Commons Sitting of 30 January 1964

Preamble
The House met at half-past Two o'clock
PRAYERS
[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]
PRIVATE BUSINESS
  BRITISH TRANSPORT DOCKS BILL (by Order)
  Read a Second time and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS
  COMMONWEALTH RELATIONS

    University of Rhodesia and Nyasaland
    Mr. Swinglerasked the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations when the unexpended portion of the contribution of £2,875,000 from Colonial development and welfare funds towards the University of Rhodesia and Nyasaland will be spent; and what part the United Kingdom is playing in the negotiations about the university's future.
    The Under-Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations and for the Colonies (Mr. R. P. Hornby): Of the unspent balance of the £2,875,000 Colonial Development and Welfare funds allocated to the College, £304,000 has not yet been committed to individual schemes. The British Government have recently released £110,000 towards the building of a Students' Union. I cannot at present say when the remainder will be made available.
    On the second part of the hon. Member's Question, I have nothing to add to the Answer given to my hon. Friend the Member for Chigwell (Mr. Biggs-Davison) on 23rd January.
    Mr. Swingler: In view of the substantial contribution made by Britain towards this university, can the hon. Member say whether it is the intention that the British Government shall con-
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    tinue to be associated with the government of the University of Rhodesia and Nyasaland? Can he also say whether, in these negotiations, the Government will ensure that the university is maintained on multi-racial lines?
    Mr. Hornby: I cannot commit the British Government in advance of the forthcoming talks on the future of the college. The details of those talks will come later. As for the general principles on which the college is run, I am sure that we have a great deal of sympathy with what the hon. Member says.

    Economic Development
    Mr. Ellis Smithasked the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations what action is to be taken on the material dealing with economic development and its financing, prepared in accordance with the decision of the Commonwealth Conference held at Montreal in 1958; what proposals Her Majesty's Government have for a Commonwealth policy for economic expansion and co-operation; and whether the Government will now prepare an economic policy to be put before the next conference of Commonwealth Prime Ministers.
    The Under-Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations and for the Colonies (Mr. John Tilney): I assume that the hon. Gentleman is referring to the reports on economic development in Commonwealth countries published by the Commonwealth Economic Committee as a result of decisions taken at the Montreal Conference. These Reports provide part of the background for decisions taken by the British Government and other Commonwealth Governments from time to time on questions of trade and financial aid.
    I would refer the hon. Gentleman to the statements issued by meetings of Commonwealth Trade Ministers last May and of Commonwealth Finance Ministers last September, of which I am sending him copies, and to the replies given in this House on 3rd December and on 5th December last.
    Mr. Ellis Smith: Does the Minister agree with me that some very fine documents have been prepared—among the best ever—and that a tremendous

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    amount of work must have been put into their preparation? Is it not logical, with the preparation of these documents, that we should adopt a policy in harmony with them? Does the Minister agree that the time has arrived when Ministers should be putting into the development of the Commonwealth the same energy as they put into the development of the Common Market?
    Mr. Tilney: I agree that the documents and the reports are extremely good. If, in the comparatively near future, there should be a debate on Commonwealth trade, the hon. Member may be lucky enough to catch your eye, Mr. Speaker, and develop the points that he wishes to make.
    Mr. Fell: Does not my hon. Friend agree that the greatest disincentive to the development of trade is the breakdown in law and order in a number of Commonwealth countries? Would not it be putting first things first to call a meeting of Commonwealth Prime Ministers as early as possible?
    Mr. Speaker: Order. That does not arise out of the Question.

    Festival of the Arts
    Mr. Sorensenasked the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations what Commonwealth countries are participating in the projected Commonwealth Art Exhibition in this country.
    Mr. Hornby: I understand that the Question refers to the Commonwealth Festival of the Arts, which is planned for 1965. Invitations to participate in this Festival are issued by the Commonwealth Arts Festival Society whose Director-General, Mr. Ian Hunter, will shortly begin a tour of the overseas Commonwealth to discuss contributions. Until this tour has been completed, the Society will not be able to say definitely which countries will take part.
    Mr. Sorensen: May I ask whether all countries in the Commonwealth are being invited to give exhibits? Is our own financial assistance confined to £80,000, or are the Government prepared to go beyond that sum if necessary?
    Mr. Hornby: The participants cannot be known until this tour by the
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    Director-General has been completed. All Commonwealth countries through their High Commissioners here have been invited to the Festival. The British Government have promised a guarantee against loss of £80,000, and in addition have given £2,000 towards the preliminary expenses of the Festival. The British Government warmly support the proposal to hold this Festival.
    Sir B. Stross: In view of the fact that this proposal is highly imaginative and desirable and that a great number of local authorities who intend to participate will help to finance it with quite considerable sums, may I ask whether, if it be successful—as we all hope—it will become a regular feature of our life, and be held at least every five years?
    Mr. Hornby: I am sure it would be a very happy event if that should prove to be the general wish of the countries participating.
    Mr. G. M. Thomson: If this proves successful, can the Minister say whether there are plans to do the thing in reverse and arrange a tour in the Commonwealth countries of some of the exhibits associated with this Festival?
    Mr. Hornby: We had better see how the Director-General gets on. Suggestions such as that made by the hon. Member may well be taken up at a later stage.

    Economic Aid
    Mr. Prenticeasked the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations why economic aid from this country to independent Commonwealth countries fell to a total of £23·1 million in the first half of the current financial year, compared with £29 million in the preceding six months, and £33·2 million in the six months before that.
    Mr. Tilney: The figures quoted by the hon. Member represent the sums of money actually disbursed. The rate of disbursments necessarily fluctuates as it is governed by the need of the recipient countries to draw on the aid available to them, under contracts into which they have entered.
    Mr. Prentice: Are we not in a rather paradoxical situation in that the Treasury White Paper last September

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    forecast an increase in aid both to Commonwealth and other recipient countries, but figures so far in this financial year seem to have indicated a large drop? Are the Government satisfied that the types and terms of aid are sufficiently in line with the needs of the recipient countries? Are they looking at this matter in the light of the apparent fall in the disbursement of aid?
    Mr. Tilney: We hope that our aid takes into account all circumstances of the recipient countries. I think it as well to remember that our aid has doubled in the last five years.
    Sir C. Osborne: Have the Government any plans to increase and stabilise the prices of raw materials which these countries send to us? This could be the best economic aid we could give them. What are we doing about that?
    Mr. Tilney: Should there be a debate on Commonwealth trade in the near future, this, no doubt, is a matter which could more easily be dealt with then than by Question and Answer, but I have much sympathy with the point of view of my hon. Friend. Of course, because there has been in recent years such a decline in the prices of raw materials, the terms of trade have turned against them.
    Mr. G. M. Thomson: Are not these figures provided to the House by the Government very unsatisfactory? Does the hon. Gentleman remember that at the end of last year we discovered that the Government had underspent by about £12 million what they had announced to the House as their aid programme? This year they look like being very much more underspent. Do the Government intend to revise the figures in order to get a more accurate idea of what are our commitments?
    Mr. Tilney: One must remember that commitments are very different from disbursements.

  CENTRAL AFRICA

    Federal Public Servants (Pensions)
    Dame Irene Wardasked the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations whether he has now considered the representations conveyed to him regard-
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    ing the pensions of Central African federal public servants; and whether he will make a statement.
    Mr. Hornby: Yes, Sir. A reply is being sent today to the representatives in London of the Federal Public Services Association. It has not been possible to accept suggestions for a general compensation scheme in addition to the terminal benefits, but arrangements for dealing with cases of hardship have been agreed between the Governments. It is our intention to deal with a number of points raised by the Staff Association in the Public Officers Agreement which is shortly to be concluded between the Governments concerned.
    Dame Irene Ward: In view of the fact that, of course, I cannot comment on the Answer, because I do not understand exactly what it means, may I ask my hon. Friend whether there is a guarantee that in default of any of the undertakings by the Governments concerned, the British Government will accept responsibility? Will my hon. Friend bear in mind that these men have served Central Africa and the community and this country very well indeed? Is he aware that it makes me absolutely livid when we do not accept our proper responsibility and cause anxiety to those who have served our interests so adequately? Is he aware that I hope that this guarantee is in this Answer, and that I should like to know?
    Mr. Hornby: Of course, I accept what my hon. Friend says about the great service which has been done by these public servants on behalf of this country and the territories concerned. I should like to remind my hon. Friend that this was an agreement reached jointly between all the Governments concerned, including the British Government, and it has been the intention by this agreement to arrive at arrangements which shall seem to be fair to all the Governments concerned and the public servants involved.
    Mr. G. M. Thomson: Is the Minister aware that there is a great deal of sympathy among hon. Members on this side of the House for the civil servants because of some of the anomalies that have arisen out of these negotiations? Can he say something about the permanent

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    machinery to be set up to deal with hardship? Will the Government be fully involved in dealing with the hardship cases?
    Mr. Hornby: I am glad that the hon. Gentleman has mentioned the point about hardship. As I said, we hope to be able to make satisfactory arrangements covering the hardship cases. Details of these will be embodied in the agreement to be announced shortly.

  TANGANYIKA

    British Military and Civil Residents
    Mr. Sorensenasked the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations what communications he has received from the Government of Tanganyika in respect of British military or civilian residents in Tanganyika; and what steps that Government has now taken to ensure the security of those residents.
    The Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations and for the Colonies (Mr. Duncan Sandys): I have nothing to add to the statements I made to the House on 20th and 27th January.
    Mr. Sorensen: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he can state approximately the number of British civilian and military personnel in Tanganyika and whether he can confirm my belief that since the independence of this country there has been no kind of criticism or complaint against military or civil personnel? Under the circumstances, would he impress on the Government of Tanganyika the need to avoid generating animus against the British?
    Mr. Sandys: I gave the figures of population in the statement to which I referred. There are quite considerable numbers, including a large number of citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies who are not of United Kingdom origin—Asian population. Regarding the question of ill-feeling between the races, I fully endorse the remarks of the hon. Gentleman and I know that President Nyerere feels the same way. There have been occasional departures from the intentions which I know animate the Government of Tanganyika in these matters and I am
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    sure that that Government regrets it as much as we do.
    Mr. F. Harris: Would not security and confidence be best ensured by discussions about the future of the military bases in Africa in conjunction with the Kenya and Tanganyika Governments to see whether a long-term solution may be found to give confidence to people of all races in this regard?
    Mr. Sandys: In any case, we are due to have some talks with the Kenya Government on defence matters. These were always envisaged to take place before independence. Regarding the wider consultations, I think the recent events in East Africa have made it desirable that we should have talks with those Governments about the future and the problem which has arisen and in which we have become involved during the last few weeks.

  GHANA

    Dr. Dennis Osborne (Detention)
    Mr. Bottomleyasked the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations if he will make a statement about the detention of Dr. Dennis Osborne, who is a United Kingdom citizen, by the Ghana Government.
    Mr. Tilney: Dr. Osborne was arrested on 17th January and was released on 24th January subject to certain restrictions. The reason given for his detention was that the Ghana Security Service wished to question him in connection with alleged subversive activities.
    Despite repeated requests by the Acting High Commissioner no representative of the British High Commission in Accra was allowed to see Dr. Osborne during this period. This is contrary to widely accepted international practice and especially to Commonwealth practice as we understand it. We should never deny the Ghana High Commissioner access to a Ghanaian citizen arrested in this country. My right hon. Friend is pursuing this point further with the Ghana Government.
    Mr. Bottomley: As one who appreciates some of the difficulties under which the President has to work, may I join

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    with the Minister in condemning this action? May I ask the Minister whether immediate steps were taken, or was some time allowed to elapse before our Acting High Commissioner made representations?
    Mr. Tilney: I would rather not go into great detail about this. I think that this is an incident which is liable to damage Anglo-Ghanaian relations. It is unfortunate, and in many ways the less said about it at the moment, the better. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."]
    Mr. Bottomley: With due respect, this is a United Kingdom citizen who is still detained. I think that representations should be made asking for his immediate release.
    Mr. Tilney: Representations were made as soon as possible.

  EAST AFRICA

    British Nationals (Safety)
    Lieut.-Colonel Cordeauxasked the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations what prior warnings he received of the danger to British lives caused by the recent overthrow of the Zanzibar Government and the recent mutiny in the Tanganyika army.
    Mr. Sandys: The situation in Zanzibar has for a long while been known to be unstable and at different times there have been rumours of trouble. We had no prior knowledge of the mutinies in East Africa.
    Lieut.-Colonel Cordeaux: Would my right hon. Friend agree that, on the whole, there is more danger to British lives and property in many Commonwealth countries than there is in foreign countries? Is it not, therefore, vital that we should have the fullest possible information concerning future happenings in those countries? Is he fully satisfied that we have had such information and, if not, will he take steps to see that in future we have it?
    Mr. Sandys: Responsibility for internal security and intelligence in that connection is a matter for these independent Governments—[Hon. Members "No."]—of course it is. They are responsible for their own security and for taking the steps necessary to ensure
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    it. If we do receive information so much the better, But we cannot make ourselves responsible for keeping in touch with every subversive activity which goes on in any Commonwealth country throughout the world.
    Lieut.-Colonel Cordeaux: Would not my right hon. Friend agree that we are equally responsible for the safety of our own people in those Commonwealth countries as we are for those in foreign countries? Surely our intelligence in those countries should be as efficient as it is in foreign countries?
    Mr. Sandys: I agree with my hon. and gallant Friend. We are responsible for the safety of our citizens in Commonwealth countries to the same extent, but not more, than we are for those in foreign countries. As to our information about pending coups and other troubles in foreign countries, we may hear about them or we may not. We cannot keep a tab on every trouble-maker throughout the world.
    Mr. Fellasked the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations if he will give an assurance that Her Majesty's Government will take all possible steps to protect British lives and property in those East African countries that have asked the United Kingdom for military help, when the Governments concerned request the withdrawal of United Kingdom forces.
    Mr. Sandys: Our concern for the safety of British lives and property in these countries, and our ability to provide help if needed, have been clearly demonstrated during this last fortnight. But the primary responsibility for law and order is and must remain that of the Governments of the countries in question.
    Mr. Fell: Is it a correct assessment of the position that as soon as these Governments ask us to withdraw our troops we are in fact at any rate, if not in theory, bound to do so? It is this period immediately after the withdrawal of our troops which holds the greatest danger to the lives and property of British people in these countries. Therefore, while everyone admires the way in which the Commonwealth Secretary has handled the situation so far, will he be careful to see that we do not withdraw

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    troops until we are pretty confident that the position is safe for British lives and property?
    Mr. Sandys: Not just British lives and property, but the general situation in these territories is very much in the mind not only of Her Majesty's Government but, even more so, of the Governments concerned. That is why I said earlier that it was my hope to arrange for consultations with the various Governments to see where we go from here.

  ZANZIBAR

    Miss D. N. Smith
    Sir P. Robertsasked the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations what information he has as to the where-abouts of Miss Diana N. Smith, a British subject employed as a nursing sister in a hospital in Pemba, Zanzibar, whose last known address was P.O. Box 98, Wete, Pemba, Zanzibar, in view of the fact that Miss Smith was last heard of when a cable was received by her father on Wednesday 15th January, 1964.
    Mr. Sandys: I understand that she is now working in a hospital in Zanzibar, and that she is safe and well.
    Sir P. Roberts: While thanking my right hon. Friend for that reply, which I am sure will be appreciated by my constituent, may I ask, arising out of what he said earlier, whether he is satisfied that there is sufficient authority in the island of Zanzibar to protect British lives and interests there?
    Mr. Sandys: I give no assurance about the Government of Zanzibar. We have taken precautions quite some time ago to deal with the possibility of the need, which might arise, as I explained to the House, for a rapid evacuation of our citizens in Zanzibar, and there is a naval vessel available for that purpose.

  CYPRUS

    Consultations
    Mr. Bottomleyasked the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations what consultations he has had with Commonwealth countries with a view to their assisting the British troops in Cyprus.
    Mr. Brockwayasked the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations what conclusions were reached at the London conference on the future of Cyprus.
    Mr. Sandys: After the opening session of the Conference I held a series of separate meetings with the representatives of Greece and Turkey and of the two Cypriot communities, with a view to finding a common basis for the discussion of the problem.
    Although the approaches of the two communities remained radically different, some useful progress was made on a number of points.
    However, it soon became evident—as was expected—that the task of reaching agreement was going to be difficult and protracted. In the meantime the situation in Cyprus has been growing extremely tense, which inevitably increases the danger of a renewal of the earlier disorders.
    In these circumstances we felt it desirable that the present peace-keeping force should be enlarged by the participation of additional countries. Negotiations to this end are now proceeding. I hope the House will forgive me if I do not go into greater detail at this juncture. I will make a further statement as soon as practicable.
    Mr. Bottomley: Whilst recognising the need for some international force to assist in keeping the peace in Cyprus, may I ask the Secretary of State to direct his mind to my Question, which asks what consultations he had with the Commonwealth?
    Mr. Sandys: All possible sources were considered.
    Mr. Brockway: Has the right hon. Gentleman had endorsement from Cyprus of any arrangements which have been made for an international force? Particularly, will he say whether this matter has been discussed with U Thant, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, with a view to getting United Nations authority for any steps which are taken?
    Mr. Sandys: I have been in fairly constant touch with all the Governments concerned, but I have not yet had a formal reaction from the Government of

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    Cyprus about this proposal. With regard to the United Nations, as the hon. Member knows we have throughout wanted to keep the United Nations fully informed about the state of the problem and of the situation in Cyprus. As evidence of that, we have arranged with the Secretary-General to have a representative in Cyprus, General Gyani, who is there as this moment.
    Mr. W. Yates: Having seen the matter at first hand, may I ask if the Secretary of State will please convey to the High Commission in Cyprus the thanks of this House, as well as to the Army, for the work they did in exemplary and prompt fashion in December last year?
    Mr. Sandys: I am sure that will be appreciated.

  SOUTHERN RHODESIA

    Mr. Winston Field (Talks)
    Mr. Brockwayasked the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations what decisions were reached in the official discussions with Mr. Winston Field, Prime Minister of Southern Rhodesia, regarding the future of that territory.
    Mr. Sandys: My talks with Mr. Winston Field were confidential.
    Mr. Brockway: I appreciate that, but is it not desirable that as a result of these discussions the Government should now declare their intention in relation to Southern Rhodesia? Is there not great danger in allowing the situation to drift on? Is it not important that we should make clear that sovereignty for Southern Rhodesia will not be recognised until a majority of the population has the right to control the Parliament and the Government?
    Mr. Sandys: I will make a statement when I have something more to say.
    Sir H. Harrison: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the Prime Minister of Southern Rhodesia is held in great regard by many people in that country for his common sense and sagacity? Will my right hon. Friend do everything he can to help him in this difficult matter?
    Mr. Sandys: As I have said, I have been having talks with the Prime
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    Minister of Southern Rhodesia. This is obviously a most difficult and delicate subject, and I think that until any conclusion is reached it is better that I should not make partial statements about these matters.
    Mr. Bottomley: Can the Secretary of State give an assurance that, as the result of these discussions, no departure has been made from Government policy already stated in the House?
    Mr. Sandys: There has been no change.

  INDUSTRY, TRADE AND REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT

    Yorkshire (East and West Ridings)
    Mr. Merlyn Reesasked the Secretary of State for Industry, Trade and Regional Development (1) how far he has proceeded with the delimitation and designation of a Yorkshire regional planning area;
    (2) if he is aware that, despite the present economic position of the East and West Ridings of Yorkshire, between 1951 and 1961 there was a net loss of population of 92,000, mainly young skilled workers, from this area, which contains a relatively small proportion of the modern growth industries; and what regional plan he has made to deal with these long-term problems.
    The Secretary of State for Industry, Trade and Regional Development and President of the Board of Trade (Mr. Edward Heath): In developing the new machinery for regional development I must at present concentrate on those parts of the country where the most pressing problems exist: but I am aware of the general situation, prospects and problems of the East and West Ridings, and I am now considering the position.
    Mr. Rees: Does the right hon. Gentleman recall that on 3rd December last he stated that he was concerned with planning for the country as a whole? Is he aware that it is very important for us to know whether the East and West Ridings will be put together with Lincolnshire or Derbyshire and that this would at least be a first step?
    Mr. Heath: Yes; I appreciate the importance of the point the hon. Gentleman has raised. I was able to discuss this with many of the local authorities and others in the East and West Ridings during my visit before Christmas.
    Mr. Mendelson: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that a statement he made during his recent visit to Yorkshire has been critically received in many quarters in industry? Will not he reconsider his position? Is it not true to say that there are certain parts of Yorkshire, particularly in the West Riding, which are mainly dependent upon old industries, some of which will need less labour in future years? Is not now the best time for future planning to bring diversification of industry to these areas, rather than waiting until there is a gross level of unemployment in Yorkshire as well?
    Mr. Heath: Yes, that is why we are considering the results of the discussions we had before Christmas.

    Pedigree Livestock (Export to Russia and Eastern Europe)
    Mr. Hendryasked the Secretary of State for Industry, Trade and Regional Development what was the amount of exports, of pedigree livestock to Russia and the Eastern European countries in the last 12 months; and what steps he is taking to encourage this trade.
    Mr. Heath: Separate figures are not available of exports of pedigree livestock but exports to Russia and Eastern Europe of cattle for breeding and dairy purposes amounted to £29,000 in 1963.
    My right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and I encourage this trade through the Livestock Export Council and we are supporting the British Agricultural Exhibition in Moscow in May.
    Mr. Hendry: I thank my right hon. Friend for that Answer, which will give a great deal of encouragement to those engaged in this trade. Is my right hon. Friend satisfied that all steps are being taken to make known to the Governments of these countries the availability and quality of British pedigree livestock?
    Mr. Heath: We are doing a great deal to make this known. Both my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture
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    and I are very anxious that exports of this kind should be increased. There will be further opportunities at the Moscow Exhibition. We are publicising this in the Board of Trade Journal this week. We are also, as I have already announced embarking on a series of talks with the representatives of the Eastern bloc countries in addition to the Soviet Union. This will give us an additional opportunity of bringing this to their notice.

    Monopolies Commission's Report (Electrical Equipment)
    Mr. Darlingasked the Secretary of State for Industry, Trade and Regional Development what decision he has come to on the recommendations in paragraph 1066 of the Monopolies Commission's Report on the Supply of Electrical Equipment for Mechanically Propelled Land Vehicles.
    Mr. Heath: I have nothing to add to the Answer given to the right hon Member for Battersea, North (Mr. Jay) on 16th January.
    Mr. Darling: If I remember rightly, the Answer was that the Government were doing something about three of the recommendations and considering the fourth. As there was no indication as to which the recommendations were, may I ask the right hon. Gentleman what he is doing about the recommendation that the Battery Association should bring to an end the price information agreement on which the members of the Association have been working?
    Mr. Heath: My hon. Friend's Answer made it clear that the recommendation that Lucas's interest in certain companies should be made known was dealt with by the publication of the Report. The other two recommendations about resale price maintenance and information agreements were covered by the statement that I made to the House the week before last announcing the legislation which we propose to introduce. I am now considering the last recommendation about publishing prices and terms.

    Electrical Plant (Commonwealth Schemes)
    Mr. Ellis Smithasked the Secretary of State for Industry, Trade and Regional Development what action he

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    has taken, in accordance with the Montreal Conference of 1958, to encourage British finance and electrical plant manufacturers jointly to tender for the plant and equipment, or specifications and designs required for the harnessing of tidal power in Western Australia, the Snowy Mountains Scheme, and other similar schemes in Australia, India, and New Zealand, and for the New Zealand Geothermal Schemes.
    Mr. Heath: With encouragement from the British Government, British manufacturers have been supplying well over half of Australia's and New Zealand's imports of heavy electrical plant and about one-third of India's.
    Mr. Ellis Smith: Does the Minister agree that the potentialities for large-scale electrical plant are greater in the world now than they have ever been? Is he aware that there is a French consortium now preparing specifications and designs for the harnessing of tidal power in Western Australia? As Britons, at Manchester University and at Trafford Park, were the pioneers of these things, will the Secretary of State take a special interest in this in order to ensure that we keep in the forefront of this type of development?
    Mr. Heath: Yes, indeed. Of course we will do that. As to Australia in particular, we are in the current year carrying out a very large programme of British Weeks and the great Exhibition at Sydney. We shall take every opportunity of pressing on with this trade.

    B.O.T.A.C. Assistance, Blyth
    Mr. Milneasked the Secretary of State for Industry, Trade and Regional Development if he will state the number of firms in the Blyth constituency which made applications for Board of Trade Advisory Committee assistance in the last two years, the number of requests granted, and the number of applications still being dealt with.
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade (Mr. David Price): During 1962 and 1963 seven applications were received for financial assistance for projects in the Blyth and Seaton Delaval employment exchange areas, which broadly correspond with the development districts in the hon. Mem-
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    ber's constituency. Two of these were later withdrawn. In one of the other five assistance has been offered and two are under consideration.
    Mr. Milne: I am grateful to the Parliamentary Secretary for that reply. What steps are now being taken to point out to industrialists that the development district outside the growth zone is still eligible for aid and that the grants available within the growth zone are also available in the development district of Blyth itself?
    Mr. Price: This is made clear in our publications, but I will give the further information to the hon. Gentleman that in the six months for which standard grants, as distinct from loans, have been available seven applications have been received for the two employment exchange areas in the hon. Gentleman's constituency and all but one have been approved in principle.

