Death Grant (Hansard, 27 May 1963)

§ 11. Mr. Lawson
asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance if he will estimate the additional number of death grants which would be payable in the year 1964 if the disqualification in the case of the death of women born before 5th July, 1888, were removed.

§ 13. Mr. Small
asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance, if he will estimate how much it would cost in 1964 to pay a death grant of £25 in the case of the death of men born before 5th July, 1883. and of women born before 5th July, 1888.

§ 14. Mr. Ross
asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance if he will estimate the additional number of death grants which would be payable in the year 1964 if the disqualification in the case of the death of men born before 5th July, 1883, were removed.

§ Mr. N. Macpherson
About 50,000 additional grants would be paid for men and 120,000 for women at a cost of some £4¼ million.

§ Mr. Lawson
Is the Minister aware that even his Government are not now trying to pretend that this is an insurance 898 scheme which is being operated on actuarial principles? Recognising that the scheme is operating on a year-by-year payment basis, will the Minister bring the old people under the same kind of protection as is given to the younger people?

§ Mr. Macpherson
While the National Insurance Scheme is not in all respects being run on an actuarial basis, it is, nevertheless, an insurance scheme and the fact remains that the people whom the hon. Member has in mind paid no contributions for this benefit and that the benefit was not provided for them under the legislation of 1946.

§ Mr. Small
Recognising that the number of people affected is diminishing each year, is not the time opportune to review the situation with a view to paying everybody? In the public mind, there appears to be differential treatment by the Ministry in the cases of death of old people.

§ Mr. Macpherson
Obviously, the people who are not covered will be a diminishing number, but the principles which I have explained still apply.

§ Mr. Ross
Surely the amount of money involved would not break the National Insurance Fund. Why does not the Minister anticipate the ending of this anomaly with the passing of the years by being a little generous now?

§ Mr. Macpherson
One reason is that many of these people had insurances of their own, often several insurances of their own, to cover this risk.

§ Sir J. Langford-Holt
Can my right hon. Friend tell me what principle, actuarial or otherwise, decided the right hon. Member for Llanelly (Mr. J. Griffiths), I presume, to include these dates in the original Act?

§ Mr. Macpherson
The dates are included automatically because of the ages of the people concerned when the 1946 Act came into effect.

§ Miss Herbison
Is the Minister aware that many of these old people who have paid for private insurance throughout their lives do not have enough money at the time of their death to cover the cost of the funeral because of the reduced value of money? Is he aware that these 899 costs bear heavily on some families who can little afford to pay them? Since in many ways the insurance principle is not operated for many of the old people who are now getting the higher pension, surely it would be a good thing to extend the scheme to provide death benefit in the case of these old people.

§ Mr. Macpherson
I doubt whether that would be the right way to proceed. A case might be made for doing it in other ways. Surely, however, it would not seem right, fifteen years after the passing of the original Act, suddenly to include these old people in the insurance scheme for the purposes of death grant alone.

§ 12. Mr. Millan
asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance if he will estimate the number of restricted death grants of £12 10s. which will be payable in the year 1964.

§ Mr. N. Macpherson
About 135,000.

§ Mr. Millan
In view of the small number involved, whatever may have been the reasons for making this restriction in 1948, is it not about time that we got rid of it now? These are all very old people, many of them in extremely indigent circumstances, and great hardship is caused to a surviving wife or husband. Could not the full amount be paid in these cases?

§ Mr. Macpherson
All I can do is to take note of what the hon. Member has said and consider it.

§ 15. Mr. Hannan
asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance how much it would cost in the year 1964 to pay full death grant in the case of the death of men born between 5th July, 1883, and 5th July, 1893, and of women born between 5th July, 1888, and 5th July, 1898.

§ Mr. N. Macpherson
About Eli million.

§ Mr. Hannan
Since, in several occasions, the Government have increased the benefits in other branches of National Insurance to cover the increased cost of living, is it now to be said that the cost of dying is to be sacrosanct? Is not the Minister aware that these expenses also have increased and that anxiety is caused Ito surviving relatives? Will he now con- 900 cider the deprivation that the Government by their mistaken policies have caused in this matter and increase at least these restricted benefits?

§ Mr. Macpherson
These benefits have been increased on one occasion, in 1958.