commissioner himself. On the general question, the hon. Member with his long experience of these matters, is aware that the fact that journeys to places of work are not generally covered—apart from the question of employers' transport—is a long-standing provision going right back to the time of the old Workmen's Compensation Acts.

§ Mr. Popplewell
Will not the Minister look at this matter again instead of riding off in that way? A special problem is involved. As the Minister himself said, it is not a question altogether of the Act but of interpretation. There is the special problem of people who have no fixed point at which they commence work but who have to travel distances. I ask the right hon. Gentleman not to be adamant but to look at the matter again and see whether he cannot do something to assist these people who are in their employment for the whole of the time they are travelling.

§ Mr. Boyd-Carpenter
The hon. Member is not, I think, facing the fact that these provisions are interpreted by 820 the statutory authorities and not by me. I would, however, add the comment that this problem of people with varying places of work is not confined to railwaymen but arises in other occupations. The matter is one which was considered earlier by the courts and has now been dealt with by the statutory authorities over a good many years.

§ Mr. Marquand
Is there not a case for referring this difficult matter to the Industrial Injuries Advisory Council together with the matter raised a week ago at Question Time connected with the bus conductor who was seriously injured by a crowd of rowdies boarding his bus?

§ Mr. Boyd-Carpenter
I doubt whether either of these matters, which turn upon the proper construction of statutory provisions, is appropriate for reference to the Advisory Council, whose function, as the right hon. Gentleman knows, is to give advice more on questions of policy.

§ 16. Mr. Oliver
asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance whether he is aware that, in respect of injuries falling within the provisions of the National Insurance (Industrial Injuries) Act, 1946, a congenital defect which reveals itself only after the accident is, for the purpose of assessing disability benefit, regarded as a disability from which the injured person would, of necessity, have suffered had the accident not occurred, thus reducing the assessment as a disability not attributable to the accident; and whether he will take steps to rectify this anomaly.

§ Mr. Boyd-Carpenter
No, Sir. I am aware that the National Insurance (Industrial Injuries) Act provides that a disability shall not be treated as resulting from an industrial injury if the claimant would in any case have been subject to that disability as the result of a congenital defect. I see no reason for an amendment of the Act in this respect.

§ Mr. Oliver
Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that this Question is wholly confined to those persons in respect of whom there was no evidence whatever before the accident of any congenital defect? Therefore, it is quite a wrong interpretation, where there is no evidence before the accident of congenital defect, to permit that defect to depreciate the amount of the assessment.

§ Mr. Boyd-Carpenter
With respect, I do not agree with the hon. and learned Gentleman. Where, as in the case which he has in mind, there is a congenital defect, which in any event would have been there regardless of the accident, the mere fact that the person concerned becomes aware of it subsequent to the accident is surely no reason for treating it as if it had been caused by it. To do so would undermine the whole idea of industrial causation, which is the justification for the special provisions of the National Insurance (Industrial Injuries) Act.

§ Mr. Oliver
Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that most people suffer from some congenital defect? If an accident brings it to light for the first time, would that be justification for having damages or benefits reduced, whether the claim was made under common law or under statute?

§ Mr. Boyd-Carpenter
I will certainly not bandy law with the hon. and learned Member. On the narrow point of special treatment of industrial injuries, it does not seem justifiable to argue that a defect which unfortunately a man would have suffered from anyhow should be treated in these circumstances, and be paid for, as if it had been caused by an industrial accident, when the hon. and learned Member himself has made it clear that it was not.

§ Mr. J. Griffiths
Would the right hon. Gentleman not agree that if a person who was suffering from a congenital disability sustained a disability through an accident, and if the accident combined with the original disability increased that person's disability, account should be taken of both disabilities in assessing payment?

§ Mr. Boyd-Carpenter
As the right hon. Gentleman knows, that is a quite different question.

§ Mr. S. Silverman
It is the same question.

§ Mr. Boyd-Carpenter
With respect to the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman), it is a most interesting and important question, but it is different from one where there is a defect from which a man would have suffered anyhow, independent of industrial accident.