    British Lion Films Ltd.
    Sir C. Osborneasked the Secretary of State for Industry, Trade and Regional Development if he will give details of the way in which the shares of British Lion Films Ltd. have appreciated in such a way that payment of £795,000 is being made to the five directors who purchased a half share in the company in 1958 for £9,000; and if he will make a statement.
    Mr. Heath: From 1958 onwards, the then deferred shareholders, who were also the executive directors, effectively had a a half interest in British Lion after the £600,000 of preferred shares held by the National Film Finance Corporation. In last year's capital reorganisation, after 591,000 of the preferred shares had been repaid, the Corporation and the executive directors were each left with a half interest in the company. From April, 1958, to March, 1963, British Lion, under the management of the executive directors, made profits totalling £1,195,829. British Lion has now been independently valued at £1,590,000 and the executive directors have been bought out for half that sum.
    Sir C. Osborne: May I ask my right hon. Friend two supplementary questions? First, is not this an outrageously big tax-free profit to make in such a short time, particularly when they were dealing partly with Government money

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    and with Government restrictions? Secondly, if the company is now doing so fabulously well, why sell it?—[HON. MEMBERS: "Hear hear."]
    Mr. Heath: I do not know why my hon. Friend should refer to these as being tax-free profits. They were profits made by British Lion and dealt with in the normal way. The tax loss which existed at the time when British Lion was created has not been used and, therefore, these were profits made in the normal way. The reason why the Government bought out the five executive directors was because, as a result of the arrangement for the five directors to continue to manage this company, they had three options. The first was that the Government should buy out. The second was that they should buy out. The third was that the Government should be forced to buy them out. As the five directors did not exercise their options, the Government had no alternative but to buy the company. The success of the company was due to the management of the five directors, and the National Film Finance Corporation had a holding of the 600,000 deferred shares which were repaid. Moreover, the Government have shared to the extent of 50 per cent. in the success of this company.
    Sir C. Osborne: My right hon. Friend has not got my point. Is he assuring the House that the difference between the £9,000 that they paid for half the capital and the £795,000 that they are now getting will be subject to tax; or will it be tax-free? In any case, if they are making all that money, I still do not understand why the company should be sold.
    Mr. Heath: If the company is to be sold and if satisfactory arrangements can be made—[HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"] then, of course, the Government will be in receipt of the full value of the company.—[HON. MEMBERS "Why sell it?"] It is being sold because Governments of both sides, including the one of which the present Leader of the Opposition was a member, have firmly declared that it is not the Government's intention to go into film production or distribution. That remains our view, as I have stated to the House.
    Mr. Jay: Is not the Secretary of State aware that this agreement was made by the present Government in 1958 and was
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    severely criticised by my hon. Friends? As the capital profit on these shares is tax-free, as the right hon. Gentleman must know, surely the right solution is, as the hon. Member for Louth (Sir C. Osborne) said, not to sell these shares out of public ownership?
    Mr. Heath: I cannot accept the view put forward by the right hon. Gentleman. This company must be managed if it is held by the Government. When it was previously managed part of the terms were those to which the right hon. Gentleman now objects. As a result of successful management it has gone from a company making a considerable loss, a heavy tax loss, to one in which the Government's money has been repaid as to the deferred shares, and it has taken half of the results of that operation of the capital in which we each had 50 per cent The right solution is, with the proper safeguards, to sell the company into hands which will work independently on distribution and production.
    Mr. H. Wilson: I would not have got to my feet had the right hon. Gentleman not referred to me. Does he recall that this highly successful operation, which was begun with a decision of the Labour Government to create the National Film Finance Corporation, received the most bitter criticism from Conservatives when they were in Opposition? The whole operation has shown that public enterprise, even in this difficult sphere, can work very successfully. Will the right hon. Gentleman now take it that the interests of the film industry demand a continuance of the good service which has been given under the aegis of public enterprise?
    Mr. Heath: If the right hon. Gentleman will look back to the speeches which he made when introducing the Bill he will see that he was not contemplating that the Government or the National Film Finance Corporation should have a holding in production or distribution companies. He made that plain at the time. We are pursuing exactly the same policy now.
    Mr. Wilson: But does not the right hon. Gentleman recall that the situation then arose of the growing power of the monopoly in distribution in this industry under the Conservative Government? It

    527
    was the Conservatives who then had to go still further into public enterprise, with our considerable support. Would the right hon. Gentleman make it absolutely clear that in the wrecking policy on which he is now engaged he will not allow control to pass directly or indirectly into the hands of any American company?
    Mr. Heath: The reason why the National Film Finance Corporation supported British Lion by taking a shareholding was not because of monopolistic tendencies in the industry but because of the great losses suffered by British Lion, and the N.F.F.C. wished to find some way of recovering its money. The monopolistic tendencies were brought about because of the decline in the requirements of the cinema-going public and of the industry itself, in which, obviously, the duopoly has been strengthened. I have given an assurance regarding the sale of British Lion, that it will maintain its present policy towards independent producers.
    Mr. Wilson: What about my further point; about it passing into American hands?
    Mr. Heath: I have given a full undertaking to the House, and the matter is now being negotiated with those who wish to buy the company.

  SMOKING (YOUNG PEOPLE)
  Mr. Pavittasked the Prime Minister what steps are being taken to co-ordinate the actions of the Minister for Science, the Minister of Health and the Postmaster-General in securing an agreed programme of action to prevent young people acquiring the habit of smoking.
  The Prime Minister (Sir Alec Douglas-Home): My three right hon. Friends and the other Ministers concerned already work closely together in this matter.
  Mr. Pavitt: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that these Ministers are working with singularly little effect? Does he recall that the Government declared their policy on this matter on 27th June, 1957, and that we have now reached the stage when £32,000 is being spent on dissuading people and £10 million on advertising to persuade people to smoke?
  528
  Will he not give a lead and try to get some real action in response to his own Government's policy?
  The Prime Minister: I think that we have taken a lead and action. Local education and local health authorities do a great deal and, for instance, my right hon. Friend the Minister of Health the other day told the House how 440,000 posters carrying the slogan "Cigarettes cause lung cancer" had been distributed for display. I do not think that there is any excuse for anyone not to know the connection between cigarette smoking and cancer.
  Mr. John Hall: Could not hon. Members who feel strongly on this subject perhaps help to set an example by suggesting that smoking should be banned throughout the Palace of Westminster?
  Mr. K. Robinson: Is the Prime Minister aware that neither the medical profession nor the public will take this campaign seriously until the Government do something about cigarette advertising? Will he discuss this with his right hon. Friends?
  The Prime Minister: Yes, Sir. I am always willing to discuss this with my right hon. Friends.

  PUBLIC SERVICE (PUBLIC AND PERSONAL INTERESTS)
  Mr. Loughlinasked the Prime Minister if he will move to appoint a Select Committee to consider standardising the law and practice relating to the exercise of responsibility by individuals in public life in cases where there may be a conflict of public and personal interests.
  The Prime Minister: No, Sir. The main principle is clearly understood—that no conflict must be allowed to arise between private interests and public duties—and I do not see that the existing arrangements require any comprehensive review.
  Mr. Loughlin: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that increasing concern is being expressed about the way in which Ministers can receive pecuniary gains from policies which they themselves pursue? Does he know that his right

  529
  hon. Friend the Minister of Housing and Local Government said last week that members of councils should not vote on matters which manifestly affect their own pockets? If this dictum applies in the case of councillors who are council house tenants, should it not apply also to Ministers and, if not, should it apply to councillors?
  The Prime Minister: Ministers have all sorts of responsibilities and Ministers in the Cabinet have overall responsibilities for every kind of policy. I do not think that we can have a rule more effective than that which all Governments have observed up to now.
  Mr. Loughlin: But if it is true that it should not apply to Ministers, would the Prime Minister give further consideration to the position of local authority representatives who are inhibited in this way in the work of the local authorities? Does not the right hon. Gentleman agree that the local authorities should achieve a greater importance in the shaping of future Governments, and will he kindly have a look at this matter with a view to standardising the practice?
  The Prime Minister: If the hon. Member will put down a Question—
  Mr. Loughlin: I have. It is on the Order Paper.
  The Prime Minister: The hon. Member's Question asks me if I
  "… will move to appoint a Select Committee to consider standardising the law and practice relating to the exercise of responsibility by individuals in public life in cases where there may be a conflict of public and personal interests."
  If the hon. Member wants me to answer a specific question about local authorities he should put one down.
  Mr. Loughlin: I have done so.

  MR. RANDOLPH CHURCHILL
  Mr. Jayasked the Prime Minister why permission was given to Mr. Randolph Churchill to see a Cabinet Paper.
  The Prime Minister: As I informed the House on Tuesday, no such permission was given.
  Mr. Jay: Does not the Prime Minister know that the Official Secrets Act forbids not merely the showing of papers to unauthorised persons, but the giving of information? Is he not aware that this particular paper was circulated to the Cabinet under the initials of the previous Prime Minister, and was formally considered and endorsed by the Cabinet? In these circumstances, will he confirm or deny the persistent report that this information was given to Mr. Randolph Churchill by the right hon. Member for Bromley (Mr. H. Macmillan)?
  The Prime Minister: I have already answered that question, and have said that Mr. Randolph Churchill divulged nothing of the advice given to the Queen. I have also said that I did not intend to give to the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition, and this applies to his right hon. Friend, any information whether or not there was a Cabinet Paper.
  Mr. Jay: As, a year ago, Miss Barbara Fell was sentenced to two years' imprisonment for showing a rather minor official document to an unauthorised person, are we to have one law for civil servants and another for Ministers?
  The Prime Minister: I have already said that no paper of any kind was shown improperly to anybody.

  CYPRUS
  Mr. Warbeyasked the Prime Minister which regional agency has the responsibility for seeking a peaceful settlement of the dispute over Cyprus, in accordance with Articles 33 and 52–54 of the United Nations Charter.
  The Prime Minister: The Treaty of Guarantee between Britain, Greece, Turkey and Cyprus constitutes a regional arrangement, rather than a regional agency, within the meaning of Articles 33 and 52–54 of the United Nations Charter. It provides for certain steps calculated to contribute to the maintenance of peace and security in the area.
  Mr. Warbey: Now that the attempt to secure a purely pacific settlement of the dispute appears to have broken down, and enforcement measures in the

  531
  form of outside military forces are contemplated, will the Prime Minister give an assurance that the Government will abide strictly by the terms of Article 53, which lays down that no enforcement action may be taken without the direct approval and authorisation of the Security Council? Secondly, in view of this, will the Prime Minister agree that it is the responsibility of the Security Council to determine that the composition and character of the forces introduced into Cyprus shall be such as to ensure a pacific settlement?
  The Prime Minister: The hon. Member is really making too many assumptions. First of all, he assumes that any attempts at settlement are at an end. Secondly, he assumes that we are contemplating enforcement measures. What we are aiming at is the introduction of an international force into Cyprus by agreement between the parties.
  Mr. H. Wilson: Is the Prime Minister aware that there will be widespread support for the idea of an international force as a stop-gap operation to keep the peace while other arrangements are being made? Is he aware that we would, at any rate, recognise the value of this not being a N.A.T.O. operation, for reasons that the right hon. Gentleman knows as well as we do—and I do not want to trespass on some very difficult negotiations; and that whatever countries are invited to serve in this very vital task of preventing tensions from flaring up on the island, the sooner it is possible to give that force a United Nations status—recognising the difficulties and delays involved in this—the better it will be for peace keeping, and the reputation of the United Nations?
  The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman is aware of the difficulties here, because we have, of course, to get the agreement of Greece and Turkey as well as that of the Cyprus Government in these matters. We are trying, as he wishes—and as I think the whole House wishes—to organise an international force which will, so to speak, hold the ring while negotiations go on. I would rather not answer today the right hon. Gentleman's Question about the United Nations umbrella over the forces, if he does not mind.

  PUBLIC INQUIRIES
  Mr. Rossasked the Prime Minister if he is satisfied that the rights of the individual to appear before statutory public inquiries of all kinds are safeguarded and are not frustrated by being made difficult and expensive to exercise; and if he will make a statement.
  The Prime Minister: I am not aware of any cases in which persons concerned are not given a full opportunity of being heard before a tribunal or other public inquiry, although the costs of doing so will naturally be greater in some cases than in others. If the hon. Member has any particular case in mind, I shall be glad to consider it.
  Mr. Ross: Does the Prime Minister think it right that objectors to the closure of the lines from Inverness to Kyle and Inverness to Wick—the only railway links in an area of 6,000 square miles—should be asked to travel to one centre? Does he not realise that anyone objecting to the closure of the Kyle of Lochalsh to Inverness line and living in the north of Skye will be faced with a journey of 140 miles each way to exercise his rights? Would the right hon. Gentleman ask his own constituents, in respect of this kind of thing, to travel from Perth to Newcastle?
  The Prime Minister: I have made inquiries on this point. The Transport Users' Advisory Council has told me that written representations are given just as much attention as any other—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."]—and that it is not necessary for a person actually to go to the committee meeting.
  Mr. Ross: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the Prime Minister's reply, I beg to give notice that I shall seek to raise the matter on the Adjournment.

  MINISTERS' AND MEMBERS' SALARIES (COMMITTEE)
  Mr. A. Lewisasked the Prime Minister on what date the Committee which he appointed to inquire into salaries of Ministers and Members of Parliament and related matters first met; and how many meetings they have held.
  The Prime Minister: I do not consider that I am responsible for the arrangements this Committee makes for its meetings.
  Mr. Lewis: Is the Prime Minister aware that until at least a few days ago the Committee had not even met? As he is responsible for setting up the Committee, can he tell us who is responsible for seeing that it meets? What is the purpose of having a Committee that does not meet?
  The Prime Minister: I understand that the panel has had several discussions, met formally yesterday, and saw the Committee this morning.
  Mr. Lewis: That is only since I put down the Question. Are we to take it that every time we want a meeting of the Committee I must put down a Question?
  The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman puts down a lot of Questions, anyhow.

  THE PRIME MINISTER
  Mr. A. Lewisasked the Prime Minister why he will not introduce legislation to provide that the office of Prime Minister shall in future only be held by a person who has secured a majority of votes in the House of Commons voting for that purpose.
  The Prime Minister: I am against unnecessary legislation.
  Mr. Lewis: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware—and I guess he is—that the present Prime Minister was not elected by any persons, either in this House or in the country, when he was appointed; and that some people doubt whether he even had the support of his hon. Friends? Surely, there should be some method whereby British democracy can work, and is not this a good way of seeing that it does so?
  The Prime Minister: I think that I dealt with that matter the day before yesterday.
  Mr. Longden: Is my right hon. Friend aware that most people are getting heartily sick of all the rubbish that is being spoken—[Interruption.]—and has been written about his selection as Prime
  534
  Minister; and that most people believe that the process of that selection was as democratic, as dignified and as expeditious as the process employed by the party opposite in selecting its leader a year ago.

  TANGANYIKA (NEWSPAPER INTERVIEW)
  Mr. Healeyasked the Prime Minister by what authority a Government intelligence officer gave an interview concerning Tanganyika which appeared in the Daily Telegraph on 23rd January, 1964.
  The Prime Minister: No authority was given for an interview, and I have no reason to suppose that the article in question was based on information supplied by a Government official.
  Mr. Healey: Would not the Prime Minister agree that statements made in this interview were mischievous, irresponsible and untrue, and can only damage co-operation between Commonwealth countries, particularly in security matters? Is he in a position to assure the House that he knows for certain that no Government servant was responsible for this interview? He will realise how important this could be for Commonwealth co-operation in future.
  The Prime Minister: I have tried to say that, to the best of my knowledge, no Government official, certainly, was responsible for this. That is what I said in my original Answer. It really is not for me to comment on the article, or on the internal affairs or personalities of other countries.
  Mr. Hastings: Would not my right hon. Friend agree that there is every merit in the public of this country being made fully aware of the Communist menace in Africa and that this article went a long way to enlighten them?
  Hon. Members: Answer.
  Mr. Healey: If the Prime Minister will not answer his hon. Friend's supplementary question, will he at least assure the House that certain statements about Mr. Kambona's residence in Moscow were untrue, and known to be untrue, and that no service is done to the cause of the Commonwealth or of

  535
  resistance to Communism in Africa by mischievous, irresponsible and untrue statements about Ministers in other Governments?
  The Prime Minister: I did not answer my hon. Friend's supplementary question because I am not concerned to confirm or not confirm statements by journalists in articles.
  Mr. H. Wilson: If the Prime Minister refuses to answer questions about a Communist plot in East Africa, may I ask whether his own statement on American television last Sunday as reported in this country—perhaps inaccurately—represents the view of Her Majesty's Government?
  The Prime Minister: I hope that the statements I make anywhere represent the views of Her Majesty's Government.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Mr. H. Wilson: May I ask the Leader of the House whether he will state the business of the House for next week?
The Lord Privy Seal (Mr. Selwyn Lloyd): Yes, Sir. The business for next week will be as follows:
MONDAY, 3RD FEBRUARY—Second Reading of the International Development Association Bill, and of the International Headquarters and Defence Organisations Bill [Lords], and Committee stage of the Money Resolutions.
Motion on a Double Taxation Relief Order.
TUESDAY, 4TH FEBRUARY—Remaining stages of the Consolidated Fund Bill, which, if the House agrees, will be taken formally to allow debate, until seven o'clock, on an Opposition Motion on the Distribution of Political Material by the General Post Office.
And, afterwards, on the Sale of the British Lion Films Limited, on the Motion for the Adjournment of the House.
WEDNESDAY, 5TH FEBRUARY—Second Reading of the Public Libraries and Museums Bill, and Committee stage of the Money Resolution.
And, if there is time, the Second Reading of the British Nationality Bill.
THURSDAY, 6TH FEBRUARY—Debate on a Government Motion on Commonwealth Trade, Technical Assistance and other Commonwealth Links.
FRIDAY, 7th FEBRUARY Private Members' Motions.
MONDAY, 10TH FEBRUARY—The proposed business will be: Debate on a Government Motion on the Buchanan Report.
Mr. H. Wilson: It looks like a more interesting week's business than the business which the right hon. and learned Gentleman announced last week. Would the right hon. and learned Gentleman tell us when it is expected that we shall have the White Paper on the Monopolies Commission and also the Bill dealing with resale price maintenance?
Mr. Lloyd: In answer to the right hon. Gentleman's first comment, I certainly hope that next week will be as useful a week as this week has been.
As for the second question, we are one week nearer to it than we were this time last week.
Mr. Grant-Ferris: Has my right hon. and learned Friend had his attention drawn to the excellent interim Report which was published yesterday by the new Inland Waterways Board? In view of the recommendations published there, can my right hon. and learned Friend say whether it will be possible for the House to discuss them before the Board produces its final Report? Would he consider arranging for the House to have at least half a day's debate on the subject?
Mr. Lloyd: Further consultations and discussions were recommended in the Report. It would be wiser to wait until those have taken place before we have a debate.
Mr. Cronin: When can the House expect a statement from the Minister of Aviation on the setting up of a committee under Sir John Lang to investigate excessive profits on a guided missiles contract, bearing in mind that this is not only a matter of great public importance but that this new committee to some extent anticipated the function of a Select Committee of the House, the Public Accounts Committee? Is it not

537
essential that the House should have a statement on this at the earliest opportunity?
Mr. Lloyd: If my memory is right, there are certain Questions down for my right hon. Friend the Minister of Aviation to answer early next week. I think that they will cover the point which the hon. Member is making. I believe that my right hon. Friend is first on the list to answer Questions then.
Mr. H. Wilson: Since this raises questions which are rather wider than the responsibility of the Ministry of Aviation, and an inquiry was set up by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, may I ask whether the right hon. and learned Gentleman will tell us why, in view of the reported loss of £2·7 million through some very unsatisfactory financial operations, an inquiry has been set up in this way, under the chairmanship of a former Permanent Secretary in a sister Department working under the same system? Why is it not being left to the ordinary machinery of the House to deal with what, on the face of the Comptroller and Auditor General's Report, looks like a public scandal?
Mr. Lloyd: I think that before we come to any kind of judgment on what the right hon. Gentleman has said it would be much better to await the Answers of my right hon. Friend to the Questions on the Order Paper.
Dame Irene Ward: On the business for Tuesday, may I ask my right hon. and learned Friend whether, having regard to my Motion on false documentaries by the B.B.C. it would be in order for the Postmaster-General to convey an apology from the Director-General of the B.B.C. to the North Country for the false documentary on our position?
[That, in the opinion of this House, the Postmaster General should require the British Broadcasting Corporation to make a statement on its recent Gallery programme on the North-East of England, which it is alleged was faked in certain respects, as it is in the national interest that documentary programmes should be true representation of fact.]
Mr. Speaker: There is some difficulty, I think, in getting the delivery of apologies into business questions.
Dame Irene Ward: On a point of order. I was referring to a Motion on the Order Paper. I think that it would be convenient that my right hon. Friend the Postmaster-General should convey the apology.
Mr. Speaker: I know of the Motion on the Order Paper, but, seriously I think that we ought to confine business questions to business, otherwise it will be interminable.
Mr. Loughlin: Does the Leader of the House recall that a fortnight ago he said that he would consider the possibility of finding time for the House to discuss the situation in Aden, where a considerable number of people are still being detained without trial and where a state of emergency still exists? Has the right hon. and learned Gentleman considered this matter and, if so, can he find time for a short debate on the situation next week?
Mr. Lloyd: I have considered the matter, but I cannot find time for a debate next week.
Mr. Mendelson: Would the Leader of the House consider arranging a foreign affairs debate in which his right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary could give an account to the House of his recent discussions with Common Market countries at the Western European Union and on other occasions on the Government's policy and their desire to participate in political discussions on the future political set-up of Europe?
Can the right hon. and learned Gentleman also tell the House whether, if a debate could not be forthcoming next week, the Foreign Secretary could at least make a statement and could be questioned on what apparently are serious departures from statements of Government policy in the House?
Mr. Lloyd: I will consider with my right hon. Friend what the hon. Member has said.
Mr. Jennings: Has my right hon. and learned Friend taken note of the Motion, in the names of about 100 hon. Members from both sides of the House,

539
on public service pensioners and their plight?
[That this House, recognising the hardships of public service pensioners and those retired from the armed forces, and especially of the older pensioners in these groups, whose pensions bear no relation to similar pensions now obtaining in the public service and the armed forces, urges Her Majesty's Government to introduce special provisions to improve such pensions.]
Would my right hon. and learned Friend be prepared to give time in the near future for a debate on this subject?
Mr. Lloyd: I will bear in mind both what my hon. Friend has just said and also what is in the Motion.
Mr. Wigg: Would the Leader of the House not consider the point made by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition and find time for a debate on the Report he mentioned? Surely the point made by my right hon. Friend was that that Report has not been considered by the House. It contains the gravest allegations about impropriety in the divulging of information and the obtaining of very large sums of public money. The right hon. and learned Gentleman is fully aware of the difficulties about putting down a Question, although I have one on the Order Paper.
Surely it is only proper that before a Minister who is personally involved in this sets up a committee of inquiry the House should have the opportunity of debating the Report of the Estimates Committee.
Mr. Lloyd: There are certain opportunities open to the Opposition for this sort of thing, and, also, there are certain days devoted to the Reports of the Estimates Committee. In fact, I am at present discussing with my hon. Friend the Member for Farnham (Sir G. Nicholson) and other hon. Members how we handle that matter. I shall bear in mind what the hon. Gentleman has said.
Sir J. Eden: On Monday's business, the Double Taxation Relief Order, may we expect a statement showing the progress which is being made in negotiations with the Ghana Government to relieve former Gold Coast civil servants and
540
other servants of Ghana from the iniquitous imposition placed upon them by the arbitrary decision of President Nkrumah?
Mr. Lloyd: I think that it would be difficult for my hon. Friend or for anyone else to get that in order under the Double Taxation Relief (Shipping and Air Transport Profits) (Lebanon) Order, 1964.
Mr. Lawson: Has the attention of the Leader of the House been drawn to the Written Answer given on Tuesday last to the effect that his right hon. Friend the Minister of Public Building and Works has decided to transfer his accounts department headquarters, employing 1,000 people, to Hastings? Since this appears to be contrary to the advice of the Flemming Report and the Government's declared policy of bringing about a more sensible distribution of Government Departments and offices, will the right hon. and learned Gentleman find time for the matter to be debated?
Mr. Lloyd: I was wondering how the hon. Gentleman would bring the point in on business for next week. I shall convey what he has said to my right hon. Friend.
Mr. W. Yates: Will my right hon. and learned Friend bear in mind that, on the Consolidated Fund Bill next Tuesday, I shall stand in my place until such time as there is a debate on the emergency now existing in Aden and the Protectorate, as I am not prepared to see British subjects remain in gaol without trial?
Mr. Lloyd: Whether my hon. Friend stands in his place or not is not for me.
Mr. Milne: Is the Leader of the House prepared to reconsider his reply about monopolies and the issue of the Government White Paper on resale price maintenance? Does he think that his reply about it being a week nearer than it was this time last week was the brightest way of dealing with a question which is of vital importance to millions of people?
Mr. Lloyd: It was a very factual way to deal with it.
Sir C. Osborne: Since the business on the Consolidated Fund Bill on Tuesday

541
is to be taken formally and the debate on the Post Office is to proceed until seven o'clock, can my right hon. and learned Friend assure the House that there will be plenty of time to discuss the question of British Lion Films, in which great interest has been shown on both sides, or shall we have to finish at ten o'clock?
Mr. Lloyd: It will be taken on the Motion for Adjournment of the House, and the debate will have to finish in accordance with the Standing Order.
Dr. King: Further to the question asked by the hon. Member for Burton (Mr. Jennings) about the Motion on public service and military pensioners, the veteran pensioners, will the Leader of the House bear in mind two points, one, that there are already over 100 signatories to the Motion from both sides of the House, and, two, that in the last pensions increase debate both sides of the House promised that they would deal with this matter soon and put it on a permanent basis? Will the Leader of the House give very serious consideration to providing an opportunity for the issue to be debated?
Mr. Lloyd: Certainly.
Sir J. Eden: With further reference to that Motion, in view of the fact that a very substantial increase took place under the 1962 Act, the largest single increase ever made in these pensions, will my right hon. Friend consider the aspect of reorganising the method of determining these pensions rather than follow the exact terms of the Motion on the Order Paper?
Mr. Lloyd: That would be a policy matter not for me, but I shall bear in mind the question of a debate.
Mr. W. Yates: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. So that there be no misunderstanding in the House about the Consolidated Fund Bill, do I understand that the rules of the House are that, if a Member is standing when the Bill is under discussion, that Member, whatever be agreed between the usual channels, has the absolute right to be called?
Mr. Speaker: No one has an absolute right to be called; it depends on his catching my eye. But I think that the
542
point which the hon. Gentleman wishes to raise is clear enough.
Mr. Scholefield Allen: In considering an opportunity for a debate on pensions, will the Leader of the House arrange matters so that discussion of the plight of the old railway superannuitants is within order, since they have had the worst deal of all pensioners in this country?
Mr. Lloyd: I shall bear that in mind.
Mr. Emrys Hughes: The Leader of the House has told my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley (Mr. Wigg) that the White Paper on Defence will be published 13th February. Can he say when there will be a debate on this and, if his answer is "Very soon", will he define "very soon"?
Mr. Lloyd: There certainly will be a debate on the White Paper within a reasonable time after its publication.
Mr. Lipton: The Leader of the House answered a question on business from me last week about the Government's intention regarding resale price maintenance. Can he now confirm that the Government have decided that the Bill relating to resale price maintenance will be on the Statute Book before the next General Election?
Mr. Lloyd: I have nothing to add to what I said last week. I covered that point.
Mr. Wigg: If the hon. Member for The Wrekin (Mr. W. Yates) exercises his undoubted right to initiate a debate on the Yemen on the Consolidated Fund Bill next Tuesday, will the Leader of the House, in discharge of his duty, institute a discussion through the usual channels in pursuance of the point made by the hon. Member for Louth (Sir C. Osborne) so that we have adequate time to discuss the position of British Lion Films?
Mr. Lloyd: As I said last week, matters of order are not for me, but the debate on this Consolidated Fund Bill will be a narrow one, and it will have to be within the terms of the Bill.
Mr. W. Yates: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. May I ask whether the Leader of the House is correct in his statement that, on the Consolidated Fund Bill, the two Front Benches can

543
agree to limit the rights of hon. Members?
Mr. Speaker: With respect, the hon. Gentleman does not listen. Nobody said that. The point is that on this Consolidated Fund Bill, as the hon. Gentleman will see if he looks at it, there is some restriction on what can be discussed, because all that will be within its scope will be matters relating to the administration in respect of which there are particular Supplementary Estimates for which the Bill will provide the money, so to speak. I should not like to give a Ruling about the total contents now. I have not got the Supplementary Estimates before me.
Mr. W. Yates: In that case, Mr. Speaker, are Amendments to the Bill by private Members allowed or not?
Mr. Speaker: If the hon. Gentleman wants to make an Amendment, he can try it. I shall consider it then. But let us get on now. I shall protect his rights, strictly.
Mr. Lipton: The Leader of the House will recall that, last week, he said that it was the Government's intention to have legislation about resale price maintenance on the Statute Book during the lifetime of the present Paraliament. What I am asking him to say now is whether this is still just an intention or whether a decision has been taken by Her Majesty's Government to have the Bill on the Statute Book before the next General Election?
Mr. Lloyd: I have nothing to add. The hon. Gentleman must draw his own conclusions.
Mr. H. Wilson: If the Leader of the House has nothing to add, has he anything to subtract?

ORDERS OF THE DAY

  FAMILY ALLOWANCES AND NATIONAL INSURANCE [MONEY]
  Resolution reported,
  That, for the purposes of any Act of the present Session to extend the meaning of the word "child" in the Family Allowances Acts, the National Insurance Acts and the National Insurance (Industrial Injuries) Acts and to Increase widowed mother's allowance and certain other benefits under the National Insurance Acts and the National Insurance (Industrial Injuries) Acts paid in respect of or by reference to children, it is expedient to authorise the payment out of moneys provided by Parliament—

  (a) of any increase in the moneys so payable under the Family Allowances Act 1945, whether on account of allowances or of the expenses of the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance, being an increase attributable to any extension of the meaning of the world "child" in that Act to include persons up to the age of 19 who are undergoing full-time instruction in a school or who are apprentices, and

  (b) any increase attributable to the new Act in the moneys so payable under section 38 of the National Insurance Act 1946 or section 60 of the National Insurance (Industrial Injuries) Act 1946 (administrative expenses).

  Resolution agreed to.

  FAMILY ALLOWANCES AND NATIONAL INSURANCE BILL
  Considered in Committee.
  [Sir WILLIAM ANSTRUTHER-GRAY in the Chair]

  FAMILY ALLOWANCES AND NATIONAL INSURANCE BILL

    Clause 1.—(EXTENSION OF ALLOWANCES, BENEFITS AND GRANTS BY INCREASE OF AGE LIMITS FROM 18 TO 19.)
    3.50 p.m.
    Miss Margaret Herbison: I beg to move, in page 1, line 5, to leave out from beginning to the second "the".
    The Chairman: I think that it will be convenient to discuss with this Amendment the Amendments in page 1, line 11, leave out from "apprentice)" to end of line 12 and insert:
    "the words 'before he or she attains the age of eighteen years' were omitted",

    545
    in page 2, line 1, leave out from "her)" to end of line 2 and insert:
    "there shall be omitted the words 'is under the age of eighteen years and'",
    and in page 2, line 5, leave out from "eighteen)" to end of line 6 and insert:
    "there shall be omitted the words 'was under the age of eighteen years and'".
    Miss Herbison: Since all the Amendments hang together, it is much better that they should be taken together, Sir William.
    This matter was raised on Second Reading by members not only of the Opposition Front Bench but of the Opposition back benches. A number of my hon. Friends have had correspondence with the Minister about it. As a result of that correspondence, together with, perhaps, pressure from both sides of the Committee, the Government decided to raise the age in question from 18 to 19 years. These Amendments, if accepted, would do away with the age limit altogether and would make dependency, and not age, the criterion.
    The Joint Parliamentary Secretary replied to the points made on Second Reading when she wound up the debate. I listened very carefully to what she said. Since then, I have read the OFFICIAL REPORT to see what she said. All that the hon. Lady was able to bring forward was a long rigmarole about all the anomalies which would be created if our request were granted.
    I wish to take up one of the first things which the hon. Lady said. She gave a number of examples by which she tried to prove that some people would get this money when they were not in need of it. But family allowances are paid generally without a means test being carried out. If the hon. Lady were to follow her argument to its logical conclusion, that conclusion would have to be that family allowances were paid throughout on a means test basis. I understand that the Government do not accept that, and we on this side certainly do not accept it. I therefore think that the hon. Lady's first argument was completely "phoney".
    The Joint Parliamentary Secretary pointed out on Second Reading that perhaps it would be better if young people
    546
    over 19 years of age came under a discretionary system. Yet she said:
    "The discretionary system often benefits people far more than a rigid insurance system. Where there is a discretion, often those people whose need is greatest get far more than they do under a rigid insurance system. But local authorities vary enormously one from another … the standard of help given to the widow or the person with a dependent child at college varies very much. We therefore thought fit to deal with the bulk of the cases now by increasing the age limit from 18 to 19."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 22nd January, 1964; Vol. 687, c. 1192]
    That statement backs up the case for the Amendment. What, in effect, the hon. Lady said was that during the period between 18 and 19 years of age—the present age limit is 18; the new one will be 19—local authorities have discretion to help, but, because their help varies so greatly, the Government have decided that, even though it may cause difficulties to raise the age to 19, they are going to raise it. If this applies to 19 years of age, it applies just as much to any age of dependency while a young person is being educated. I think that that demolishes another of the hon. Lady's arguments.
    In another part of her speech the Joint Parliamentary Secretary said:
    "If we were not to make that period end at a specified age but dependent upon the end of education we think that it would put an almost intolerable burden on the child, who would be under very great pressure to continue education, regardless of whether he was a suitable subject or not, in order to qualify his mother for widow's benefit if the age of 50 was reached by the mother during the critical time."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 22nd January, 1964; Vol. 687, c. 1190.]
    It would not be the mothers putting an intolerable burden on the child. There would be, and always is, an intolerable burden on these children.
    Is it not a sad reflection on our present legislation that the question whether a person should carry on as a student until 20 years of age should be affected by whether or not his mother would continue to obtain her pension, which at present is £3 7s. 6d. What the hon. Lady is saying is that if the age were raised from 19 to 20 years, in the example which I am giving, whether or not a child were capable of benefiting from the education, the mother might insist on the child continuing in full-time education so that she would reach the

    547
    age of 50 during that time and continue to receive her £3 7s. 6d.
    Should not the Govenment approach the matter from another angle? Should not they have realised long before this that it is an intolerable burden on any woman to realise that, having reached the age of 49 years and 6 months and after caring for a family, and because her last child leaves full-time education, she will lose her £3 7s. 6d. and may get only 10s. a week or nothing at all? If the Government had given as much thought to that aspect of the problem as they have to the question of the anomalies which might arise if we made the criterion dependence and not age, we should not be discussing the problem of the woman who might reach the age of 50 while her child continued his education between the ages of 19 and 20, or 19 and 21, or 19 and 22. I ask the Minister and the Joint Parliamentary Secretary to give serious thought to this.
    I emphasise that it was the present Government which changed the age from 40 to 50 years. In the meantime, many widowed mothers have suffered very greatly. Many of them have missed by a year, a month, a week or even a day obtaining a pension which we on this side feel they should have had. All the reasons given by the Joint Parliamentary Secretary are reasons of expediency and not of principle at all. I ask her and the Minister to have second thoughts on this matter. I ask the hon. Lady to bend her thoughts to this matter and to accept the Amendment. If she finds that impossible, I ask her to give the reasons why it is impossible, but I hope that we shall not hear arguments about the difficulty of administration or the kind of "phoney" reasons which we were given on Second Reading.
    4.0 p.m.
    The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance (Mrs. Margaret Thatcher): I will try to deal as quickly as I can with the arguments raised by the hon. Lady the Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison), but I should point out that what she expresses to be her intention is very different from what her Amendments would achieve.
    Perhaps I may deal with the question a little more generally than the hon.
    548
    Lady did in the context of what her Amendments would do. The whole legislation which the Amendments would change is basically legislation to deal with children, it is drafted to deal with children and it has been interpreted as dealing with children in their middle to late teens. It is all relevant to that context.
    The Amendment moved by the hon. Lady would alter the definition of a child. It would leave out the limit prescribed within the family allowances regulations so that the definition of a child would become
    "A person shall be treated for the purposes of this Act as a child during any period while he or she is undergoing full-time instruction in school or is an apprentice."
    That depends, therefore, upon what is a school in this context and how the phrase full-time instruction is interpreted.
    "School" is defined widely to include
    "instruction not only in a school in the ordinary sense of the word, but also in a university, college, establishment for further education or other educational establishment as defined or within the meaning of the Education Act."
    The regulations also allow any other establishment to be treated as a school for the purposes of the Act
    "if in the opinion of the Minister it should be treated as an establishment similar to one of those specified."
    Partly because the legislation is dealing in the context of children, a number of other establishments have been specified as schools, including commercial schools, comptometer and other calculating machine schools, dancing, dramatic, speech training and music schools, schools of hairdressing, riding schools, sea training schools, Outward Bound schools and schools run by the National Institute of Houseworkers. They have all been recognised because under the existing legislation, an age limit is prescribed within the Act which limits that Act to children of the age group that I have tried to describe as "middle to late teens".
    A child is a person who is undergoing full-time instruction in any one of those establishments. Full-time instruction is also generously interpreted. As a general rule, it means receiving during a week about 20 hours' instruction before five o'clock in a class. Therefore, according to the hon. Lady's definition, anyone

    549
    receiving full-time instruction in any of those establishments is a child and would qualify, therefore, for dependency increases on either unemployment, sickness or widowed mother's benefit.
    I notice that the hon. Lady does not intend such people to qualify for family allowances, although I was not certain whether she was trying to have a different rule for family allowances and National Insurance merely to get the Amendment in order, or whether she intended to have a different rule.
    Mr. G. R. Mitchison: I had some responsibility for drafting the Amendment. If I may satisfy the hon. Lady's curiosity, the reason why family allowances have been left out is that they are paid out of public funds and we should, therefore, be out of order in attempting to put forward an Amendment. We sometimes hope that the Government will be consistent.
    Mrs. Thatcher: I was hoping that the hon. and learned Member would be consistent. He has now explained his inconsistency in his Amendments concerning family allowances.
    The new definition would, therefore, apply to those taking a second or third degree at university—a research degree after an ordinary degree—even while they were receiving a grant or bursary which would normally make them independent because they were at a school—that is, a university—receiving full-time instruction of 20 hours a week. They might also be doing demonstrating. I remember that when taking my first science degree, many people in that category did demonstration work in the vacation, but they would still be children for the purposes of the Acts with which we are concerned.
    If the hon. and learned Member intends to include family allowances in these provisions, the application of his Amendment to family allowances would mean that a student or graduate might well be married, have children of his own and get family allowances, and yet, because for the purposes of the hon. Lady's definition he was still a child, he might qualify his own parents to receive family allowances in respect of him.
    I hope that the hon. Lady will appreciate the significance of the point which I made at the outset. This whole legis-
    550
    lation is drafted in respect and in the context of children and late teen-agers, with the expectation that there will be a limit to these things and that that limit will come in the age limit and not merely in the description of schools.
    I turn now to the provisions concerning widowed mothers, with which one of the Amendments is concerned. A widowed mother's allowance may continue in respect of her child for two reasons. One is that the child is still residing with her up to the age—in the Bill—of 19. The child might, in fact, be earning and independent, but because she still resides with the mother she continues to qualify her mother for the widowed mother's allowance.
    If we removed the age limit, as the hon. Lady's Amendment would do, any widowed mother who had a son or daughter residing with her would continue to get widowed mother's personal allowance, with its advantageous earnings rule, so long as the child was with her; and a child is not defined except by relation to the ordinary family allowances provision. Thus, in the case of a mother with a single daughter who never gets married, if the child continued to reside with her mother even though she was 30 or 40 years of age, she would still qualify her mother for a widowed mother's allowance.
    The other limb of the widowed mother's benefit when she has children living with her is that she still continues to receive it so long as the child is at an educational establishment and is not older than 19. These two provisions march together. At the moment, therefore, the course of the child's education is unlikely to affect the widowed mother's benefit position, because the mother will get it so long as the child is residing with her whether or not she is continuing her education.
    Under the hon. Lady's Amendment, there would be no limit to the residence condition, and this, of course, has nothing whatever to do with the test given by the hon. Lady of education and dependency So long as the son or daughter was residing with the mother, even though they got married and brought husbands or wives home to live with them, they would qualify their mother for widowed mother's allowance.

    551
    Even when the education has ceased, if the child has come home he or she will still continue to qualify the mother for the widowed mother's allowance. If the hon. Lady states that she did not intend this residence provision to continue indefinitely, the other factor becomes important. As the hon. Lady knows, the important factor is whether the mother is 50 years of age when the son or daughter reaches 19. The hon. Lady made some comments about this, but they are more relevant to a later Amendment.
    Clearly, we will get one or two tricky circumstances if there is no age limit. At the moment—
    Miss Herbison: The hon. Lady has said that I made reference to that, but that it applies to another Amendment. It applies also in this case, because I was taking up the points that the hon. Lady has made in resisting the criterion of dependency.
    Mrs. Thatcher: On the assumption that the same provisions would qualify for a widowed mother's benefit and the age limit of 50 would stay. Without an age limit on the child, we should come to a very tricky moment.
    For example, if the mother were to become 50 within a few months of the child reaching 19 and the child wanted to cease its education and go out to earn a living—a girl might have come to the end of a secretarial course—the mother might say, "If you go on for another six months, I shall be 50, and, therefore, become entitled to benefit between the age of 50 and 60", which would amount to very nearly £2,000. That is the amount that would be at stake.
    Bearing in mind the list I have given of establishments ranking as schools, it would be very tempting for the mother, or for the child, to say, "Shall I go back for another six months, or perhaps take a language course?" The Act would be open to a good deal of manipulation. We think that it would be better to recognise the context in which these provisions were drafted, which is for children, keep the age limit of 19, and deal with it by the Anderson grants. The grants to which I referred on the
    552
    last occasion as being discretionary were the grants which applied to secondary school education. These vary a great deal between one local authority and another.
    As soon as a person comes into a silghtly higher age group qualifying for grant to go to university or college at the higher education grant, the system of Anderson grants is uniform throughout the country. As the hon. Lady probably knows a maximum grant of £300 for maintenance over and above tuition is awarded in those circumstances and there is provision for supplementation to the person who has to go home during the vacation and cannot expect to be supported by a mother or father.
    We think that to remove the age limit would make nonsense of the residential qualification for widowed mothers' allowance and also make nonsense of the family allowance provision, if the intention were to apply the age limit to that as well. We think, therefore, that the Bill as it is, without the Amendment, would be better—to extend the limit to the age of 19, which will deal with the bulk of the cases. When the limit was fixed at 18 in 1956 there were 19,500 children aged 18 or over still at school in Great Britain. In 1962, the figure was 31,500, so more children are staying on later.
    We think that the increase to 19 will still preserve the essence of the Family Allowances Act as providing for children and will deal with the majority of the cases. Over and above those cases, the matter is better dealt with by reference to the Anderson grant system. I hope, therefore, that the Committee will reject the Amendment.
    Mr. Mitchison: To what extent will this depend on the definition of the school, that is to say, the Order which the hon. Lady read out, including a number of establishments as schools? She will realise that that Order was made by the Minister, it could be revoked and a more appropriate Order substituted if that were required. There is really no point in the terms of that Order, and I should like to know how far it comes into these figures.
    Mrs. Thatcher: The definition of schools which I gave referred only to schools for family allowance purposes.

    553
    That is an extended definition of establishments similar to schools. The figures that I have given of children staying on relate to secondary schools in the ordinary meaning of the words. The hon. and learned Gentleman has emphasised my point that because the Act applied to children we have tried to be generous all along, in every one of these interpretations, and the basis is that it is not suitable for extending the right into the ordinary period of adulthood.
    4.15 p.m.
    Miss Herbison: The reply which we have received from the hon. Lady deals, first, with the Amendments on the Notice Paper. It is true that my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison) is very good at working out Amendments, but neither he nor I would ever claim that we are as fortunate as the hon. Lady in having the staff of the Ministry beside her to help her.
    The hon. Lady and the Minister are very well aware what we want by our Amendment. When the hon. Lady comes to the second part of her case and leaves the technicalities of the Amendment, she shows very clearly that what we want the Government at this stage are not prepared to give.
    I want to refer to a letter which came from the hon. Lady to one of my hon. Friends, when he was asking to have the age raised above 18, merely, I think, at that time, to 19. The hon. Lady, in her letter of 19th July, 1963, wrote these words:
    "Age 18 was adopted because it was the highest practical point that could be fitted into the national insurance and family allowances schemes and it has not so far proved possible to improve upon it. There has to be a point at which childhood comes to an
    end for these purposes and it could not be taken beyond the age 18 without far-reaching consequences in the structure and administration of both schemes."
    The Government, a few months after the hon. Lady sent that letter to my hon. Friend, discovered that they could overcome the consequences, both structural and administrative, in order to raise the limit from 18 to 19 years of age. We on this side of the Committee feel that the difficulties which were inherent in raising it from 18 to 19 could just as easily be overcome in changing it to dependency.
    I would again make the plea to the Minister to have another look at this. Of course, no one on this side of the Committee wants the position which the hon. Lady says would result if this Amendment were accepted, of a widowed mother in those circumstances continuing to receive a pension for the rest of her life. What we want from the Minister is an answer to the point that we are making about making these people really dependent, that the age should go up to about 22 on full-time education and that those taking perhaps a primary degree should be covered by this scheme.
    If the Government had the will to do so they themselves could find the right form of words. It could not be done at this stage, but they could put down appropriate Amendments in another place. Unless we get an assurance that they will do so, we shall have to vote on these Amendments as they are on the Notice Paper.
    Question put, That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause:—
    The Committee divided: Ayes 191, Noes 159.

    Division No. 11.]

    AYES

    [4.20 p.m.

    Agnew, Sir Peter

    Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hon. John

    Clarke, Brig. Terence (Portsmth, W.)

    Allason, James

    Boyle, Rt. Hon, Sir Edward

    Cleaver, Leonard

    Arbuthnot, Sir John

    Braine, Bernard

    Cole, Norman

    Awdry, Daniel (Chippenham)

    Brewls, John

    Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.

    Barlow, Sir John

    Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. Sir Walter

    Cordle, John

    Barter, John

    Brown, Alan (Tottenham)

    Corfield, F. V.

    Batsford, Brian

    Browne, Percy (Torrington)

    Costain, A. P.

    Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton

    Bryan, Paul

    Courtney, Cdr. Anthony

    Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gos & Fhm)

    Bullus, Wing Commander Eric

    Critchley, Julian

    Berkeley, Humphry

    Campbell, Gordon (Moray & Nairn)

    Crowder, F. P.

    Biffen, John

    Carr, Rt. Hon. Robert (Mitcham)

    Cunningham, Sir Knox

    Bishop, Sir Patrick

    Cary, Sir Robert

    Dance, James

    Black, Sir Cyril

    Chataway, Christopher

    d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry

    Bossom, Hon. Clive

    Chichester-Clark, R.

    Deedes, Rt. Hon. W. F.

    Bourne-Arton, A.

    Churchill, Rt. Hon. Sir Winston

    Digby, Simon Wingfield

    Box, Donald

    Clark, Henry (Antrim, N.)

    Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. M.

    Drayson, G. B.

    Jennings, J. C.

    Powell, Rt. Hon. J. Enoch

    du Cann, Edward

    Johnson, Eric (Blackley)

    Prior, J. M. L.

    Eden, Sir John

    Johnson Smith, Geoffrey

    Prior-Palmer, Brig. Sir Otho

    Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)

    Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)

    Pym, Francis

    Elliott, R. W. (Newc'tle-upon-Tyne, N.)

    Joseph, Rt. Hon. Sir Keith

    Quennett, Miss J. M.

    Emmet, Hon. Mrs. Evelyn

    Kaberry, Sir Donald

    Rawlinson, Rt. Hon. Sir Peter

    Errington, Sir Eric

    Kerans, Cdr. J. S.

    Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin

    Farey-Jones, F. W.

    Kerby, Capt. Henry

    Ridley, Hon. Nicholas

    Farr, John

    Kirk, Peter

    Ridsdale, Julian

    Fell, Anthony

    Lagden, Godfrey

    Roberts, Sir Peter (Heeley)

    Finlay, Graeme

    Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry

    Roots, William

    Fisher, Nigel

    Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)

    Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard

    Fraser, Ian (Plymouth, Sutton)

    Lilley, F. J. P.

    Russell, Sir Ronald

    Freeth, Denzil

    Lindsay, Sir Martin

    Scott-Hopkins, James

    Gammans, Lady

    Litchfield, Capt. John

    Sharples, Richard

    Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, Central)

    Lloyd, Rt. Hon. Selwyn (Wirral)

    Shaw, M.

    Goodhew, Victor

    Longden, Gilbert

    Skeet, T. H. H.

    Gough, Frederick

    Loveys, Walter H.

    Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'd & Chiswick)

    Grant-Ferris, R.

    Lucas Tooth, Sir Hugh

    Spearman, Sir Alexander

    Green, Alan

    McAdden, Sir Stephen

    Stainton, Keith

    Gresham Cooke, R.

    MacArthur, Ian

    Stanley, Hon. Richard

    Grosvenor, Lord Robert

    McLaren, Martin

    Stodart, J. A.

    Hall, John (Wycombe)

    McLean, Neil (Inverness)

    Studholme, Sir Henry

    Hamilton, Michael (Wellingborough)

    Maginnis, John E.

    Summers, Sir Spencer

    Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N. W.)

    Marshall, Sir Douglas

    Taylor, Edwin (Bolton, E.)

    Harrison, Brian (Malden)

    Marten, Neil

    Taylor, Frank (M'ch'st'r, Moss Side)

    Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)

    Maude, Angus (Stratford-on-Avon)

    Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret

    Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere (Macclesf'd)

    Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.

    Thomas, Sir Leslie (Canterbury)

    Hastings, Stephen

    Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C.

    Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon, S.)

    Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel

    Mills, Stratton

    Touche, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon

    Heath, Rt. Hon. Edward

    Montgomery, Fergus

    Turner, Colin

    Hendry, Forbes

    More, Jasper (Ludlow)

    van Straubenzee, W. R.

    Hiley, Joseph

    Morgan, William

    Vaughan-Morgan, Rt. Hon. Sir John

    Hill, J. E. B. (S. Norfolk)

    Morrison, John

    Vosper, Rt. Hon. Dennis

    Hirst, Geoffrey

    Mott-Radclyffe, Sir Charles

    Walker, Peter

    Hocking, Philip N.

    Nugent, Rt. Hon. Sir Richard

    Wall, Patrick

    Hogg, Rt. Hon. Quintin

    Oakshott, Sir Hendrie

    Ward, Dame Irene

    Holland, Philip

    Orr-Ewing, Sir Ian (Hendon, North)

    Williams, Dudley (Exeter)

    Hollingworth, John

    Osborn, John (Hallam)

    Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)

    Hopkins, Alan

    Osborne, Sir Cyril (Louth)

    Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)

    Hornby, R. P.

    Page, Graham (Crosby)

    Wise, A. R.

    Hornsby-Smith, Rt. Hon. Dame P.

    Page, John (Harrow, West)

    Wolrige Gordon, Patrick

    Howard, Hon. G. R. (St. Ives)

    Pannell, Norman (Kirkdale)

    Wood, Rt. Hon. Richard

    Hughes-Young, Michael

    Partridge, E.

    Woodnutt, Mark

    Hutchison, Michael Clark

    Pearson, Frank (Clitheroe)

    Yates, William (The Wrekin)

    Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)

    Peyton, John

    Jackson, John

    Pickthorn, Sir Kenneth

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

    James, David

    Pitt, Dame Edith

    Mr. Peel and Mr. Hugh Rees.

    Jenkins, Robert (Dulwich)

    Pounder, Rafton

    NOES

    Albu, Austen

    Donnelly, Desmond

    Houghton, Douglas

    Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)

    Duffy, A. E. P. (Colne Valley)

    Howie, W. (Luton)

    Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)

    Ede, Rt. Hon. C.

    Hoy, James H.

    Barnett, Guy

    Edelman, Maurice

    Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)

    Baxter, William (Stirlingshire, W.)

    Edwards, Robert (Biston)

    Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)

    Beaney, Alan

    Edwards, Walter (Stepney)

    Hunter, A. E.

    Ballenger, Rt. Hon. F. J.

    Evans, Albert

    Hynd, H. (Accrington)

    Benn, Anthony Wedgwood

    Finch, Harold

    Hynd, John (Attercliffe)

    Bennett, J. (Glasgow, Bridgeton)

    Fitch, Alan

    Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)

    Benson, Sir George

    Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)

    Irving, Sydney (Dartford)

    Blackburn, F.

    Galpern, Sir Myer

    Janner, Sir Barnett

    Blyton, William

    Ginsburg, David

    Jay, Rt. Hon. Douglas

    Boardman, H.

    Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. C.

    Jeger, George

    Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G.

    Gourlay, Harry

    Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)

    Bowden, Rt. Hn. H. W. (Leics, S. W.)

    Greenwood, Anthony

    Jones, Rt. Hn. A. Creech (Wakefield)

    Boyden, James

    Grey, Charles

    Jones, Dan (Burnley)

    Bradley, Tom

    Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)

    Kelley, Richard

    Bray, Dr. Jeremy

    Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)

    Kenyon, Clifford

    Brockway, A. Fenner

    Grimond, Rt. Hon. J.

    Ledger, Ron

    Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)

    Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W.)

    Lee, Frederick (Newton)

    Carmichael, Neil

    Hamilton, William (West Fife)

    Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)

    Castle, Mrs. Barbara

    Hannan, William

    Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)

    Collick, Percy

    Harper, Joseph

    Lipton, Marcus

    Cronin, John

    Hart, Mrs. Judith

    Loughlin, Charles

    Cullen, Mrs. Alice

    Hayman, F. H.

    Lubbock, Eric

    Dalyell, Tam

    Healey, Denis

    Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson

    Darling, George

    Henderson, Rt. Hn. Arthur (Rwly Regis)

    MacColl, James

    Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)

    Herbison, Miss Margaret

    McKay, John (Wallsend)

    Davies, Ifor (Gower)

    Hill, J. (Midlothian)

    Mackie, John (Enfield, East)

    Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)

    Hilton, A. V.

    McLeavy, Frank

    Doig, Peter

    Holman, Percy

    Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)

    556

    557

    Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)

    Peart, Frederick

    Stross, Sir Barnett (Stoke-on-Trent, C.)

    Manuel, Archie

    Popplewell, Ernest

    Swain, Thomas

    Mapp, Charles

    Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)

    Symonds, J. B.

    Marsh, Richard

    Probert, Arthur

    Taverne, D.

    Mason, Roy

    Randall, Harry

    Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)

    Mendelson, J. J.

    Redhead, E. C.

    Thomas, Iorwerth (Rhondda, W.)

    Millan, Bruce

    Rees, Merlyn (Leeds, S.)

    Thomson, G. M. (Dundee, E.)

    Milne, Edward

    Reid, William

    Thornton, Ernest

    Mitchison, G. R.

    Reynolds, G. W.

    Tomney, Frank

    Monslow, Walter

    Rhodes, H.

    Wade, Donald

    Moody, A. S.

    Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)

    Wainwright, Edwin

    Morris, Charles (Openshaw)

    Robertson, John (Paisley)

    Warbey, William

    Morris, John

    Rodgers, W. T. (Stockton)

    Wells, William (Walsall, N.)

    Noel-Baker, Rt. Hn. Philip (Derby, S.)

    Ross, William

    White, Mrs. Eirene

    O'Malley, B. K.

    Silkin, John

    Wilkins, W. A.

    Oram, A. E.

    Silverman, Julius (Aston)

    Willey, Frederick

    Owen, Will

    Slater, Mrs. Harriet (Stoke, N.)

    Williams, D. J. (Neath)

    Paget, R. T.

    Sorensen, R. W.

    Wilson, Rt. Hon. Harold (Huyton)

    Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)

    Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank

    Woof, Robert

    Parker, John

    Spriggs, Leslie

    Yates, Victor (Ladywood)

    Parkin, B. T.

    Steele, Thomas

    Pavitt, Laurence

    Stonehouse, John

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

    Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)

    Strauss, Rt. Hn. G. R. (Vauxhall)

    Mr. Lawson and

    Mr. Charles A. Howell.

    Question proposed, That the Clause stand part of the Bill.
    4.30 p.m.
    Mr. Bruce Millan: I put down an Amendment which has not been selected, but which would have had the effect of making the Clause apply from the date of the Prime Minister's announcement of these changes, namely, 10th December, 1963. The Amendment was in page 2, line 6, at the end to add:
    (4) In relation to the National Insurance Acts 1946 to 1963 and the National Insurance (Industrial Injuries) Acts 1946 to 1963 this section shall have effect and shall be deemed always to have had effect since the 10th December 1963.
    I believe that the transitional provisions in Schedule 3 are also involved.
    As the Clause stands, taken in conjunction with the transitional provisions which come later, its effect will be that certain children will have fallen out of the National Insurance benefits and will come in again when the Bill comes into operation. It happens that within the last couple of weeks two cases have been brought to my attention of children reaching the age of 18 about last November and still at school, but in respect of whom National Insurance benefits have not been paid since. In one case an old-age pensioner is the parent, and in the other the father is receiving sickness benefit.
    I understand that the Minister intends to bring in the changes by Order, and that the Order will apply from about 30th March. In the kind of case I have mentioned, the children concerned will
    558
    again become eligible for dependents' allowances as from 30th March. We will then have the anomalous position of a gap between about November and about the end of March, and I suggest that when a change of this kind is being made, it would be better to make some provision for retrospective payment.
    After all, we are admitting that the legislation was wrong in laying down the age limit of 18. As has been pointed out, there is very little change of circumstances which makes 19 right now which did not make 19 right several months ago, and perhaps even longer ago. In those circumstances, it seems a pity that we cannot get some kind of retrospective payment. People in kind of circumstances I have mentioned were, naturally, interested in the Prime Minister's announcement, but many are now disappointed to find that the change is not yet effective.
    Mr. Norman Cole: I am sure that we are all sympathetic to the many cases of those who have lost this allowance for six months and who are possibly to get it back. However, the hon. Member for Glasgow, Craigton (Mr. Millan) will appreciate that if the Amendment had gone through, and the qualification had been made still being dependent, the same thing would have happened if a child had again become dependent by going to some kind of training college.
    Mr. Millan: I am not talking about the Amendment which we have just discussed and the Amendment in my name would not have had that effect. What I am saying is that people involved in cases of the kind I have described were

    559
    encouraged by the Prime Minister's announcement that a change was to be made, but have since been disappointed to find that the change will not become effective until about the end of March, and perhaps slightly beyond that. There is a certain anomaly. I understand that there might be difficulties about making retrospective payment, but I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will say something about this aspect of the matter.
    The Minister of Pensions and National Insurance (Mr. Richard Wood): The hon. Member for Glasgow, Craigton (Mr. Millan) has made the case which he would have made if his Amendment had been selected, and I shall try to answer it. The only sense in which one can admit that this legislation proves that former legislation was wrong is the sense in which any subsequent legislation admits that previous legislation was wrong, by changing it. That argument for retrospection could be transferred to any legislation.
    I should like to deal with the substance of the hon. Member's case, which is a serious one. I understand that his aim would be to give the benefit of the increase in National Insurance and Industrial Injuries benefits back to the date of the announcement by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, on 10th December, to anyone who had a "qualified child" between the ages of 18 and 19 between that date, 10th December, and 30th March, when, as I announced last week, the Bill is to take effect.
    There are important practical difficulties about retrospection in this kind of case. If we were to pay back to 10th December, 1963, it would be necessary to examine the papers of all persons who have drawn benefit between 10th December, 1963, and 30th March this year, to see whether anything was owed to them. The scale of that operation becomes evident when I point out that the number of sickness benefit claims a week is about 200,000, that people go on and off the sick list, and that about 50,000 of that 200,000 claimants are on sickness benefit for only a week or less. Therefore, even in the time which has gone by so far since 10th December, there would be more than 1 million claims, and there might well be another 1 million by the time the Bill was through.
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    This would be an immense labour. I have no doubt that the work involved in finding the cases which the hon. Member would like to find would delay the fixing of the day on which the Bill came into operation. I hope that the Committee will agree with me that the staff of the Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance deserves congratulations for bringing this rather complicated Bill into effect so quickly. The kind of operation which the hon. Gentleman has suggested would prevent the staff from meeting the target of 30th March.
    One general point is that the purpose of the payments which the hon. Gentleman has in mind is to meet current needs, the needs at the time, and in that sense there is less argument for paying them retrospectively than might exist in other cases. I cannot find any precedent for retrospective payment of benefits of this kind in previous National Insurance legislation, and it would be difficult to pick out the particular changes the hon. Gentleman has in mind for particularly favourable retrospective treatment.
    I am aware of the point that the hon. Gentleman has in mind, and when we get to future entitlement rather than payment he will find that Schedule 3 contains a provision which is intended to benefit the widow whose child reaches the age of 19 between the time the Bill receives the Royal Assent and the appointed day. Therefore, a widow of this kind will qualify for a widow's pension paid from the appointed day if she reached her fiftieth birthday before the child became 19.
    This is an arrangement exactly similar to that made in the Family Allowances and National Insurance Act, 1956, which was the only other occasion when the age limit which we are discussing today was changed. The effect is that the widow will not lose entitlement because of the time that is necessary after the Royal Assent to bring the Bill into operation. I am of the opinion that for the purpose of entitling the widow to this benefit it is reasonable that the Bill should go back as far as the Royal Assent, but no further.
    To sum up, for the reasons that I have given it seems right that entitlement should run from the date of the Royal Assent, but I think that, in accordance

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    with precedent, and because of the real difficulties that would be created by retrospection, the payment of the benefits should take effect from the appointed day.
    Mr. Mitchison: I have listened to the right hon. Gentleman's statement with interest. The fact is that whether or not it was right to make this change before the Prime Minister's statement, it does not lie in the mouth of the Government to say that ever since that statement, morally at any rate, or administratively, or politically, or whatever general word one takes for the purpose, there has been a case for letting these people get the additional benefits they are now going to get.
    The Minister is saying that it is not administratively practicable; that it would break the back of the Ministry; that it would, if I might refer to this beautiful phrase again, affect the whole structure and administration of the Ministry if we were to give effect to a moral case. I think that the right hon. Gentleman would admit that.
    We on this side of the Committee do not accept that kind of thing so readily in view of what has happened about the very change that we have just been discussing, that is to say, the change from 18 to 19. We were told that that would break the back of the Ministry. That was impossible until the Government suddenly discovered that they were going to do it. If it is possible to do one thing after saying that it is impossible, we require a little persuasion to believe that something else is so impossible that even this elastic Government cannot manage to do it.
    It may be that that is the case. This is not the kind of thing about which hon. Members really are in a position to say aye or nay. It is, therefore, not a matter on which I feel able to invite my hon. Friends to divide against the Clause which, so far as it goes, we otherwise support, but I regard it with suspicion.
    When one talks about retrospective legislation, there is one case where one is constantly getting something of this sort. It is where a Government statement is made, usually in connection with tax evasion, and then legislative retrospection operates and nobody really objects to it. I should have thought that this kind of case—I do not say
    562
    this particular one—merited a little extra effort. If the right hon. Gentleman says that it really is impossible, that he cannot do anything, we must accept it as a case where our legislative and administrative activities cannot keep pace with what we think to be right. If that is so, it is a confession of failure, and I suppose that one must accept it.
    Question put and agreed to.
    Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.

    Clause 2.—(INCREASE OF WIDOW'S ALLOWANCE, WIDOWED MOTHER'S ALLOWANCE, CHILD'S SPECIAL ALLOWANCE AND INDUSTRIAL INJURIES DEATH BENEFIT FOR WIDOW WITH CHILDREN.)
    Mr. Mitchison: I beg to move, in page 2, line 24, at the end to insert:
    "In relation to children over five years of age the figures in columns 3, 4 and 5 of this table shall have effect with the addition to each figure in column 3 of 6s. 6d. and to each figure in columns 4 and 5 of 5s. 0d. and in relation to children over 11 years of age the said figures shall have effect with the further addition to each figure in column 3 of 9s. 6d. and to each figure in columns 4 and 5 of 7s. 6d.".
    The Chairman: I think that it would be convenient if, at the same time, we were to discuss the Amendment in Schedule 1, page 7, line 36, at the end to insert:
    "In relation to children over five years of age the last-mentioned figures shall have effect with the addition of 6s. 6d. to the figure in the first column and of 4s. 0d. to the figures in the second and third columns and in relation to children over 11 years of age the said figures shall have effect with the further addition of 9s. 6d. to the figure in the first column and of 5s. 6d. to the figures in the second and third columns".
    4.45 p.m.
    Mr. Mitchison: Subsection (1) provides, in effect, that as regards the widow's allowance, the widowed mother's allowance and the child's special allowance, the increase in respect of a child shall, between the figures in the table in the Clause and the family allowances legislation, amount to 37s. 6d. a head. That is quite clearly, and so far as I can see correctly, stated in the Explanatory and Financial Memorandum. Perhaps I might quote it because the Government are a little quick to misunderstand. It says:
    "Taking account of family allowances the total benefit payable in respect of each child will therefore become 37s. 6d. a week."

    563
    Though the language of the Clause is a trifle complicated, the effect is really quite a simple one, and one with which in general we would not disagree.
    During the Second Reading debate we stated, and we still think, that there is a case for making a change—which I agree at once has not hitherto been made in this legislation—and drawing a distinction between the young child whose maintenance is not nearly so costly and the older child. As the hon. Lady the Joint Parliamentary Secretary pointed out in the course of winding up the Second Reading debate, this has already been done in the case of National Assistance. No doubt I shall be told there is a profound difference between the two systems, but I wonder whether that is so in the case that we are now considering.
    We are here dealing substantially with widows and their children. What are we trying to do in this legislation about these widows? We are trying to make good, in terms of money, the loss of the man who is normally the chief bread-winner of the family. When we do that, we have regard—and, of course, this allowance about children shows this—not only to the widow herself, but to her domestic responsibilities, and in doing that we have a figure for the widow and a figure for the child.
    If that is our real object, I can see no logical ground for making the same payment in respect of the cheaper, younger child, as one makes in respect of the dearer, older child. For that reason we are not going to try to cut down the amount which the Government intend to pay for a child, but we propose to add to it in the case of older children. The effect of the Amendment is to make an addition of 6s. 6d. in respect of the first child over 5, and 5s. in respect of the next two, and in respect of children over 11, we make an addition of 9s. 6d. for the first child, and 7s. 6d. for subsequent children.
    We are here in a slight difficulty about the rules of order. We cannot propose Amendments to the Family Allowances Act, and no doubt it would have been more logical to try to deal with it in conjunction with that, but we have to
    564
    take things as they are. We on this side of the Committee may be asked why we have selected these figures. What we are trying to do is to raise a question of principle, the principle being the difference in the cost to the widow of children of different ages, and in no sense do we feel ourselves tied by these figures.
    I should like to tell the Committee how we arrived at the figures. Not only was our method a simple one, but it may be that our arithmetic was wrong. However, I do not think that it matters. What we are trying to do is to get this established as a matter of principle, and I think that we would be the first to say that if that were done there ought to be no difficulty, by analogy with other cases, in arriving at an appropriate figure.
    I have looked at the figures given by the hon. Lady the Joint Parliamentary Secretary during the Second Reading debate. They were from the National Assistance Orders. The lowest figure is 19s. 6d. The next one, for a child over 5, is 23s. There is a higher figure for children over 11, and a still higher one for older children, I think over 16.
    What we did was to take the figures that she gave us, because, just as the actual figures are quite sufficient to raise the matter, so the actual ages are sufficient, and we kept to the ones that she had put before the House. She considered that they were sufficient and that was quite good enough for us. Doing that, we took the last figure. We found that there had been an increase of 3s. 6d. on that figure, and we took a proportionate increase on 37s. 6d. Applying that, it is a matter of simple, even if incorrect arithmetic—and I would never wish to vouch for my arithmetic—to do the same thing further on.
    The substantial point is that we want this different treatment of children brought in on this occasion. We think it an appropriate moment to do it. As the right hon. Gentleman said, this is primarily a Bill about widows. Broadly speaking, we are dealing with cases of widows with children, and they raise this general question.

    565
    I repeat: we had proposed this in our own party pamphlet, but I do not wish to discuss the whole of that now. I merely wish to say that whether or not it was there I should still have thought it right to raise this matter as a separate issue. Again—and I am not sure that this arises directly on the Amendment—we must not be taken to regard these figures as unalterable. We shall not divide on the question of the amount that the Government have taken—37s. 6d.—but every hon. Member would probably agree that there is very little risk of that figure being too high. It may well be too low, even in the case of the youngest and—if I may use the phrase—least expensive child.
    Therefore, we feel little doubt that the right way of dealing with the question is to make an addition in the case of the older children. If we were to do the thing in full detail we should probably make another addition at a later age, but we did not want to depart from what the hon. Lady had put before us as a sufficient exposition of National Insurance principles.
    The second Amendment is arrived at in the same way, by taking the National Assistance changes in proportion. It is applied to the allowances in respect of children under something that is really rather different—the death benefit under the Industrial Injuries Act as laid down in the First Schedule. We simply felt that if it were right in one case it would be right in another, and with some hesitation—because we thought that we might be told that we had not put down Amendments in a sufficient number of places—we thought that we had better put it down in Schedule 1 as well as Clause 2.
    But the substantial point arises on the first Amendment. It is the question whether there should not be a greater allowance for older children than is given in respect of the young ones.
    Mr. John McKay: Usually we are very glad to give a little extra to any of the insurance beneficiaries, but it seems to me that we are overlooking many insured persons, I put down a new Clause—Increase of weekly rates of benefit in respect of children—expecting it to be discussed, to show the remarkable differences which result from the operation of the Bill in the benefits to
    566
    one section of the insured population as compared with others.
    My Amendment is based on information which I have examined and analysed to the best of my ability. As a result of the Government's proposals in respect of widows, bearing in mind that the benefits to be paid to the sick, the unemployed and the injured will stand still, whereas the benefits paid to the sick, the injured and the unemployed, respectively will be 28s, 6d., 23s, 6d, and 13s, below National Assistance, the widows in the respective cases will receive 3s. more than National Assistance—
    The Chairman: Order. I am finding it difficult to relate the figures which the hon. Member is now propounding to those included in the Amendment.
    Mr. McKay: I am sorry to get out of order, Sir William. I always try to keep in order, but it is sometimes difficult. I want to express certain opinions which are not very popular, and which are not very well understood. I am disappointed that on this occasion the Labour Party has not taken the opportunity of trying to help the injured, the sick and the unemployed.
    The Chairman: Order. I am sorry to have to interrupt the hon. Member again. I hope that he will keep strictly to the terms of the Amendment that we are now debating. He is straying far too wide.
    Mr. McKay: I am sorry. I shall just have to take the Bill and the Amendments as they are. It is rather difficult for anybody to speak against the Amendments.
    I hope that the widows will receive the extra money. It will put them in a better position. At the same time, I must express my absolute objection to the attitude that the Labour Party has adopted on this occasion by ignoring all the rest of the beneficiaries under the National Insurance scheme at a time when we are seeking to improve the position of widows to such an extent.
    5.0 p.m.
    Mr. Wood: The point that was in the mind of the hon. Member for Wallsend (Mr. McKay) was the fact that the Bill's direct object is to give preference to the children of widowed mothers. I under-

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    stand that the purpose of his proposed new Clause would be to abolish that preference. Since the Government have introduced the Bill to increase the preference given to children of widowed mothers, I do not see how they could be in any sort of agreement with the idea that they should abolish that preference.
    I now want to turn to what was said by the hon. and learned Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison). He said that on this occasion he would not discuss the part of the Labour Party pamphlet which dealt with this subject. I understand that during the course of the afternoon we shall be discussing a good many things in the Labour Party's pamphlet, in various contexts. I think that the hon. and learned Gentleman suggested that the idea of differentiating according to age in connection with children's benefits of this kind represented part of his party's policy.
    The hon. and learned Gentleman pointed out that his purpose is to give to the children under 5 the same rates as the Government propose in the Bill; to children between 5 and 11 higher rates, and to children over 11 higher rates still. When I studied the figures, particularly in conjunction with those in the other Amendment to the First Schedule, I found them rather queer. But the hon. and learned Gentleman, as always, is extremely modest about his arithmetical powers. I do not think we should be conducting an effective debate if we discussed details, so I will address myself to the principle which I think was the object of the hon. and learned Gentleman.
    I understand that he has chosen the steps 5 and 11 because of the similar steps in the National Assistance scale rates. As he so often does, he has anticipated some of the excellent arguments which I shall put forward. He predicted that I should probably draw the attention of the Committee to the fact that it is individual circumstances which matter in respect of National Assistance. That is why there exist different rates for children of different ages.
    I will not joint issue with the hon. and learned Gentleman on the question of the possibility of introducing differential rates of this kind into the
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    National Insurance scheme. It would be possible to do so. The reason it has not been done in the past, and why I do not think it should be done in the present, or in the future, is that the National Insurance scheme, unlike National Assistance, has to deal with broad categories of people and to try to meet the usual, average situation.
    It would certainly be possible to make the structure of National Insurance even more complicated than it is, which would be the effect of accepting this Amendment—and it would be an effect repeated many times elsewhere throughout the insurance scheme. I suggest that this would be inappropriate to the insurance scheme. One thing it would inevitably do would be to send up the administrative costs. Apart from the slightly queer arithmetic of the Amendment, I think that I must point out that, however the hon. and learned Gentleman did his sums, he would be subject to the criticism that the amounts he proposes for children, certainly above the ages of 5 and 11, are disproportionate when compared with other insurance benefits.
    To take one figure in the Amendment. The hon. and learned Gentleman proposes 53s. 6d. for the eldest child if he or she is over the age of 11. This 53s. 6d. compares with a rate of 41s. 6d. which we pay for an adult dependant. It compares also with the rate of 38s. 6d. which is the unemployment or sickness benefit rate for boys and girls under 18. It compares with 46s. which is the personal unemployment or sickness benefit for married women. In my opinion, these kinds of increases would be very much out of proportion with the purpose which they are intended to fulfil.
    As I understand that some remarks by my hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary about the National Assistance scales form the basis for the proposals of the Opposition in these Amendments, I think it worth while pointing out that up to the age of 18 the rates proposed by the Bill are all higher than the National Assistance scales. We find, and I think we shall continue to find, that the Opposition is making the most of the opportunity today to put forward a number of very generous proposals.
    I hope that the hon. and learned Gentleman will not find any reason to

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    disagree when I say that the lavish approach of the Opposition this afternoon, as an Opposition, is not, so far as I have read my back copies of HANSARD, matched by their generosity when in office. Since 1951 Conservative Governments have increased the real value of allowances for the children of widowed mothers including family allowances by these proportions: 157 per cent. for the first child—that is a real value increase—and 243 per cent. for the second and third children.
    During the last 12 years, and in this Bill, for the reasons I have given, rather than make differential improvements for different ages we have had as our objective the making of substantial improvements for widows' children of all ages. We believe that to be the better way to deal with this problem. In view of the increases which have been made, the increases which will be added under the provisions of the Bill, and the distinction, which I have tried to point out, which exists between what I believe should be the primary purposes of a National Assistance scheme and a National Insurance scheme, I must ask the Committee to reject the Amendment.
    Mr. James Griffiths: Far be it from me to take away any crumb of comfort with which the Government may console themselves over what they have done about social insurance. We shall not only argue about the increases in benefits, but also about the distribution of the contributions between the State and the contributor. However, that is a matter for the hustings and not for this Committee.
    I wish to ask a question about what the right hon. Gentleman said earlier. He referred to the way in which we have so far provided for child allowances by family allowances and the varying provisions under the National Insurance legislation. But, as the Minister will know, we are about the only country which does not provide for an age rate in the social insurance part of National Assistance.
    There is nothing remarkable about such an idea. Most of the social insurance schemes of European countries and others have been framed and have come into operation since our own. In most cases we were in advance of other
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    countries regarding family allowances, except France, where the family allowance was not provided for social service purposes but as part of the population policy.
    Most other countries have made provisions for such schemes. Canada provides so much for the first child and so much for the second, with an age scale of, I think, 5, 10 and 14. I am certain that this is done in countries on the Continent. The Minister seemed to suggest that it was impossible to have an age scale for such allowances in any social insurance scheme. But it is not impossible. It may or may not be desirable. But most countries work such schemes and find that it is possible, and there are strong arguments in favour of them.
    The Minister provides a strong argument in the Bill. He has raised the age to 19 and I hope he realises what that means. He is providing an allowance in respect of an age beyond which a contributor to the National Insurance scheme is considered to be an adult. It is the first time that has been done.
    It fell to me to fix the age at which a contributor to the National Insurance scheme should become an adult. Whether in law or in the general practice this is the age I provided the age at which a contributor and beneficiary under the scheme became an adult should be 21. That is accepted in common law and in election law, but it was desirable to have the same provision in this field as in the industrial injuries scheme. To treat a workman who had injuries as being less than an adult at 18 would create all kinds of problems. So the age was fixed at 18. The question is, does one regard a child of 19 as exactly the same as one of 5, 6, or 10? We have to look at this problem within the context of our social insurance scheme just as we do in relation to the National Assistance scheme.
    I am not clear whether the Minister thinks it undesirable to do this. The impression I formed, and if my impression was wrong he may correct it, was that he was arguing that it was impossible to have a social insurance scheme with age-scaled rates for children and dependants. That is not so because we are. I think, in the minority of countries which retain a flat rate for children.

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    Most countries have gone on to the age scale.
    Mr. Wood: I specifically said that it would be possible to do so, but I thought, for reasons I gave, that it would be undesirable.
    Mr. Mitchison: We are told that one of the difficulties in this matter is that this generally is an insurance scheme. This phrase is used again and again by the Government when they think that in it they will find some refuge from a proposition which is put to them. It is very inapt in this case. The whole basis of what I put to the Minister was that the foundation for this payment ought to be the loss suffered by the widow, the loss of the earning power of her husband in relation to her liabilities, of which obviously the children are the largest liability.
    The fundamental basis of insurance surely is that we cover people against the loss they may suffer. That is exactly what we are trying to do here. Our whole case is that a different loss is suffered according to the age of the child because older children cost more than younger ones. If the Minister regards this as an insurance scheme, surely he ought to accept our proposal. He ought to do something more about it. It has been suggested that all these questions of widows' benefits depend largely on the incidence of that loss in practice—the way in which it comes and is borne. It has been suggested in connection with the earnings rule that there should be a proper investigation of this kind of thing. That has never been done. That being so, whatever other evidence the Minister puts up, it is incorrect to say that it cannot be done because this is the form of an insurance scheme.
    Next, we are told that it is impracticable; that it would complicate matters too much. In relation to the other point we have been discussing, we were told that it has not so far proved possible to improve upon it—"it" being the present arrangement. There has to be a point at which this can be fixed without far-reaching consequences to the structure of both schemes. There ought to be a little hole in the Dispatch Box. Every time a Minister of Pensions and National Insurance says that a thing is
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    too complicated he should be reminded of that little hole and put a penny through it into the Box. Thereby there would be a useful contribution to public funds.
    5.15 p.m.
    My right hon. Friend the Member for Llanelly (Mr. J. Griffiths), has pointed out that a number of countries actually follow the practice that we propose. One cannot accept the proposition that there is any grave or serious difficulty about it. Fundamentally, what we have to do is to meet a human need which we all recognise—the widows' loss. We are entitled to give the widow slightly preferential treatment over the other people because there is an element of compensation in this.
    I purposely put these figures on a somewhat artificial basis. I thought I made clear. I took the National Assistance scales because they give a rough guide, but I would be the first to agree that when we are considering a question of this sort we need to have not only the sort of inquiry which has been recommended to the Ministry—but which so far as I know has never been carried out, an inquiry into what happens to widows—but also a very careful examination of other legislation to remove inconsistencies so far as we can. This is not a case in which the inconsistencies should be removed by reducing the amount payable in respect of children.
    I am not in the least shocked by the figures which the right hon. Gentleman gave. He said that Conservative Governments have done very well in this matter because they have increased the benefits. It would be out of order to go into that at great length, but, obviously, there are two other things to be considered. One is what they have done by way of increasing contributions and the fall in the Exchequer contribution. The other is that when this kind of thing has been considered the Advisory Committee has looked at the increase in earnings.
    That is the right figure because what the widow has lost is the earnings of her husband. That is a far better basis for comparison than the retail price index, which over-simplifies the whole question. I remain completely unconvinced that in principle a change of this

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    kind is not required. I also remain unconvinced that it is impracticable. I am even more unconvinced that there is anything wrong about it. On the contrary, I think it is right. Therefore, I hope my hon. and right hon. Friends will go into the Division Lobby in support of this proposal.
    Mr. McKay: I want particularly to deal with the question of widowed mothers on this occasion and to remain in order. I have made a number of analyses of this particular subject and I did not expect to be out of order when I spoke about them. It is difficult to remain in order, but I shall say my few words as near as possible in order as I can be and yet try to give a clear indication of how good the proposals of the Government are. If we can make them better we should do so. When we talk about these things and analyse them properly we do not merely say how good or how bad they are.
    I want to suggest what the Bill will do in respect of widowed mothers. I take the example of a widow with three children. She has £3 7s. 6d. and, for the three children, £5 12s. 6d., making an income of £9 under the Bill. All of us want the income of National Insurance beneficiaries, whoever they are, to be raised above the National Assistance level. If that same widow with three children were on National Assistance she would receive £3 3s. 6d. and, taking the highest rates, 28s. for the first child, 23s. for the second child, and 19s. 6d. for the third child. In all the cases I have attempted to analyse, I have taken the same figures for children and the same figure for rent.
    When I speak about National Assistance I emphasise that I am not talking about the money scale. I am talking about the total National Assistance paid, including the rent. I have taken the rent at 25s. in all these cases. Therefore, under National Assistance this widow would receive £7 19s. The widow receiving benefits under the Bill would
    have a balance of 21s. above National Assistance plus the rent.
    On the same analogy, a widow with four children would receive £3 3s. 6d., 28s. for the first child, 23s. for the second, 23s. for the third, and 19s. 6d. for the fourth, plus 25s. for the rent. This is under National Assistance. A widow in her position receiving benefits under the Bill would receive £10 17s. 6d., thus having a balance over and above the National Assistance scale of 35s. 6d.
    Hon. Members who have followed me will immediately see where these analyses lead. One can go further and compare these figures with benefits received by people under insurance who receive less than the National Assistance rate. One must take the 35s. 6d. by which the widow with four children is better off under the Bill than a widow on National Assistance and add to it the amount by which a sick insured man with the same family is under the scale—say, 20s. or 30s. It is necessary to do this sum to arrive at the economic advantage of one over the other.
    I am absolutely in favour of the proposals, but I want to make it clear that I am astonished and almost disgusted at the difference between the position of one person and the position of another person under the same insurance scheme. The numbers in one category are ten times as great as the numbers in the other. It would take a great deal of money to put into effect my proposal of 37s. 6d. for every child; it would probably cost about £90 million more. However, it would be worth it, to put people who are sick, injured or unemployed—after all, there are ten times as many of these as there are of people in the other category—above the scale. There would then be some satisfaction in the insurance scheme. I hope that my proposal will be implemented soon after the General Election by the Labour Party when it is in office.
    Question put, That those words be there inserted:—
    The Committee divided: Ayes 158, Noes 205.

    Division No. 12.]

    AYES

    [5.26 p.m.

    Albu, Austen

    Bellenger, Rt. Hon. F. J.

    Boardman, H.

    Allaun, Frank (Sa ford, E.)

    Benn, Anthony Wedgwood

    Bottomley, R. Hon. A. G.

    Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)

    Bennett, J. (Glasgow, Bridgeton)

    Bowden, Rt. Hn. H. W. (Leics, S. W.)

    Barnett, Guy

    Benson, Sir George

    Boyden, James

    Baxter, William (Stirlingshire, W.)

    Blackburn, F.

    Bradley, Tom

    Beaney, Alan

    Blyton, William

    Bray, Dr. Jeremy

    Brockway, A. Fenner

    Holman, Percy

    Padley, W. E.

    Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)

    Houghton, Douglas

    Paget, R. T.

    Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)

    Howie, W.

    Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)

    Callaghan, James

    Hoy, James H.

    Pavitt, Laurence

    Carmichael, Neil

    Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)

    Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)

    Castle, Mrs. Barbara

    Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)

    Peart, Frederick

    Chapman, Donald

    Hunter, A. E.

    Popplewell, Ernest

    Cliffe, Michael

    Hynd, H. (Accrington)

    Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)

    Collick, Percy

    Hynd, John (Attercliffe)

    Probert, Arthur

    Corbet, Mrs. Freda

    Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)

    Randall, Harry

    Cronin, John

    Irving, Sydney (Dartford)

    Redhead, E. C.

    Cullen, Mrs. Alice

    Jay, Rt. Hon. Douglas

    Rees, Merlyn (Leeds, S.)

    Dalyell, Tam

    Jeger, George

    Reynolds, G. W.

    Darling, George

    Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)

    Rhodes, H.

    Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)

    Jones, Rt. Hn. A. Creech (Wakefield)

    Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)

    Davies, Ifor (Gower)

    Jones, Dan (Burnley)

    Robertson, John (Paisley)

    Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)

    Kelley, Richard

    Rodgers, W. T. (Stockton)

    Diamond, John

    Kenyon, Clifford

    Ross, William

    Doig, Peter

    Ledger, Ron

    Silkin, John

    Duffy, A. E. P. (Colne Valley)

    Lee, Frederick (Newton)

    Silverman, Julius (Aston)

    Ede, Rt. Hon. C.

    Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)

    Snow, Julian

    Edelman, Maurice

    Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)

    Sorensen, R. W.

    Edwards, Robert (Bilston)

    Lipton, Marcus

    Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank

    Edwards, Walter (Stepney)

    Loughlin, Charles

    Spriggs, Leslie

    Evans, Albert

    Lubbock, Eric

    Steele, Thomas

    Finch, Harold

    Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson

    Strauss, Rt. Hn. G. R. (Vauxhall)

    Fitch, Alan

    MacColl, James

    Stross, Sir Barnett (Stoke-on-Trent, C.)

    Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)

    McKay, John (Wallsend)

    Symonds, J. B.

    Galpern, Sir Myer

    Mackie, John (Enfield, East)

    Taverne, D.

    Ginsburg, David

    McLeavy, Frank

    Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)

    Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon, P. C.

    Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)

    Thomas, Iorwerth (Rhondda, W.)

    Gourlay, Harry

    Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)

    Thornton, Ernest

    Greenwood, Anthony

    Manuel, Archie

    Thorpe, Jeremy

    Grey, Charles

    Mapp, Charles

    Tomney, Frank

    Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)

    Marsh, Richard

    Wainwright, Edwin

    Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)

    Mayhew, Christopher

    Warbey, William

    Grimond, Rt. Hon. J.

    Mendelson, J. J.

    Weitzman, David

    Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W.)

    Millan, Bruce

    White, Mrs. Eirene

    Hamilton, William (West Fife)

    Milne, Edward

    Wilkins, W. A.

    Hannan, William

    Mitchison, G. R.

    Willey, Frederick

    Harper, Joseph

    Monslow, Walter

    Williams, D. J. (Neath)

    Hart, Mrs. Judith

    Moody, A. S.

    Wilson, Rt. Hon. Harold (Huyton)

    Hayman, F. H.

    Morris, Charles (Openshaw)

    Woof, Robert

    Healey, Denis

    Moyle, Arthur

    Yates, Victor (Ladywood)

    Henderson, Rt. Hn. Arthur (Rwly Regis)

    O'Malley, B. K.

    Herbison, Miss Margaret

    Oram, A. E.

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

    Hill, J. (Midlothian)

    Oswald, Thomas

    Mr. Charles A. Howell and

    Hilton, A. V.

    Owen, Will

    Mr. Lawson.

    NOES

    Agnew, Sir Peter

    Campbell, Gordon (Moray & Nairn)

    Farr, John

    Allan, Robert (Paddington, S.)

    Carr, Compton (Barons Court)

    Finlay, Graeme

    Allason, James

    Cary, Sir Robert

    Fisher, Nigel

    Anderson, D. C.

    Channon, H. P. G.

    Fraser, Ian (Plymouth, Sutton)

    Arbuthnot, Sir John

    Chataway, Christopher

    Freeth, Denzil

    Ashton, Sir Hubert

    Chichester-Clark, R.

    Gammans, Lady

    Atkins, Humphrey

    Clark, Henry (Antrim, N.)

    Gardner, Edward

    Awdry, Daniel (Chippenham)

    Clarke, Brig. Terence (Portsmth, W.)

    Gibson-Watt, David

    Barber, Rt. Hon. Anthony

    Cleaver, Leonard

    Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, Central)

    Barlow, Sir John

    Cole, Norman

    Glyn, Sir Richard (Dorset, N.)

    Barter, John

    Cooper-Key, Sir Neill

    Goodhart, Philip

    Batsford, Brian

    Cordle, John

    Goodhew, Victor

    Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton

    Corfield, F. V.

    Grant-Ferris, R.

    Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gos. & Fhm)

    Costain, A. P.

    Green, Alan

    Berkeley, Humphry

    Courtney, Cdr. Anthony

    Gresham Cooke, R.

    Biffen, John

    Craddock, Sir Beresford (Spelthorne)

    Grosvenor, Lord Robert

    Birch, Rt. Hon. Nigel

    Crawley, Aidan

    Gurden, Harold

    Bishop, Sir Patrick

    Cunningham, Sir Knox

    Hall, John (Wycombe)

    Black, Sir Cyril

    Dance, James

    Hamilton, Michael (Wellingborough)

    Bossom, Hon. Clive

    d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry

    Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N. W.)

    Bourne, Arton, A.

    Deedes, Rt. Hon. W. F.

    Harris, Reader (Heston)

    Box, Donald

    Digby, Simon Wingfield

    Harrison, Brian (Maldon)

    Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hon. John

    Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)

    Boyle, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward

    Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. M.

    Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere (Macclesf'd)

    Braine, Bernard

    Doughty, Charles

    Harvey, John (Walthamstow, E.)

    Brewis, John

    Drayson, G. B.

    Hastings, Stephen

    Bromley, Davenport Lt.-Col. Sir Walter

    du Cann, Edward

    Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel

    Brown, Alan (Tottenham)

    Eden, Sir John

    Henderson, John (Cathcart)

    Browne, Percy (Torrington)

    Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)

    Hendry, Forbes

    Bryan, Paul

    Elliott, R. W. (Newc'tle-upon-Tyne, N.)

    Hiley, Joseph

    Buck, Antony

    Emmet, Hon. Mrs. Evelyn

    Hill, J. E. B. (S. Norfolk)

    Bullus, Wing Commander Eric

    Errington, Sir Eric

    Hirst, Geoffrey

    Burden, F. A.

    Farey-Jones, F. W.

    Hocking, Phillip N.

    576

    577

    Hogg, Rt. Hon. Quintin

    Marten, Neil

    Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'd & Chiswick)

    Holland, Philip

    Maude, Angus (Stratford-on-Avon)

    Spearman, Sir Alexander

    Hollingworth, John

    Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.

    Speir, Rupert

    Hopkins, Alan

    Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C.

    Stainton, Keith

    Hornby, R. P.

    Mills, Stratton

    Stanley, Hon. Richard

    Hornsby-Smith, Rt. Hon. Dame P.

    Miscampbell, Norman

    Stodart, J. A.

    Howard, Hon. G. R. (St. Ives)

    Montgomery, Fergus

    Studholme, Sir Henry

    Hughes-Young, Michael

    More, Jasper (Ludlow)

    Summers, Sir Spencer

    Hutchison, Michael Clark

    Morgan, William

    Taylor, Edwin (Bolton, E.)

    Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)

    Morrison, John

    Taylor, Frank (M'cla'st'r, Moss Side)

    Jackson, John

    Neave, Airey

    Teeling, Sir William

    James, David

    Nugent, Rt. Hon. Sir Richard

    Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret

    Johnson, Eric (Blackley)

    Oakshott, Sir Hendrie

    Thomas, Sir Leslie (Canterbury)

    Johnson Smith, Geoffrey

    Osborn, John (Hallam)

    Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon, S.)

    Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)

    Page, Graham (Crosby)

    Touche, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon

    Joseph, Rt. Hon. Sir Keith

    Page, John (Harrow, West)

    Turner, Colin

    Kerans, Cdr. J. S.

    Partridge, E.

    van Straubenzee, W. R.

    Kerby, Capt. Henry

    Pearson, Frank (Clitheroe)

    Vane, W. M. F.

    Kerr, Sir Hamilton

    Peel, John

    Vaughan-Morgan, Rt. Hon. Sir John

    Kershaw, Anthony

    Percival, Ian

    Walker, Peter

    Kirk, Peter

    Peyton, John

    Wall, Patrick

    Lagden, Godfrey

    Pickthorn, Sir Kenneth

    Ward, Dame Irene

    Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)

    Pitt, Dame Edith

    Williams, Dudley (Exeter)

    Lilley, F. J. P.

    Pounder, Rafton

    Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)

    Lindsay, Sir Martin

    Powell, Rt. Hon. J. Enoch

    Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)

    Litchfield, Capt. John

    Prior, J. M. L.

    Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)

    Lloyd, Rt. Hn. Geoffrey (Sut'nC'dfield)

    Rawlinson, Rt. Hon. Sir Peter

    Wise, A. R.

    Lloyd, Rt. Hon. Selwyn (Wirral)

    Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin

    Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick

    Longden, Gilbert

    Rees, Hugh (Swansea, W.)

    Wood, Rt. Hon. Richard

    Loveys, Walter H.

    Ridley, Hon. Nicholas

    Woodhouse, C. M.

    Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh

    Ridsdale, Julian

    Woodnutt, Mark

    McAdden, Sir Stephen

    Roots, William

    Woollam, John

    MacArthur, Ian

    Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard

    Yates, William (The Wrekin)

    Maclay, Rt. Hon. John

    Russell, Sir Ronald

    MacLeod, Sir J. (Ross & Cromarty)

    Scott-Hopkins, James

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

    Maginnis, John E.

    Shaw, M.

    Mr. McLaren and Mr. Pym.

    Marshall, Sir Douglas

    Skeet, T. H. H.

    Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.
    Clause 3 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

    Clause 4.—(RELAXATION OF EARNINGS RULES FOR WIDOW'S BENEFIT AND RETIREMENT PENSIONS.)
    5.30 p.m.
    Mr. Mitchison: I beg to move, in page 4, line 10, to leave out "hundred" and insert "thousand".
    The Temporary Chairman (Dr. King): I suggest that it would be convenient for the Committee also to discuss the following three Amendments in the name of the hon. and learned Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison): in line 13, leave out "hundred" and insert "thousand".
    In line 21, leave out "hundred" and insert "thousand".
    In line 22, leave out "hundred" and insert "thousand", together with the proposed Amendment to the title, in line 10, after "to", insert "repeal or", together with the first new Clause—(Repeal of earnings rule for widow's benefit).
    Mr. Mitchison: I gladly avail myself of the opportunity offered to refer to the other Amendments.
    I must explain to the Committee what we have done and why we have done it. Our intention is most simply expressed in the proposed new Clause, for we want to repeal the earnings rule relating to widows' benefits. The logical brother of that is the Amendment, which has not been called, to leave out subsection (1). I say no more than that it had to be, as it were, a paving Amendment to the Clause. The four Amendments—the one I moved and the three being discussed with it—are in each case designed to delete "hundred" and insert "thousand", and the effect of that is to make the earnings rule apply only to widows who are earning a very great deal of money per week.
    However, that is not our substantial intention. Our intention is to abolish the rule, but we are bound by the rules of order, and this is the best way we can attempt to achieve our object. If we divide on this proposition I hope it will be perfectly clear that what we really want is the abolition of the earnings rule. This sort of thing has happened on other occasions in connection with the earnings rule. I shall not discuss the figures

    579
    because, as I say, the substantial point concerns the earnings rule itself.
    At the risk of some repetition, I must return to what I was saying when we were discussing the last Amendment; that when one has to consider widows benefits—and I am including all kinds of widows benefits—one must realise that they arise out of widowhood. They arise out of the person losing the services to the household of someone who is normally its main breadwinner. We are, therefore, considering a state of affairs which is completely different from the position of retirement pensioners.
    The point about the earnings rule in relation to retirement pensioners is that if one is going to make a pension conditional on retirement, retirement must mean something. It is different from the age pension which we have in certain cases. That does not arise for widows. For them one is trying to meet, in money, the financial loss they have suffered or, at least, to make a contribution towards it.
    It has been said that this question of the earnings rule has been examined and that there is a vital difficulty about it; that the widow automatically, when she reaches pensionable age, becomes a retirement pensioner and that, therefore, one cannot put the widow in such a position that before she reaches the age of 60 she is doing quite well and then finds that, when she gets to 60, having regard to the earnings and the rest of it, it is not enough. I reply that if that is the case against it I do not think very much of it as a case. I always think it rather a bad argument to say that one must not do something that one recognises to be right at the time because something else will happen in the future which will produce an awkward situation. The right course then is to deal with the awkward situation, rather than do the wrong thing at the time.
    I notice that one of the recommendations made by the National Insurance Advisory Committee in May, 1956, in page 20, of Cmnd. 9752 was:
    "A widow should be able to elect not to be treated as retired when she reaches the age of 60, or when she is widowed above that age, and a widow who has been treated as retired should be able, on the same conditions as for other retirement pensioners to
    580
    revert to the same position as if she had not been so treated …"
    The recommendation then deals with another point that is not related to this Amendment.
    As far as I know, that recommendation has not been followed. If it has been, the argument disappears; otherwise, it may very well be that it ought to be done. I trust that I am not called upon to provide for every legislative consequence of an Amendment of this character, and I should like to know why, if I am right in supposing that that has never been done, the Government have neglected the Report of the Advisory Committee.
    The earnings rule was originally introduced when the limit was about one-third of the average widow's earnings, and the result was that the limit exempted only a comparatively small number of cases. What has happened over the years has been that, gradually, the proportion of the average widow's earnings which the limit bears to the total has risen, and the limit is at present more than half—about three-fifths, I think—of the average widow's earnings. The result is that, if we divide widows roughly into three earnings groups, all those in the bottom group and more than half of those in the middle group will be protected by the rule; it is only those at the top of the middle group and those in the top group who will not be affected by it at all.
    I do not object to that, but it has reached the point of absurdity—and I do not ask hon. Members to take that statement on my authority. It was the Advisory Committee that, in 1960, on this very ground, urged that the rule should not be relaxed any further. I do not agree with the Advisory Committee. I think that the rule should be relaxed to the point of extinction. However, the Committee's reason was that if there were any fundamental ground—I do not believe there is—for the rule in these cases, it had disappeared because the number of cases to which the fundamental ground could apply was so comparatively small, and had grown so comparatively small year by year. The position had become quite different from what it was in the 'forties and the majority of widows, even apart from

    581
    the particular change here, will now be outside the rule altogether.
    It might be said, "If this is the position, we should stiffen the earnings rule", but we would all agree—and I think that the Advisory Committee itself would agree—that that approach is entirely against the whole trend of modern legislation. It is bad enough to have an earnings rule which operates so very differently as regards men and women—because the position I have just stated is not the position of the retirement pensioners at all; their position is entirely different—we do not want to make it worse by aggravating the difference.
    Whatever was the position when this rule was first introduced—and there was some case for it then—the reasons for it have now disappeared. I will not repeat what I said on Second Reading, but it is an important point. Looking at the OFFICIAL REPORT afterwards, I felt that perhaps I had not made myself sufficiently clear about it.
    5.45 p.m.
    We now have an earnings rule that is unjustifiable in principle and which, in practice, works entirely the wrong way. A woman may be earning a considerable amount. We can all think of employment in which professional married women, for instance, may be earning a great deal, and when they become widows they continue to earn a good deal of money. The proportion affected by the earnings rule is vastly different from the proportion affected who are earning much less. What it comes to is that, in order to get the same amount, the obvious distinction that some women are earning at a much higher rate than others applies in this case, and the effect is that in, say, terms of hours of work, we restrain people very differently according to the amount they are earning.
    There is another fantastic result. The rule applies to earnings, and only to earnings. Consequently, we may have two widows in precisely similar circumstances, one of whom is earning, let us say, £500 a year, and affected by the earnings rule, and the other, getting exactly the same amount out of investments, completely untouched by it. What is the social justice in that? I
    582
    simply cannot see the case for it. It seems to be just another illustration of the utter stupidity, the perverseness, of the rule in its present form.
    I do not say that when the rule was first introduced there was not a case for it. The case very largely depends on the high proportion of widows who are now not affected by it. However, in these matters, one lives and learns, and there is no doubt that the rule has created a very great deal of resentment, and that resentment will not be appeased by the removal of yet another group of widows from operation of the rule. It will merely make the rule a little more ridiculous. We shall not oppose it—it is a further relaxation, and the very opposite to what the Advisory Committee said should be done, and the more the rule breaks down in practice the easier we shall find it to remove it altogether, as we intend to do.
    Turning back to the Report, the majority—not at that time with the hesitation it later showed—reported in favour; I admit that. I much prefer the minority Report, which dissented, among other things, on this particular ground.
    The Committee put forward the argument which I have just put forward about the difference, in effect, in terms of working hours in different cases, and it went on to put the dilemma. If I remember rightly there used to be a dilemma posed by medieval schoolmen called Occam's Razor. This, I think, is Titmuss's Razor. The dissenting note in the Report says:
    "The logical solution for the Committee would have been to adopt a lower earnings limit for women. But this would be at variance with the whole direction of public policy in equalising rewards for men and women."
    I hope that the party opposite is not going back on that, at any rate not just before an election.
    The note continues:
    "Yet an 'effective' earnings rule devised for men is not at present, nor can be in the foreseeable future, an 'effective' rule for woman"—
    the difference being that the average earnings for women are so much lower.
    "This unresolved dilemma is partly responsible for driving the Committee further towards a weakening in the earnings rule as an instrument of policy."
    This was in 1956. In 1960 the Committee jibbed about it. In 1963 it just

    583
    accepted an alteration, and in 1964 the Government had not the courage to submit the matter to the Committee. If it had been submitted, I do not know how far the Committee would have gone.
    It is becoming ridiculous and, at the end of it all, there is a paragraph in the Report, to which I referred on Second Reading, about the misunderstanding and confusion that all this causes. People resented that very much. It is said that the real cause of the resentment is that people who are doing the same job are getting different incomes. Both are getting the same pay but one of them in addition is getting a widow's benefit. It is said that it was in recognition of that sort of difficulty that the earnings rule was introduced. This may well be so. I wonder whether it is logical. What we are trying to do is to deal with an exceptional loss, an insurable loss—the loss of a husband. The widow has suffered that loss and we have to think in terms of the family. The widow ought no more to be discouraged from going out to work than she was before her widowhood, when she may well have done so. It depends on what part of the country she is in and on all sorts of circumstances. Why should we penalise the widow who goes out and earns? I do not see any justice in it.
    I shall be interested to hear the Minister's defence of the earnings rule as a real matter of morals and practice. I am not in the least interested, though I am sure he will be, in anyone saying that it was introduced under a Labour Government. The question we have to look at now is whether it is right or wrong in circumstances which have changed. In comparison with that question, I am not interested in whether or not this matter appears in a particular pamphlet. I do not mind the Minister having a bit of fun. Ministers need a little relaxation, particularly in this jungle of stuff which constitutes National Insurance, but at the end of the day I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will answer the fundamental question whether it is right or wrong to continue this rule now.
    Mr. Cole: I intervene in the debate because this is a matter about which I
    584
    have been most concerned. I am in some support of what the hon. and learned Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison) said about the earnings rule, but I did not understand that as a general policy the rule came about because there could be two women working side by side with one having more means than the other because she was in receipt of a full pension, theoretically, plus her pay. This may have been part of the reason, but I thought that there was rather more than that to it. I thought that from the days when we did not have quite as much employment as there is nowadays and it was a question of a person who otherwise would be taken care of by the State usurping a job which might have gone to somebody else. But there is no doubt that the atmosphere and the scene have changed considerably since then.
    I should like to add another point in support of what the hon. and learned Member said. He said that the widow had lost a great insurable factor in her husband and all that that meant in the way of consortium and the rest. I entirely agree. There is little enough we can do, whether or not she earns a whole day's pay. This widow's pension is a sort of solatium to make up for her loss—although, of course, it will not—but there is also a good financial reason here.
    It strikes me that this rule is an usurpation of the warranty which insurance is supposed to bring in its train. It is as if an insurance company had decided half way to do away with the profits towards which one had contributed in the premium and had altered the policy. I do not like the earnings rule and I suspect that people are getting to like it less and less.
    I congratulate the Government on the steps they have taken over the years towards eliminating the rule. I should not have thought that a great many widows are affected by it now. I should not have thought that those who do part-time jobs and cannot afford time to do a whole week would be much affected now that the limit is to allow earnings of up to £7 a week. But the earnings rule is an irritation. It is a sort of running sore. I hope that one day, not too far off, we shall see the end of the earnings rule altogether. I

    585
    am amused at the labyrinthine methods which have to be adopted to get the amendment in order—to make a widow able to earn £50 a week before she comes under the earnings rule. This is the sort of thing that happens in Parliament. It is fantastic but that is the way we have to do it in this place. I am glad that it does not happen elsewhere.
    I should like to ask my right hon. Friend two simple questions. Firstly could he clarify—and he probably can from his own knowledge—the origins of this facet of the earnings rule in our insurance policy? Do the cases which gave rise to that policy still obtain? If not, can we look forward to the day when the earnings rule is eliminated? Secondly, would my right hon. Friend address his mind to a point which I am sure has been made by constituents to all of us from time to time. It is the question why, if the husband has been paying the premium settled by the Government of the day in his contributions, his widow is apparently not entitled to receive the compensation towards which he had contributed.
    I hope that my right hon. Friend will answer these questions as I am very concerned about the working of the earnings rule.
    6.0 p.m.
    Mr. A. V. Hilton: The hon. Member for Bedfordshire, South (Mr. Cole) tells us that he wishes to see the end of the earnings rule in the not too distant future. He can help the Committee to put an end to it this very night. Let him come with us into the Lobby and vote, if the matter goes to a Division. Since this is something which we all feel very strongly about, I am sure that all my right hon. and hon. Friends would welcome the hon. Gentleman in the Lobby with us.
    I support what has been said by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison). Through the loss of their husbands, widows have already suffered very serious hardship, and what they need at such a time is kindly action and consideration. The repeal of the earnings rule for widows would be one of the kindest things we could do. No question of charity comes into it at all. It is a plain piece of justice that a widow, having lost the breadwinner, should be treated well.
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    My hon and learned Friend reminded us that the earnings rule was introduced as long ago as 1946. Of course, there have been many changes since then. Hon. Members on both sides of the Committee will have noted from time to time the hard way in which the earnings rule has operated, and, of course, my hon. and learned Friend gave illustrations of the adverse consequences which it has on widows.
    When we on this side criticise the earnings rule, we are often taunted by hon. Members opposite who say that it was the Labour Government who introduced it. We cannot deny this, but, after such a long interval, getting on for eighteen years now, most people are of opinion that the time is now ripe for a change, and the change which we advocate tonight is the repeal of the rule.
    Recently, both from these benches and from the country as a whole, there has been much criticism of the present Government's policies. The Government could go some way to redeem themselves if they would accept what we are urging upon then and repeal the earnings rule so far as it applies to widows. If the Minister would say that he accepts what we suggest, he would earn the gratitude of many widows who have suffered by the rule and the gratitude of many other people besides.
    Mr. Wood: I will do my best to answer the fundamental question which the hon. and learned Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison) put. I say at once that I quite appreciate the point that, although the effect of the Amendment would be to take all the force away from the earnings rule for widows, the real intention of the Opposition in moving it and the related Amendments is to abolish that earnings rule, while, so I understood from the hon. and learned Gentleman's speech, keeping the rule for retirement pensioners.
    The hon. and learned Gentleman was rather reticent about the pamphlet, which he seemed almost shy of mentioning—
    Mr. Mitchison: Not a bit.
    Mr. Wood: I am glad to hear that the hon. and learned Gentleman subscribes to what, believe, is his party's policy.
    Mr. Mitchison: An excellent pamphlet.
    Mr. Wood: I shall try to examine it critically, and, in explaining the objections which I find to the Amendment, to make clear why I regard the policy of the Labour Party in this matter as misconceived.
    My predecessors and I have probably given more thought to the problems of the earnings rule than to any other aspect of National Insurance. It is, as the Committee knows, a subject which has engaged the personal attention of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, and it has always been very present to the mind of my hon. Friend the Member for Tynemouth (Dame Irene Ward) who, for a moment, I see has deserted the front line. Her constant championship of widows and her assignations with successive Prime Ministers to press the claims of widows are very well known to the Committee. I should like to say, for my part, that her powerful influence—perhaps, as she is not here, I may say her overwhelming influence—on new and ignorant Ministers I very gratefully acknowledge.
    My own view on the very important question of the earnings rule, and on this Amendment in particular, has been reached not so much on the ground of cost—although the cost of doing what the party opposite would like would be quite considerable, about £6 million more than is involved in the Bill—or even on the fact that abolition of the rule, as the hon. and learned Gentleman made perfectly clear, would not help those most in need. The reason why I oppose abolition of the earnings rule for widows is that the consequences of such abolition would, in fact, be far more intricate and far-reaching than seems, even after the hon. and learned Gentleman's speech, to be generally realised. As I was encouraged by my horoscope, "Friends will support your ideas if you explain them"—though I admit that it did not commit the Opposition—I shall do my best to answer the fundamental question which the hon. and learned Member asked.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Bedfordshire, South (Mr. Cole) seemed to be questioning the basis on which we pay widows' benefits to widows. The
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    contributory National Insurance scheme qualifies a married couple for widows' benefits, if the husband dies, selectively—as was arranged when the Labour Party introduced the system where the widow is unlikely to be able to support herself by her own earnings. I must make clear to my hon. Friend and to the hon. and learned Gentleman that what we are not doing in the payment of widows' benefits is making up for the loss of the husband, because, if we were making up for the loss of the husband, we should pay widow's benefit to all widows. That is not what we do. Therefore, what we are trying to do is to make up for the loss of the power of a widow to support herself by her earnings.
    The Amendment's effect would be that widows who qualified for benefit would be able to draw the benefit on top of unlimited earnings—in fact, in the words of the Amendment, on top of anything up to £50. But the only reason why they are getting this benefit at all is that they are thought to be unlikely to support themselves by their earnings, and there would be other widows without children, or who were under 50 years of age when their husband died—
    Mr. Mitchison: I dislike interrupting the right hon. Gentleman—he is always so polite—but surely what he says is quite inconsistent with the fact that a widow may have unlimited unearned income from investments and not be touched by the earnings rule?
    Mr. Wood: I am prepared to face that point. What I have been trying to explain is that the purpose of the scheme as it exists, and as it existed when the scheme was initiated by the Labour Party, is to replace the absence of earnings. It insures against the inability of the widow after her husband dies to support herself by her earnings. Although I appreciate the hon. and learned Member's point, I do not think it is relevant in this context to say that other widows may have a considerable background of unearned income and therefore are better off, and that that is unfair on the widow who is unable to support herself by her earnings. This insurance scheme is trying to do the job of replacing the inability to earn, and, naturally, does not therefore take into account unearned income.

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    I was trying to explain that, as against the widows who are getting the benefit only because they are unlikely to be able to support themselves by their earnings, and whom the Amendment would relieve entirely of the earnings rule, there are other widows without children or who were under 50 when their husband died who would not qualify for benefit and who might have very little in the way of earnings. They might not be earning at all, but existing on sickness or unemployment benefit. It therefore seems to me that if the widows who qualified for the benefit because they were over 50 or because their children had not reached the age of 19 until they were over 50 were allowed to draw it whatever their earnings, I should be very hard put to it to find a decent justification for withholding benefit from any widow.
    Therefore, as I see it, the present selectivity which we exercise, and with which I think the Opposition agree, would become untenable, and the first consequence of the policy which the hon. and learned Member has suggested would be the payment of unconditional pensions for widowhood. They would have to be paid to every woman who had lost her husband.
    I do not believe that the changes since 1946 which the hon. and learned Member for Kettering mentioned afford ground for abolishing the earnings rule, and I find it very hard to explain the change of mind in the party opposite, from a belief that widow's benefit should be selective to an acquiescence, to say the least—although I do not think it appears in the Opposition's policy—that these pensions should become unconditional, because that is what the pressures which would follow the abolition of the earnings rule would lead to. I do not find it easy to follow the argument, in the light of a recent letter from the headquarters of the Labour Party which I saw in a newspaper. It pointed out, rightly, that the abolition of the earnings rule for retirement pensioners would benefit only the minority who have an income of at least £7 12s. 6d. a week. I cannot see why this does not apply with equal force to widows' pensions.
    Mr. Mitchison rose—
    6.15 p.m.
    Mr. Wood: We are in Committee. I should like to continue. If I lose the
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    thread of my argument the Committee may lose something extremely valuable.
    It must be said for the Labour Party's proposals that they seem to acknowledge the difficulty of abolishing the rule for widowed mothers and keeping it for widows. If I may say so presumptuously, the party opposite realises that it would be foolish to allow a widow to draw benefit regardless of her earnings while her children may or may not be keeping her at home, but while at at any rate she has children to bring up, and then to apply an earnings rule when the children grow up and leave her free. However, a mother may become not only a widow—I am talking in National Insurance terms—but, as the hon. and learned Member pointed out, a retirement pensioner. It is here that the Labour Party's proposals seem to take no account of the very real difficulties which the hon. and learned Member mentioned.
    I think that the hon. and learned Gentleman was rather light-hearted about these difficulties. He suggested that we should do something which he thought it was right for us to do and then face the difficulties later. We are given two conflicting kinds of advice. We are told to go ahead and damn the consequences. If we go ahead and then find it impossible to deal with the consequences, we are told that we have been extremely improvident.
    Mr. Mitchison: I do not think the Minister can have followed what I said. I advised him to take the advice which had been offered to him by the Advisory Committee, and I read it out. That would obviate this difficulty. If he proposes to say that it is administratively impossible—and puts a penny in the box—that is another matter.
    Mr. Wood: If I might continue and try to explain, as I proposed to do, what some of these difficulties would be, and to refer to ways in which they might be circumvented, perhaps I should avoid the necessity to put pennies in the box and yet might convince the hon. and learned Member that the difficulties are very real.
    I want to address myself to this very real problem, as I think the hon. and learned Member admitted it is, of where

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    the widow graduates to retirement pension. Under the present law, a widow pensioner need not transfer to a retirement pension on her sixtieth birthday; she can wait until she is 65. There is no argument between us on that. Suppose that there was an earnings rule for retirement pension but not for widow's pension. Clearly the widow would be well advised to put off her retirement until she was 65 and to draw her widow's pension in addition to her earnings. It would obviously be common sense for her to do so, provided the retirement pension and the widow's pension were at the same rate. At present, they generally are at the same rate, but we know that there is a growing number of widow pensioners—and the number will become quite considerable—who would be able to draw a higher retirement pension, either because of the graduated pension which the widow, or her husband, or both, had earned, or because of the flat-rate increments which her husband had earned for her.
    Therefore, there is a difficult choice before widow pensioners of 60—and this will affect more and more of them as time goes on—between taking a higher retirement pension with an earnings rule or taking a lower widow's pension without an earnings rule. It would be very difficult for most widows to come to a sensible judgment about that unless they were quite certain about their earnings—their continuance, and the way in which they would move up or down in future.
    If a woman's husband dies when she is over 60, she gets a retirement pension. If the Amendment was accepted and the Labour Party's policy were introduced, when she draws retirement pension she would be subject to an earnings rule. Her sister who was widowed when under 60 could, however, draw her widow's pension and earn as much as she liked. I should not like the job of trying to persuade the older widow that this was fair. It would certainly be one of the consequences that it would, no doubt, be necessary to allow her to draw a widow's pension, which, again, would involve her in exactly the same awkward choice that I have tried to describe.
    592
    There is the widow aged 60 who already has a retirement pension when her husband dies. Since, because of its graduated addition, it may be higher than the widow's pension, she may be drawing more than she would if she transferred to a widow's pension and avoided the earnings rule. It would certainly seem odd to compel this widow to go on to a lower widow's pension, when she was already a retirement pensioner, in order to avoid the earnings rule.
    Suppose that, to avoid those complications, it was decided to allow widows between the ages of 60 and 65 to draw their retirement pensions free of any earnings rule. I should very much like the hon. and learned Gentleman's advice about how this could be justified to other women between 60 and 65. There would be the position of no earnings rule for widow pensioners between 60 and 65 but an earnings rule, not only for married women and spinsters between those ages, but also for widows who never qualified for widow's pensions because their husbands died before they were 50.
    Mr. Mitchison: The Minister was kind enough to ask my advice. I will give it in general terms quite clearly. There are abundant anomalies at present. There would be other anomalies if a change were made. In those circumstances, what we should do is to do the right thing, what we believe to be right; and this, I think, is right.
    Mr. Wood: The hon. and learned Gentleman continues to press his point that this is the right thing to do. I suggest that by removing certain anomalies to which the hon. and learned Gentleman has drawn our attention about unearned and earned income, he would merely lead us into just as difficult anomalies in the future. To distinguish between giving widow pensioners between 60 and 65 their pension without an earnings rule and giving it to other widows who did not qualify earlier with an earnings rule is not the kind of proposal which will get the hon. and learned Gentleman much of a cheer at the hustings in a few months' time.
    Therefore, to get a cheer, perhaps the hon. and learned Gentleman may be persuaded to allow widows like these—those who never qualified for widows'

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    benefits—to join the concessionary group between the ages of 60 and 65. If the party opposite did that, however, how would they face the spinsters? Indeed, a childless widow whose husband died when she was 25 would get into the circle if all widows were admitted, but a spinster would be kept outside.
    Therefore, a spinster would draw a retirement pension, which would be reduced if she earned more than £5 a week, but a widow whose husband died, say, 35 years before could earn as much as she liked on top of her pension. I should appreciate and admire more than ever the hon. and learned Gentleman's powers of persuasion if he thought that he could make this seem fair to the women who have never had husbands.
    I believe that the only way out of this dilemma is to abolish the earnings rule for retirement pensioners as well. Last week, I gave my reasons why I did not think that this solution could, or should, be adopted, and I understand from one or two perusals of New Frontiers for Social Security that it is not the proposal of the Labour Party. Nevertheless, for reasons which I have tried to give today, I believe that it would be hopeless to try to maintain an earnings rule for retirement pensioners if the earnings rules for widows' benefits were abolished.
    Therefore, I must ask the Committee to reject the Amendment, and I ask it to do so in order that the principle of retirement pensions remaining conditional upon retirement can continue to be maintained.
    Miss Herbison: The Minister has given many reasons why he thinks that our Amendments should be opposed. He has taken us from the widow to the retirement pensioner. I want to take the right hon. Gentleman back to other anomalies which exist. One could apply to all these anomalies the reasons which have been given concerning the anomalies that might be caused if our Amendments were accepted.
    This matter was raised on Second Reading, when the Joint Parliamentary Secretary gave reasons why such a proposal could not be adopted. The existing anomalies are two in kind. The first category is what happens to what I may call the industrially injured widow and the widow of the war disabled. They
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    have a high rate of pension with no earnings rule attached to it.
    In dealing with that category of widow, the hon. Lady said on Second Reading:
    "It depends on the principles of the insurance applying to the two different schemes"—
    that is, the schemes for the widow of the man who has died naturally and for the widow of the man who has lost his life through industrial accident or as a result of war.
    The hon. Lady stated:
    "National Insurance is based on the concept of absence of earnings and one is insuring against being unable to support oneself by one's own efforts."
    I thought that in this case it was the husband who was insuring the wife, and not the wife herself; yet if one takes this from the Joint Parliamentary Secretary, one would assume that it was the wife who did the insuring. The hon. Lady went on to say:
    "The Industrial Injuries scheme is based on entirely different concepts, partly due to historical reasons, and it has an element of compensatior in it …"
    I accept that Industrial Injuries benefit in all fields, whether widows' benefits or any other field, has an element of compensation in it, but that does not give any reason why in that instance an earnings rule should apply to the widow of a man who died naturally as against the widow of the man who lost his life through an industrial accident.
    The hon. Lady went on further to say—and this is an important point to make:
    "In the meantime, it would be absurd to attempt to justify the existence of a scheme and to justify its differences"—
    the only difference that the hon. Lady picked out was "its preferential rate"—
    "and then o complain of the very preferences which that scheme gives."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 22nd January, 1964; Vol. 687, c. 1196–7.]
    We do not complain about the preferential rate of benefit. We do not in any way complain about the rate of benefit which is paid to the widows of the industrially injured or to the widows of war victims. What we complain about is that an earnings rule is applied to the widow of the man who has died from natural causes and no earnings rule is applied to the widow of the industrially injured. I should like the

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    Minister to get rid of that anomaly even if it means that further anomalies are incurred.
    I come, however, to the second case with which the Minister has not dealt adequately. My hon. and learned Friend who moved this Amendment spoke of the second type of case. We discussed it on a number of occasions on Second Reading, but the Parliamentary Secretary ran away from it completely—she did not even mention it. This is the case of two widows whose husbands have died from natural causes. One widow finds that she has to go out and earn to keep herself and family. The other widow is in a much more favourable position. She is able to stay at home because she has a very good unearned income. Is not that a very great anomaly, too?
    6.30 p.m.
    There is the further case of the widow, part of whose income comes from her own earnings and part from unearned income. I understand that the part that is unearned income is not taken into account. That is a further anomaly.
    It seems to us, as to most people in the country—even the spinsters about whom the Minister was so concerned—that we should be giving justice to these widows if this Amendment were accepted. I am a spinster, and I know many other spinsters who are completely behind me on this Amendment, because they feel that here justice will be given to another group of women, and they are willing to wait to see if later they might get some justice, too.
    The Minister said, "What a difficult position the widow would have to face when she comes to 60 years of age, and how difficult it would be, if there was an earnings rule applied to her, to make a sensible judgment on these matters." I would leave it to the woman to make a sensible judgment if, until she reached that age, she were given the justice which war widows and industrially disabled widows are being given at present.
    I want to touch on one further point. My hon. and learned Friend called to his aid the reports of the Ministry's own advisory committee. They have shown very clearly that further increases of the amount that a widow can earn would make nonsense of the earnings rule.
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    They thought that we had almost come to that stage on the last occasion. I think that they were right. I have a sneaking feeling that that was the reason the Minister did not put it to the Committee this time. I do not blame him for that. The Minister wants to make a decision on these matters, which are important matters, and to bring that decision to fruition as quickly as possible.
    I have no complaint, but I say to the Minister that he cannot have it both ways. He tries to bamboozle the Committee with all the reasons why it cannot be done because of the anomalies that would ensue, and yet runs away from the advice of his own Advisory Committee, which has warned him at least on two occasions of the effect of raising the amount that can be earned under the earnings rule. In spite of the case that the Minister has made—I think that he tried to deal with the matter as fully and fairly as he possibly could—he would be very wise to accept the Amendment.
    Mr. Ede: I have always admired the Minister but I do not think that I have ever admired him more than I have tonight. I meet a good many widows who want to argue with me about this matter. I listen to what they have to say. Then, as a rule, I have to point out to them that under the law they are not entitled to a pension. That, of course, is a perfect answer so far as concerns anything practical being done while the law remains as it is.
    They then want to get into arguments about abstract justice and all sorts of matters which they think justify amendment of the law. The right hon. Gentleman did not do as I do. I never allow myself to get drawn into an argument with a widow on the abstract justice of the present law. Difficult as it always is to argue with a woman, when one gets into an argument with a widow about the abstract justice of the present law, one just has to keep on saying, "Well, the law is as it is".
    The right hon. Gentleman, in the details into which he went, showed very considerable courage, because I cannot help feeling that, in the end, one gets driven back to the position that the victims never seem able to appreciate

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    that the laws that we make here ought to be applied to them. One of the difficulties that confronts us as legislators is: how can we make our decisions satisfy the claims of abstract justice? I suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that, when all the arguments he has adduced this evening have been considered, we come back to the position: can we honestly say to ourselves—let alone what we say to widows—that we think that justice is being done?
    I would appeal to the Minister to recognise that when it comes to justice, the existing law is quite indefensible when we are dealing with its victims, and I hope that, even if it is not done tonight, the day will not be very far distant when the rule will be abolished. I could only wish I had thought to send half a dozen of the ladies who talked to me in my constituency to talk to him. I should like him to try the speech that he has made tonight on them. I am quite sure that they would tell him frankly, while listening to all that he had to say, that they still did not think they were getting a fair deal in view of the spirit of the country at the present time towards people situated in the difficult situation in which many of them are.
    Mr. Mitchison: I feel a little like someone who has been taking part in a mixed doubles and is left merely to return the ball at the end of the volley. What the Minister has just heard from my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) is substantially what the great majority of people in this country believe. The earnings rule is really discredited, not as an abstract matter, not as a statement of general morals, but simply as a matter of practice.
    It is felt by people to be radically unfair, and it is unfair. I shall not repeat what has been said about industrial injuries, but it is a point that strikes people very much. How can it be fair in one case and unfair in another? It is no use trying to draw fine distinctions between the principles of the two Acts. There are differences but I cannot see that any of them really affect the point that what is fair in one case could equally well and should be fair in the other, and that what is practicable in one case is also practicable in the other.
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    In trying to go some way into the question of how far it would be practicable, perhaps I have been on the wrong lines but, after all, it is up to the Minister, if the rule is unfair in its operation, to get rid of it. The rule is unfair not only in relation to industrial injuries but also to other cases.
    The first and most obvious one is that it only deals with earnings. That is bound to make it unfair. One can find instances one way and another, but it is obviously unfair that, if a widow has a considerable unearned income, it is not taken into account in reckoning her pension, while, if she has a considerable earned income, that is taken into account. It is perfectly simple and it is bound to strike anyone as being unfair.
    Nowadays the commonest instances will not be of women entirely on earnings or entirely on unearned income, but of women who derive income from both sources. Even in these cases, however, one finds gross unfairness between one woman and another, cases where the earned income in one instance and the unearned income in the other brings the person concerned within the operation of the rule.
    The second aspect that strikes everyone as being unfair is the difference between the operation in relation to widows and that in relation to retirement pensioners. I shall not discuss the rule for retirement pensioners but will merely point out that to them it is a very much smaller financial matter. The men are affected at a far earlier stage than the women will be. The limit in relation to their average earnings is a far lower proportion, just as the limit in relation to women's average earnings was, at the beginning, a far lower proportion.
    When, however, one considers the widows, what the Government are doing now is dealing with a group of widows who are at the top of the earnings scale, and it is that group of widows only which is affected. Every increase made in the limit means a reduction in the number of widows affected, unless it is paralleled by an increase in women's earnings at the same time, and we constantly get the ridiculous position of the Advisory Committee time after time having to consider how these two things

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    match up to the scale of women's earnings on the one hand and the limitation for purposes of the earnings rule for widows on the other.
    The Committee has been considering this matter from that point of view for years. From what I see of its reports, the Committee can hardly be described as wildly revolutionary or likely to say to the Minister that he must not relax the rule if he wants to do good work. That is what it said in 1960 and in 1963 it only passed the change proposed because it thought that it was just within the limit of no relaxation since it could be just matched, and no more, with the change which had taken place in women's earnings.
    6.45 p.m.
    We thus have the situation where his responsible, experienced and very cautious Advisory Committee tells the Minister that he must not relax this rule any further and then he comes along with what is admitted to be a relaxation, although we do not object to it as far as it goes. But we do say that the Government have reached the moment where they should recognise that the rule is now ineffective, that the lack of effectiveness is its unfairness, that it is widely misunderstood and that, all this being so, the time has come for them to drop it.
    I do not know what it is that makes the Government nowadays carry on with a rule simply because it has been in operation for some time. I listened with admiration to the right hon. Gentleman's administrative dialectic, but if that is all he can say in defence of a rule which affects a large number of people who have suffered grievous hardship and who look for help to the State—not through National Assistance but through National Insurance—then it is a very poor defence indeed.
    I was glad to hear that the hon. Member for Tynemouth (Dame Irene Ward) constantly bombards Ministers with
    requests for a change. I agree with my right hon. Friend who said that he could send a whole packet of widows to the Minister. I, too, could send a packet to the Minister. If all six hundred or more of us released packets of widows upon the right hon. Gentleman his plight would be very sore indeed.
    If he will not accept the Amendment as it stands, I urge him to give an undertaking that he will abolish the rule in the lifetime of this Parliament. He has an uncertain amount of time left but, after all, what are uncertainties here? It may be a question of weeks or months but he should nevertheless take the step. The right hon. Gentleman might even get far enough to assure us that he can draw up the necessary provision a great deal better than I have been able to do and get it done in another place. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will say that he will look again at this and undertake to get rid of the rule in this Parliament.
    My last plea is that put forward by the minority in the Report I have referred to—that the rule is completely misunderstood. Widows simply do not know where they are. That applies not only to the rule but to a great many other things which concern widows under these schemes, but it operates principally in connection with the operation of the earnings rule.
    In a democratic country, once one gets the position where the people principally affected really do not know why certain things are done and often get themselves into trouble simply because they do not understand it, then it is time for a change. After all, we shall soon have an election. Could not the right hon. Gentleman consider in this matter the preponderant feelings of the electorate? I am sure that if he did he would abolish the rule.
    Question put, That "hundred" stand part of the Clause:—
    The Committee divided: Ayes 190, Noes 147.

    Division No. 13]

    AYES

    [6.50 p.m.

    Agnew, Sir Peter

    Barber, Rt. Hon. Anthony

    Bishop, Sir Patrick

    Allan, Robert (Paddington, S.)

    Barlow, Sir John

    Black, Sir Cyril

    Allason, James

    Barter, John

    Bourne-Arton, A.

    Anderson, D. C.

    Batsford, Brian

    Box, Donald

    Arbuthnot, Sir John

    Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton

    Braine, Bernard

    Ashton, Sir Hubert

    Berkeley, Humphry

    Brewis, John

    Atkins, Humphrey

    Biffen, John

    Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. Sir Walter

    Awdry, Daniel (Chippenham)

    Birch, Rt. Hon. Nigel

    Brown, Alan (Tottenham)

    Browne, Percy (Torrington)

    Henderson, John (Cathcart)

    Partridge, E.

    Bryan, Paul

    Hiley, Joseph

    Pearson, Frank (Clitheroe)

    Buck, Antony

    Hill, J. E. B. (S. Norfolk)

    Peel, John

    Bullus, Wing Commander Eric

    Hirst, Geoffrey

    Percival, Ian

    Campbell, Gordon

    Hogg, Rt. Hon. Quintin

    Peyton, John

    Cary, Sir Robert

    Holland, Philip

    Pickthorn, Sir Kenneth

    Channon, H. P. G.

    Hollingworth, John

    Pitt, Dame Edith

    Chataway, Christopher

    Hope, Rt. Hon. Lord John

    Pounder, Rafton

    Chichester-Clark, R.

    Hopkins, Alan

    Powell, Rt. Hon. J. Enoch

    Clark, Henry (Antrim, N.)

    Howard, Hon. G. R. (St. Ives)

    Pym, Francis

    Clarke, Brig. Terence (Portsmth, W.)

    Hughes-Young, Michael

    Rawlinson, Rt. Hon. Sir Peter

    Cole, Norman

    Hutchison, Michael Clark

    Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin

    Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.

    Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)

    Rees-Davits, W. R. (Isle of Thanet)

    Cordle, John

    Jackson, John

    Ridley, Hon. Nicholas

    Corfield, F. V.

    Jenkins, Robert (Dulwich)

    Ridsdale, Julian

    Costain, A. P.

    Johnson, Eric (Blackley)

    Roots, William

    Courtney, Cdr. Anthony

    Johnson Smith, Geoffrey

    Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard

    Craddock, Sir Beresford (Spelthorne)

    Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)

    Russell, Ronald

    Crowder, F. P.

    Kaberry, Sir Donald

    Scott-Hopkins, James

    Cunningham, Sir Knox

    Kerans, Cdr. J. S.

    Sharples, Richard

    Curran, Charles

    Kerr, Sir Hamilton

    Shaw, M.

    Dance, James

    Kershaw, Anthony

    Skeet, T. H. H.

    d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry

    Kirk, Peter

    Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'd & Chiswick)

    Deedes, Rt. Hon. W. F.

    Lagden, Godfrey

    Spearman, Sir Alexander

    Digby, Simon Wingfield

    Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)

    Stainton, Keith

    Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. M.

    Lilley, F. J. P.

    Stodart, J. A.

    Doughty, Charles

    Lindsay, Sir Martin

    Studholme, Sir Henry

    Drayson, G. B.

    Litchfield, Capt. John

    Summers, Sir Spencer

    Eden, Sir John

    Lloyd, Rt. Hn. Geoffrey (Sut'nC'dfield)

    Taylor, Edwin (Bolton, E.)

    Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)

    Lloyd, Rt. Hon. Selwyn (Wirral)

    Teeling, Sir William

    Elliott, R. W. (Newc'tle-upon-Tyne, N.)

    Longden, Gilbert

    Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret

    Errington, Sir Eric

    Loveys, Walter H.

    Thomas, Sir Leslie (Canterbury)

    Farey-Jones, F. W.

    Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh

    Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon, S.)

    Farr, John

    McAdden, Sir Stephen

    Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin

    Finlay, Graeme

    McLaren, Martin

    Touche, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon

    Foster, Sir John

    Maclean, Sir Fitzroy (Bute & N. Ayrs)

    Turner, Colin

    Fraser, Ian (Plymouth, Sutton)

    McLean, Neil (Inverness)

    van Straubenzee, W. R.

    Freeth, Denzil

    MacLeod, Sir John (Ross & Cromarty)

    Vane, W. M. F.

    Gardner, Edward

    Marshall, Sir Douglas

    Vosper, Rt. Hon. Dennis

    Gibson-Watt, David

    Marten, Neil

    Walker, Peter

    Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, Central)

    Mathew, Robert (Honiton)

    Wall, Patrick

    Goodhart, Philip

    Maude, Angus (Stratford-on-Avon)

    Williams, Dudley (Exeter)

    Goodhew, Victor

    Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.

    Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)

    Grant-Ferris, R.

    Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C.

    Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)

    Green, Alan

    Mills, Stratton

    Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)

    Gresham Cooke, R.

    Miscampbell, Norman

    Wise, A. R.

    Grosvenor, Lord Robert

    Montgomery, Fergus

    Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick

    Gurden, Harold

    Moore, Sir Thomas (Ayr)

    Wood, Rt. Hon. Richard

    Hall, John (Wycombe)

    More, Jasper (Ludlow)

    Woodhouse, C. M.

    Hamiton, Michael (Wellingborough)

    Morgan, William

    Woodnutt, Mark

    Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N. W.)

    Morrison, John

    Woollam, John

    Harris, Reader (Heston)

    Heave, Airey

    Yates, William (The Wrekin)

    Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)

    Nugent, Rt. Hon. Sir Richard

    Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere (Macclesf'd)

    Oakshott, Sir Hendrie

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

    Harvey, John (Walthamstow, E.)

    Osborn, John (Hallam)

    Mr. MacArthur and

    Hastings, Stephen

    Osborne, Sir Cyril (Louth)

    Mr. Hugh Rees.

    Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel

    Page, Graham (Crosby)

    NOES

    Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)

    Corbet, Mrs. Freda

    Grimond, Rt. Hon. J.

    Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)

    Cronin, John

    Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W.)

    Barnett, Guy

    Cullen, Mrs. Alice

    Hamilton, William (West Fife)

    Beaney, Alan

    Dalyell, Tam

    Hannan, William

    Bellenger, Rt. Hon. F. J.

    Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)

    Harper, Joseph

    Benn, Anthony Wedgwood

    Davies, Ifor (Gower)

    Hart, Mrs. Judith

    Bennett, J. (Glasgow, Bridgeton)

    Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)

    Hayman, F. H.

    Benson, Sir George

    Diamond, John

    Healey, Denis

    Blackburn, F.

    Doig, Peter

    Henderson, Rt. Hn. Arthur (Rwly Regis)

    Blyton, William

    Duffy, A. E. P. (Colne Valley)

    Herbison, Miss Margaret

    Boardman, H.

    Ede, Rt. Hon. C.

    Hill, J. (Midlothian)

    Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G.

    Edelman, Maurice

    Hilton, A. V.

    Bowden, Rt. Hn. H. W. (Leics, S. W.)

    Edwards, Robert (Bilston)

    Holman, Percy

    Bradley, Tom

    Edwards, Walter (Stepney)

    Houghton, Douglas

    Bray, Dr. Jeremy

    Evans, Albert

    Howell, Charles A. (Perry Barr)

    Brockway, A. Fenner

    Finch, Harold

    Hoy, James H.

    Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)

    Fitch, Alan

    Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)

    Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)

    Fletcher, Eric

    Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)

    Callaghan, James

    Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)

    Hunter, A. E.

    Carmichael, Neil

    Galpern, Sir Myer

    Hynd, H. (Accrington)

    Castle, Mrs. Barbara

    Ginsburg, David

    Hynd, John (Attercliffe)

    Chapman, Donald

    Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. C.

    Jay, Rt. Hon. Douglas

    Cliffs, Michael

    Grey, Charles

    Jeger, George

    Collide, Percy

    Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)

    Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)

    602

    603

    Jones, Dan (Burnley)

    Morris, John

    Sorensen, R. W.

    Kelley, Richard

    Moyle, Arthur

    Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank

    Kenyon, Clifford

    Noel-Baker, Rt. Hn. Philip (Derby, S.)

    Spriggs, Leslie

    Lawson, George

    O'Malley, B. K.

    Steele, Thomas

    Ledger, Ron

    Oram, A. E.

    Stross, Dr. Barnett (Stoke-on-Trent, C.)

    Lee, Frederick (Newton)

    Oswald, Thomas

    Symonds, J. B.

    Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)

    Owen, Will

    Taverns, D.

    Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)

    Padley, W. E.

    Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)

    Lipton, Marcus

    Paget, R. T.

    Thomas, Iorwerth (Rhondda, W.)

    Loughlin, Charles

    Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)

    Thornton, Ernest

    Lubbock, Eric

    Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)

    Thorpe, Jeremy

    Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson

    Pearl, Frederick

    Tomney, Frank

    MacColl, James

    Price, J. T. (Westhougton)

    Wainwright, Edwin

    McKay, John (Wallsend)

    Probert, Arthur

    Warbey, William

    Mackie, John (Enfield, East)

    Randall, Harry

    Weitzman, David

    Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)

    Rees, Merlyn (Leeds, S.)

    Wells, William (Walsall, N.)

    Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)

    Reynolds, G. W.

    White, Mrs. Eirene

    Manuel, Archie

    Rhodes, H.

    Wilkins, W. A.

    Mapp, Charles

    Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)

    Willey, Frederick

    Mayhew, Christopher

    Robertson, John (Paisley)

    Williams, D. J. (Neath)

    Mendelson, J. J.

    Rodgers, W. T. (Stockton)

    Wilson, Rt. Hon. Harold (Huyton)

    Millan, Bruce

    Ross, William

    Woof, Robert

    Milne, Edward

    Silkin, John

    Yates, Victor (Ladywood)

    Mitchison, G. R.

    Silverman, Julius (Aston)

    Moody, A. S.

    Silverman, Sydney (Nelson)

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

    Morris, Charles (Openshaw)

    Snow, Julian

    Mr. Sydney Irving and

    Mr. Redhead.

    Question proposed, That the Clause stand part of the Bill.
    Dame Irene Ward: I must apologise to the Committee that I was not able to hear all the discussion on the Amendments. As everyone realises, there is always a great deal to do on a Thursday and it is not always possible to be in the Chamber for the whole of a debate. However, I have lived so much with the provisions of the Clause that I can repeat the arguments on both sides almost in my sleep. Although I feel that I owe the Committee an apology, that does not mean that I am not certain what arguments have been put forward. I did not vote on the Amendment because, not having heard the argument, I did not think that it was right to do so, but I am certain that if I had heard my right hon. Friend's reply I would not have agreed with him.
    7.0 p.m.
    I do not often agree with the hon. and learned Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison), but I heard him say—and I agreed with him—that this side of the Committee should put forward the argument that widows, having been relieved of the earnings rule, do not like to find the earnings rule applies to them on reaching the age of 60.
    I am not a great feminist, but I sometimes think that men think—
    The Deputy-Chairman: I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Lady, but we cannot
    604
    have another discussion on an Amendment which has been discussed and decided on. She cannot seek to rehash all the arguments which were deployed on the Amendment which we have discussed and which has been disposed of.
    Dame Irene Ward: Sir Robert, I was not intending to do that. All that I was going to do was to emphasise—and I do not think that this was brought out during the discussion on the Amendment—that men always think that they know all about women's motives. They do not. Ministers always think that they know all about women's motives, but they do not.
    My objection to the Clause is that when the earnings rule is applied to widows they do not earn increments, whereas when they reach the age of 60 and the earnings rule is applied they do earn them. That ought to have been taken into consideration. A widow to whom the earnings rule is applied gets no benefit at all, whereas when the earnings rule is applied to a widow on reaching the age of 60 as a retirement pension she at least gets increments.
    I should have thought that that would have been a cover to these discrepancies. The Minister's argument is that widows would not like having the earnings rule applied when they reach the age of 60. That is the point that I should like to have made when the Amendment was being discussed.
    The Deputy-Chairman: Order. I am sorry, but that is what the hon. Lady cannot do now.
    Dame Irene Ward: Sir Robert, surely I am entitled to say why I object to the Clause?
    Mr. McKay: On a point of order. Having discussed a Clause at considerable length, and having put forward Amendments to it and taken a decision on them, is it in order for an hon. Member to start discussing the Clause again?
    The Deputy-Chairman: I have pointed out to the hon. Lady that on the Question, That the Clause stand part of the Bill, it is not in order to discuss the merits of an Amendment which has been dealt with.
    Dame Irene Ward: I am discussing the Question that is now before the Committee. This Clause imposes an earnings rule on widows at a certain level of income. I am entitled to say that I do not support the Clause. I would rather that there were no earnings rule on widows' earnings, and I am entitled to say so.
    It is a pity that I cannot put forward all the reasons why I object to the earnings rule being applied to widows at all. I think that they are being put into the position in which, because of the earnings rule, they will not derive the benefit of receiving increments. I think that I am in order in saying that.
    Although it has nothing to do with the Amendment which has been discussed, perhaps I might say that the Conservative Lady Members of Parliament and I presume hon. Ladies opposite with the exception of perhaps one of them take the same view—would have liked an inquiry into the whole matter. We suggested it, but our request was turned down.
    I shall say no more. I wanted to register my disapproval of the way in which the whole matter has been handled. I repeat that men always think that they know all about women's motives. They think that they know all about what widows feel about these matters. My mother was widowed when I was a very small child, and I know a great deal more about the difficulties of
    606
    being a widow than men do, for the simple reason that they have had no experience of it, nor could they. I regret that we did not abolish the earnings rule for widows.
    Mr. Wood: Rather than repeat the speech which I made half an hour ago, perhaps I might suggest to my hon. Friend that she reads it tomorrow. She will find that, among other things, I said some delightful things about her which I do not feel inclined to withdraw even though she judged my speech without having heard it.
    Miss Herbison: I shall be surprised indeed if, when the hon. Lady the Member for Tynemouth (Dame Irene Ward) reads the Minister's speech tomorrow, she agrees with what he said.
    This Clause raises the limit of earnings before the earnings rule is applied. The hon. Lady said that she would like the earnings rule for widows to be abolished. The hon. Lady is always extremely forthright, and I believe what she said, but why was it that she did not join us in the Division Lobby when we were voting on just that issue?
    Dame Irene Ward: I hope that I shall be in order in saying that my colleagues and I, by exercising a great deal of pressure, swayed my Government into introducing the Bill. One is sometimes a little inhibited from voting against one's Government, or against one's Minister, if they do things which they have been urged to do. I know the hon. Lady very well, and I think that in similar circumstances she would have been as generous as I was. That is the reason for my not voting.
    Miss Herbison: I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her explanation, but I would haw been happier if, even though she could hot join us in the Lobby, we had been joined by some of those Conservative Lady Members to whom she referred. In fact, not one of them joined us.
    I hope that the hon. Lady will maintain her pressure on the Government. I hope that she will read the Minister's speech and will be as dissatisfied with it as I have been. I am sure that with her energy she will be back at the Minister. I hope that her pressure, with the pressure from my hon. Friends, will

    607
    cause the Minister to move a further Amendment in another place.
    Question put and agreed to.
    Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.
    Clauses 5 and 6 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

    New Clause.—(WIDOW'S EXTENDED BENEFIT.)
    Section 17 of the National Insurance Act 1946 (Widow's Benefit) shall be amended by the addition of the following words, "and in the case of a widow's deferred pension, if (subject to the conditions in subsection (1) (c) and subsection 2 of this section) at the husband's death she was over the age of forty she shall be entitled to this benefit on attaining the age of fifty".—[Mr. P. Browne.]
    Brought up, and read the First time.
    Mr. Percy Browne: I beg to move, That the Clause be read a Second time.
    I feel rather dubious about speaking after being told that no man knows how widows think. I accept that my hon. Friend the Member for Tynemouth (Dame Irene Ward) knows a great deal more than I do about what widows and women think. Nevertheless, I would point out that many of the pensions Bills that I have seen go through the House have been steered through all their stages quite successfully by men.
    The Clause is designed to help those women who are widowed between the ages of 40 and 50 and who are not in receipt of the widowed mothers' allowance. The position of these widows was mentioned twice in the Second Reading debate. The hon. Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison) and I both referred to it. Her idea was that there should be a graduation between the age groups, and I thought that that was a good idea. Nevertheless, my Clause provides for a straightforward figure for the lot. I was interested to notice that after we two had mentioned these widows one of my hon. Friends put down a Question on the subject, and the day before yesterday the Daily Mail also mentioned them. I should like to mention the history behind the present position in which these widows find themselves. A woman who is widowed when she is below the age of 50 is automatically entitled to receive a widows' allowance for 13 weeks. If she
    608
    has children under a certain age she also receives the widowed mothers' allowance. If she was married before 1948 it is possible that she will be in receipt of 10s. per week.
    7.15 p.m.
    Her sister, who was widowed when she had passed the age of 50, had certain alterations made in her conditions by the Acts of 1946 and 1956. There was a certain amount of horse trading. In a way, widows over the age of 50 were better off, although widows between the ages of 40 and 50 who had previously benefited were cut out. One alteration was that the previous condition of ten years' marriage was made a condition of three years' marriage, and what we called running starts were introduced, which enabled a widow, after drawing the allowance, to benefit from her husband's contribution to the extent that she could draw unemployment and sickness benefit. She can now draw unemployment benefit up to the normal limit of 19 months, after which she will have her cards stamped in the normal way without collecting any more benefit, and she can be sick indefinitely.
    In the Second Reading debate I referred to the fact that in my constituency there were some widows who, quite understandably, could not adjust themselves during the 13 weeks' period and that if they were under 50 years of age they would often obtain a certificate from a sympathetic doctor and would perforce go sick until they were able to find themselves a job and to readjust.
    When the new regulations were introduced in 1956 the age limit was raised from 40 to 50. The hon. Lady quoted from a speech made from the Government Front Bench in January of last year which pointed out that this had happened. The object of the Clause is to retain the beneficial results of the 1956 and 1957 Acts, while providing that a woman who is widowed between the ages of 40 and 50 will automatically qualify for the widows' benefit at the age of 50.
    Hon. Members may ask why I want this changed. My right hon. Friend has just mentioned that we are moving towards a general selectivity in pensions, and I think this is a good thing. It is a subject on which I have spoken with various degrees of success, and have experienced a certain amount of ridicule,

    609
    in the past five years, although I have been delighted to find that during the last year or so hon. Members on both sides of the Committee have agreed that this is something that we shall come to in due course.
    I want to give two additional reasons why I believe that widows between the ages of 40 and 50 should be helped. When this legislation was framed women generally were marrying, and were having families, later in life than they are today. The age of marriage has fallen. People are marrying and having children at a younger age. The result is that, if they are widowed when they are 40, 45 or 47, it is likely that they will have left their jobs a good deal earlier in life. They may well not have got as far as university, should they have had the brain, nor may they have achieved proficiency in a skilled occupation to which they can return.
    Secondly, in certain parts of the country—I am sure this applies to the constituencies of my hon. Friend the Member for Tynemouth and the hon. Member for Lanarkshire, North, just as it does to mine—the openings for women are comparatively few, and rehabilitation is difficult at that age. Although, by choice, I would like to see the age limits for widows' benefits reduced, I have not asked for that. But I believe that we have here a group of widows who should now be helped selectively, and the Clause is a halfway house to this. It recognises that these people have not been able to learn skills because they married young—the general trend today—and it recognises the difficulties of obtaining jobs in many parts of the country and also of rehabilitation.
    I hope that my right hon. Friend will consider the Clause sympathetically. On the last Amendment I voted for the Government. I would have given different reasons for doing so, but I should be out of order if I went into detail about them. Nevertheless, in the Second Reading debate I referred to the fact that I believe in selectivity. I believe that it would be fair to say that those who have unearned income are probably paying tax on it. I have always disagreed with the pension principle—that the money that people pay taxes on, in so far as it is pension money, should not be put back into the pension
    610
    fund. That has been one of my main arguments for selectivity in the past.
    I have explained my reasons for disliking any increase in the present benefit for the 10s. widow—another point touched on by the hon. Lady—because the widows with whom we are dealing now are much more worthy of help. I hope that my right hon. Friend will accept the Clause and that I shall have the support of hon. Members on both sides of the Committee.
    Mr. Cole: As was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Torrington (Mr. P. Browne), this is not the ideal solution, and a lot of us would have preferred a return to an earlier age than 50. Both my hon. Friend and the Daily Mail have indicated that in many cases a woman widowed when over 40 has been "out of circulation", as it were, from the point of view of employment for 20 years or more. That will become increasingly the case as the age of marriage is lower. In the competitive employment market—it is still a competitive market despite the fact of high employment—she will not find it easy to get a suitable job, and that will become even more difficult as her age increases. This is recognised by the fact that we give a full widow's pension at the age of 50. The only difference between the policy of the Government and this new Clause is the stage at which employment becomes a super-difficulty and the question of pension arises.
    This new Clause indicates a happy compromise in our efforts to promote suitable legislation in this matter. I will not adduce the argument about the position of those people who may miss the full benefit because they are within a fortnight of the appropriate age. Wherever the line is drawn that sort of thing will always happen. But if someone misses the qualifying age of 50 by a year or 18 months, that means that it is missed for the next eleven years or so, and this Clause would obviate that state of affairs. It does not represent a complete panacea for all the widows under 50. But whatever job they may be doing at under that age they may find it increasingly difficult, as their 50th birthday approaches, to continue with that work. But always they may be buoyed up by

    611
    the thought that on passing their fiftieth birthday they will get the full benefit. That is the principle that is enshrined in other pensions legislation where, as one approaches the age of 60, there is the knowledge that when the time comes it is possible to retire and not work but get a full retirement pension.
    My hon. Friend has tried to meet the problems which face the Government. Some of these problems arise from the sort of administrative jungle which inevitably surrounds pension legislation and I am certain that the anomalies result from this. I do not think that the acceptance of this Clause would result in a feeling of satisfaction by every widow in the country but it might be considered that a move forward had been made. I hope that my right hon. Friend will discern some virtue in this proposal. I beg him not to tell us again about the administrative difficulties. In most cases it will be some years before it is necessary to pay a pension at 50. I consider this a good Clause and I am glad to support it.
    Mr. McKay: I am happy to support this Motion. During the Second Reading debate I referred to the reduction of the age from 50 to 40. Here we have a compromise. At that time I suggested that widows at 40 should be allowed to contribute to a pension until they reached the age of 50 and then receive a pension in the same way as widows of 50. This is a little better than that idea. It suggests that the widow should not pay any contribution if she is over 40 but that she should receive a pension at 50.
    Sir Spencer Summers: I hope that the Minister will remind us why Parliament changed the age from 40 to 50 and what would be the approximate cost of returning to the age of 40. This proposed new Clause represents an attempt to assist the position of a particular type of widow without "putting the clock back" as much as previously. One may agree with the motive behind this idea, but I cannot help feeling that there is a flaw in the argument.
    If it be true, as I believe it is, that a widow who is over 40—here we are not dealing with the widowed mother—finds,
    612
    for reasons which have been advanced, that it is difficult to get a job, she may, at the age of 42 or 43, have to manage as best she can, perhaps for seven years. That is the time when her need is real and when she requires help. It is a poor consolation to her to be told, "Do not worry too much. In six or seven years' time benefit will be coming to you because of a proposal made in the early part of 1964. All you have to do is to fight for your existence for the next six or seven years." If a widow can overcome her difficulties during that period she may well be able to manage for considerably longer. It seems to me, therefore, that if the need of a widow under the age of 50 is as real as has been argued by my hon. Friend the Member for Torrington (Mr. P. Browne) she deserves more generous treatment than is proposed in this Clause, and that it is not enough to try to meet the needs of such people in this way.
    I am not qualified to comment on whether we should go back to the age of 40. I do not remember the arguments which prompted the Government to raise the age to 50. Perhaps finance had something to do with it. I ask that the Minister remind us of what was said in the past, about which he will be far more familiar than some hon. Members on the back benches.
    7.30 p.m.
    Dame Irene Ward: I am very glad to be able to support this new Clause, although of course I agree with the speech made by my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Sir S. Summers). I wish to thank my hon. Friend the Member for Torrington (Mr. P. Browne) for what he said about the varying opportunities in different parts of the country for women to obtain employment. This has always been one of the problems which arise in a Bill which covers a general legislative problem. I should have thought that, with all the difficulties arising in various parts of the country over unemployment and the finding of jobs for school leavers, this proposal, although, as my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury said, it is limited, would have been a way of helping the young as against the older women.
    I always find great difficulty in Bills produced Departmentally, because there

    613
    seems a tremendous lack of co-ordination. In my part of the world, the North-East Coast, there is generally heavy industry, but in Whitley Bay, which is part of my constituency, we get the benefit of the rate distribution because we have no industry. The problem of women wanting employment adds to the difficulty of the area I represent. There is no general employment available to women in my part of the world. It is not a textile area.
    We are indebted a great deal to the Minister, but I should have thought that a progressive Minister would have seen that it would be very helpful if we were allowed to have the general inquiry for which we asked before this Bill was conceived. There are tremendous human problems. In Government Departments there is lack of co-ordination. While it is generally accepted that in London there is no shortage of jobs, I well remember in my part of the world a woman who had very good qualifications as a secretary and who had the greatest difficulty in finding a job because young people naturally at the beginning of their lives have a right to be considered.
    This is a tremendously difficult problem. I hope that when he replies my right hon. Friend will not merely negative this new Clause. I hope he will say that the speeches made on it have drawn his attention to the fact that we are not only asking for something for widows. We are seeking something which would vitally affect the employment problem as related to school leavers who have their way to make in life and also widows who find themselves without a job struggling to pay high contributions to keep in line for a proper pension when they reach the age of 60.
    I do not know how we can make an impression on my right hon. Friend. Of course he may have argued very much in favour of having an inquiry. If so, I apologise for being so jolly hard on him. But the rest of the Cabinet must have been unaware of the difficulties which arise in areas such as mine. I, therefore, hope that when he replies he will not negative this new Clause, but will give some hope that proper and appropriate action will be taken.
    Mr. J. Griffiths: I hope, as the hon. Lady the Member for Tynemouth
    614
    (Dame Irene Ward) does, that the Minister will not negative this new Clause. I hope that the hon. Lady will not mind my reminding her that she voted for the Bill which increased the age from 40 to 50, as did all hon. Members opposite.
    Dame Irene Ward: I also remember, going back to 1950, that we all wanted to increase the retirement pension, and I remember the selectivity of hon. and right hon. Members opposite when they were in Government. So, tit-for-tat, I cut that out.
    Mr. Griffiths: I am glad that the hon. Lady does not deny what I said—that they voted to increase the age from 40 to 50.
    We all realise that this very difficult problem surrounds the whole question of widows' pensions and that there is need for an inquiry. Once we departed from the old system of insurance by which a pension was provided for widows—of 10s. a week as it was in 1945—and brought in a new system in which we tried to relate the widow's pension to the different circumstances of widowhood, we provided not one kind of widow's pension, but a number.
    They began with the widow's allowance for 13 weeks. That conformed with an international convention. It was regarded as essential from the standard of health that a woman should be able to remain away from work for 13 weeks. We provided a pension for widows with children. The question was whether the pension should continue after the children had ceased to be dependants. That was in keeping with the kind of general selectiveness for widows.
    Then the question arose, at what age should we regard it as too difficult to ask the widow whose child had grown out of the dependent stage to go to the labour market? We decided in our Act of 1946 that the age should be 40. If a widow was widowed at the age of 40 and without children it was regarded as too much to ask her to go back to the labour market after she had been out of industry for perhaps 20 years. Similarly, in the case of the widow with children we decided that if she were 40 or over when the eldest child ceased

    615
    to be dependent, she should have a widow's pension for the rest of her life.
    I think that has worked as well as any of the previous provisions. None of them gave difficulty, and none of them will give difficulty unless we go back to a general widow's pension. This age was regarded at that time by the whole House as being very fair. There was no argument or discussion about it. There was a general realisation that beyond 40 years of age it would be too much to ask a woman who had been out of the labour market for many years to seek to go back to it.
    Then the Government, for some reason which I have never heard explained, raised the age from 40 to 50. Was that based on experience? Was it based on the experience of the Ministry of Labour, for example? It is not an easy matter for men who lose their jobs at the age of 40 to find other jobs. I have had ample evidence of this in my own area. There has been a change from the old industries like steel to new ones. It is much more difficult for women. On the whole, when the age was 40 the system worked well.
    I was not here when the hon. Member for Torrington (Mr. P. Browne) moved the new Clause. I understand that its effect will be, not to restore the age of 40, but to provide a kind of half-way house. Whatever compromise is provided, it will be anomalous. Everybody in the Committee would be pleased if the age were put back to 40. What are the arguments against doing that? When the age was raised to 50 and pushed into that Bill, it was the bitter pill in the sugar.
    I see no reason why we should not restore the age to 40. Hon. Members on both sides of the Committee agree that a change should be made. They agree that the age of 50 is too high. If it is too high, let us fix the age. Let us have no half-way house; if we are to fix an age, why not fix 40? I do not think that it would cost a great deal. I should like to know the experience of the Ministry of Labour. What does that Ministry think of the chances today, with unemployment at half a million, of a woman entering the labour market for the first time at 40 or 45? Is it fair to ask a woman of that sort of age to
    616
    enter employment, perhaps in an industrial district, for the first time? As we are all agreed that 50 is too high, we should do the straightforward thing and put the age back to 40, where it was before this Government increased it to 50.
    Mr. Wood: I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Torrington (Mr. P. Browne), not only for giving us the chance to discuss this matter, but also for giving us a very clear picture of the situation as it exists at the moment. The picture my hon. Friend gave us was supplemented by the right hon. Member for Llanelly (Mr. J. Griffiths)—and who better, because he had the responsibility for these matters in those days.
    I should like to round off the picture as to why this change was made and what the effect has been. During the passage of the 1946 Bill the concession was made that the pension should also be given to the widow who ceased to draw widowed mother's allowance after the age of 40. The right hon. Gentleman asked why the change back to 50 had been made. The reason was that the concession made during the passage of the 1946 Measure created the anomaly that the widow who was widowed after the age of 40 did not then get the pension, unless she could qualify for widowed mother's allowance. Therefore, the title for pension depended on the age of the widow, and also on the age of the child, at the time of the father's death.
    I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman remembers that this became very anomalous and that the National Insurance Advisory Committee recommended that the widowed mother's allowance should continue until the child was aged 18, and with higher rates. At the same time the Committee suggested that the concession—which I have just described—at the age of 40 should disappear, but only for women who were widowed after that. The Committee also said that there was no evidence—on this we could argue for a long time—that the age of 50 was wrong in relation to employment prospects.
    7.45 p.m.
    I want to take this point further, because it is a serious point made by the right hon. Gentleman and by my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury

    617
    (Sir S. Summers). I want to point out to the Committee the provisions which exist to deal with it. The test at the age of 50 exists because the woman who is widowed, or ceases to draw widowed mother's allowance, when she is over 50 is likely to find it difficult to get back into work. I am leaving aside for the moment the question whether widows under 50 might also find it difficult. I think that we all realise that the age of 50 by itself would be a very crude instrument, if one merely drew a line and said that widows falling on one side would get the benefit but those falling on the other would not. It would not only be crude. It would be cruel.
    Therefore, one of the provisions is what we have just been discussing, namely, that the widow over 50 gets benefit but subject to an earnings rule. I need not go over some of the arguments we have had about that. At the same time, younger widows without children are assumed to be able to earn their living. Therefore, they get no pension, unless they happen to have a reserved right to a 10s. pension under the old scheme.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Torrington was very fair, but I think that these provisions assume an even greater importance than he attached to them. If widows who are younger—the younger widows, to use a shorthand expression—cannot work because they are ill, they then can qualify immediately for sickness benefit, which is at the same rate as the widow's pension. As my hon. Friend fairly pointed out, this goes on, or unemployment benefit with continuing title continues, if necessary until 60, when she gets retirement pension.
    Mr. J. Griffiths: No.
    Mr. Wood: Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will make his point later. In fact such a widow gets her unemployment benefit. Then she gets credits to continue her title for retirement pension when the time comes. If she is unable to get work, or to work, she gets benefit at the same rate as the widow's pension. This was a valuable concession which was introduced by the Government in 1957 after the Report of the National Insurance Advisory Committee to meet the problem of the widow under 50 who cannot work.
    618
    Therefore, the issue becomes this in relation to the Clause. As sickness benefit is available for widows who are continuously nable to work, my hon. Friend's proposal would give benefit only to the women who are widowed between 40 and 50 who are fit to work and therefore probably working. Those are the women whom he would benefit. What be would he doing, in effect, is to give to those widows what would be equal to a retirement pension at a specially early age.
    Mr. Cole: I appreciate my right hon. Friend's point that once the children have left the age of dependance and the woman is over 50 she should qualify for a pension, but under the present legislation a childless widow over 50 also draws the pension. What is the difference between the two, particularly if both are having to return to the labour market?
    Mr. Wood: That calls in question the whole dividing line—if there is to be a dividing line. The older widow, the one over 50, gets her pension, subject to the earnings rule. The widow under 50 does not get benefit, but, if she is unable to work and to support herself by her earnings, she qualifies for sickness benefit, which is at the same rate as the older widow's benefit. I would be happy to give my hon. Friend a longer answer on this topic if he cares to raise it again at a later stage.
    The question of giving a retirement pension to widows at an especially early age would be difficult to justify because I find it difficult to see that the woman between 40 and 50 is so clearly in greater need than a single woman or a woman widowed before reaching the age of 40. As I see it, it is necessary to have some dividing test. We can argue at length about whether it should be 50 or younger, but what we have done with the age 50 test is to try to temper its effects by firstly subjecting the older widows who get the benefit to an earnings rule and, secondly, by giving cover to the younger widows for benefits which are, in fact, exactly equal to the widow's benefit. We could argue about this for a long time. With the test we now have at the age of 50, and with the modifications which I regard as important, I believe that we in have secured something better than is contained in the proposed new Clause.
    Miss Herbison: The Minister has again called in aid the Advisory Committee of his Ministry and has said that it advised that the age of 50 did not present difficulty in finding employment. The hon. Member for Tynemouth (Dame Irene Ward) has clearly shown that in her constituency it is difficult, often even at the age of 40, for a widow to find employment. The hon. Member for Torrington (Mr. P. Browne) made exactly the same point.
    The Minister's reply to that is that if a woman in the category covered by the proposed new Clause is sick and unable to work she gets sickness benefit—the same amount, £3 7s. 6d., as the widow's benefit. If she is without work and cannot find work, the Minister tells us, she gets unemployment benefit. According to the right hon. Gentleman—because this was his whole case—these widows would be drawing either sickness or unemployment benefit.
    Questioned about this, the right hon. Gentleman said, in effect, "If these widows are not drawing unemployment benefit and they cannot find work they will get their credits." It is small comfort to such a widow to be told, after she has struggled to find a job and has been told that she has no right to unemployment benefit, "Do not worry, at least your credits are being paid for you". What must happen to her? Her only recourse is to National Assistance. I will not develop this point because in other debates and on Second Reading we have made our feelings clear on this issue.
    There may be difficulties in accepting the proposed new Clause, and I do not think that it represents the best change that could be made, but I support it because it is an improvement on the present position. I am convinced that almost everyone in the country feels that there is something wrong when there should be this absolute dividing line—50 or over, or just under 50. It is true that we would be creating a dividing line, an arbitrary one, but at least it would be 10 years earlier in a woman's life than the present one and it is for that reason that I support the proposed new Clause.
    620
    I have told the Minister what is the policy of the Labour Party, having given great thought to this matter and realising that widowhood of itself should not give a right to pension. That was in our 1946 Act. We in the Labour Party still believe that that is the case, but, accepting that, we still believe that the age of 50 is too high. We now take the view, after giving the matter careful examination, that there should not be an arbitrary age. Our policy is to have a sliding scale, beginning at a certain age, when the widow would get full pension, reducing according to age until the stage when the widow is sufficiently young to go on to the labour market—after 26 weeks and we are changing it from 13 to 26 weeks—with a chance of getting a job. As I have said, since we believe that the proposed new Clause represents an improvement on the present position, my hon. Friends and I are ready to support it.
    Mr. Cole: I appreciate my right hon. Friend's views on this subject now, but there are still two points which worry me. Firstly, for the life of me I cannot see, despite the unemployment and sickness benefit, why there should be a distinction affecting the case of a woman aged 46, 47 or 48 who wants to get a job but cannot get one. I realise that she may receive unemployment benefit for 19 months, but what happens after that? Why is she supposed theoretically to be in a measurably better position from the point of view of getting a job than a woman aged 52 or 53? This is the crucial dividing line. The age of about 50 is sometimes a crucial age for women and, for this and other reasons, it seems a peculiar age to choose for this dividing line.
    Secondly, this whole system appears to be somewhat of a lottery. A childless widow aged 50½ receives the widow's pension and at 60 the retirement pension if she so elects and if the necessary contributions have been paid. A widow aged 47—with three years to go until she is 50—has to wait not just three years, until she reaches 50, but 13 years, until she is 60. I cannot understand this argument that a widow aged 47 is still young enough to get a job which, theoretically, she must hold for the next 13 years.
    If what I have said is the case, why should not a widow aged 52 who gets a

    621
    job not perhaps hold that job for eight years? This seems a most odd and arbitrary administrative position. There appear to be anomalies and I hope that my right hon. Friend will reconsider this matter.
    8.0 p.m.
    Sir S. Summers: I, too, think that we should look at the age at which full benefit should be paid to the widow. I do not blame my right hon. Friend for not accepting this Amendment, because I do not think that it would do what should be done or help those whom it is designed to help when they need it most. My right hon. Friend said that the lot of the widow over 50 is not as bad as all that, because of sickness benefit and unemployment benefit for a specified number of weeks; and that, therefore, the younger widow, as he called her, is not too badly off.
    On the other hand, if benefits are being paid in certain circumstances to these younger widows, the cost of going a step further and paying them to those who cannot find work cannot be very great. There cannot be all that number of people who would be content—or could be content—to rely at that age on the widow's benefit, even if they had not any children, as an alternative to finding work. I am sure that, if they could find work, they would. We are dealing with people who are entitled neither to unemployment benefit nor sick benefit, and who want work but cannot get it. I therefore hope that the Government will, if not now, at some other time, see if something cannot be done far these people.
    Mr. P. Browne: I am surprised that my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Sir S. Summers) did not put down a Clause of his own to do what he wants, instead of carping at mine. I agree with the hon. Member for Lanarkshire,
    North (Miss Herbison) that all my right hon. Friend has said is that if a widow is under 50 she has a right to sickness benefit ad infinitum, or can get unemployment benefit. But as I pointed out, and as was echoed by the right hon. Member for Llanelly (Mr. J. Griffiths), she cannot draw unemployment benefit indefinitely and, after a maximum period of 19 months, only gets credits.
    I should have thought that rather than rely on the N.I.A.C. Report of 1956, the very least my right hon. Friend could have said was, "I accept the anomalies, I accept the fact that people get married younger, and I accept the difficulties existing in certain regions. I will therefore refer the matter again to the N.I.A.C. to see if it has ideas different from those in 1956." I thought that my right hon. Friend's reply was awfully negative. I hate saying that, because he is so courteous. He was so very pleasant in his reply, but he did not say anything.
    Mr. Cole: What worries a lot of us is this lottery to which I referred; that if a woman is widowed before 50 she may have to wait another 10 years and more. Could not my right hon. Friend consider making the same kind of right apply earlier so that if the widow is able to show that she cannot get employment, she may on application qualify for a widow's pension at 50 even if widowed before 50? That compromise might be considered for the future.
    Mr. Wood: I assure my hon. Friends that I will carefully consider the arguments that have been put forward, but I cannot now go as far as to suggest that it will be possible to make any concession like that. I will consider the arguments.
    Question put, That the Clause be read a Second time:—
    The Committee divided: Ayes 120, Noes 152.

    Division No. 14.]

    AYES

    [8.5 p.m.

    Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)

    Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)

    Diamond, John

    Barnett, Guy

    Carmichael, Neil

    Doig, Peter

    Beaney, Alan

    Castle, Mrs. Barbara

    Ede, Rt. Hon. C.

    Bennett, J. (Glasgow, Bridgeton)

    Chapman, Donald

    Edwards, Robert (Bilston)

    Blackburn, F.

    Cliffe, Michael

    Edwards, Walter (Stepney)

    Blyton, William

    Collick, Percy

    Evans, Albert

    Boardman, H.

    Corbel, Mrs. Freda

    Finch, Harold

    Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G.

    Cronin, John

    Fitch, Alan

    Bowden, Rt. Hon. H. W. (Leics, S. W.)

    Cullen, Mrs. Alice

    Fletcher, Eric

    Bray, Dr. Jeremy

    Dalyell, Tam

    Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)

    Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)

    Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)

    Galpern, Sir Myer

    Browne, Percy (Torrington)

    Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)

    Ginsburg, David

    Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon, P. C.

    Lubbock, Eric

    Reynolds, G. W.

    Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)

    Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson

    Rhodes, H.

    Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W.)

    MacColl, James

    Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)

    Hamilton, William (West Fife)

    McKay, John (Wallsend)

    Robertson, John (Paisley)

    Hannan, William

    Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)

    Rodgers, W. T. (Stockton)

    Harper, Joseph

    Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)

    Ross, William

    Hayman, F. H.

    Manuel, Archie

    Silkin, John

    Henderson, Rt. Hn. Arthur (Rwly Regis)

    Mapp, Charles

    Snow, Julian

    Herbison, Miss Margaret

    Mayhew, Christopher

    Sorensen, R. W.

    Hill, J. (Midlothian)

    Mendelson, J. J.

    Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank

    Holman, Percy

    Millan, Bruce

    Spriggs, Leslie

    Houghton, Douglas

    Milne, Edward

    Steele, Thomas

    Howell, Charles A. (Perry Barr)

    Mitchison, G. R.

    Stonehouse, John

    Hoy, James H.

    Moody, A. S.

    Stross, Dr. Barnett (Stoke-on-Trent, C.)

    Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)

    Morris, Charles (Openshaw)

    Symonds, J. B.

    Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)

    Morris, John

    Taverne, D.

    Hunter, A. E,

    O'Malley, B. K.

    Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)

    Hynd, H. (Accrington)

    Oram, A. E.

    Thomas, Iorwerth (Rhondda, W.)

    Hynd, John (Attercliffe)

    Oswald, Thomas

    Thornton, Ernest

    Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)

    Owen, Will

    Wainwright, Edwin

    Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)

    Padley, W. E.

    Warbey, William

    Jones, Dan (Burnley)

    Paget, R. T.

    Ward, Dame Irene

    Kelley, Richard

    Pavitt, Laurence

    Wilkins, W. A.

    Kenyon, Clifford

    Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)

    Willey, Frederick

    Ledger, Ron

    Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)

    Williams, D. J. (Neath)

    Lee, Frederick (Newton)

    Probert, Arthur

    Yates, Victor (Ladywood)

    Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)

    Randall, Harry

    Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)

    Redhead, E. C.

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

    Loughlin, Charles

    Rees, Merlyn (Leeds, S.)

    Mr. Ifor Davies and Mr. Grey.

    NOES

    Agnew, Sir Peter

    Goodhew, Victor

    Oakshott, Sir Hendrie

    Allan, Robert (Paddington, S.)

    Gough, Frederick

    Osborn, John (Hallam)

    Allason, James

    Grant-Ferris, R.

    Osborne, Sir Cyril (Louth)

    Anderson, D. C.

    Green, Alan

    Page, Graham (Crosby)

    Atkins, Humphrey

    Gresham Cooke, R.

    Partridge, E.

    Awdry, Daniel (Chippenham)

    Grosvenor, Lord Robert

    Pearson, Frank (Clitheroe)

    Barber, Rt. Hon. Anthony

    Gurden, Harold

    Percival, Ian

    Barlow, Sir John

    Hall, John (Wycombe)

    Pickthorn, Sir Kenneth

    Barter, John

    Hamilton, Michael (Wellingborough)

    Pitman, Sir James

    Batsford, Brian

    Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N. W.)

    Pitt, Dame Edith

    Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton

    Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)

    Pounder, Rafton

    Berkeley, Humphry

    Harvey, Sir Arthur Vera (Macclesf'd)

    Proudfoot, Wilfred

    Biffen, John

    Harvey, John (Walthamstow, E.)

    Rawlinson, Sir Peter

    Bishop, F. P.

    Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel

    Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin

    Black, Sir Cyril

    Henderson, John (Cathcart)

    Rees, Hugh (Swansea, W.)

    Bourne-Arton, A.

    Hiley, Joseph

    Ridsdale, Julian

    Box, Donald

    Hill, J. E. B. (S. Norfolk)

    Roots, William

    Braine, Bernard

    Hirst, Geoffrey

    Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard

    Brewis, John

    Holland, Philip

    Sharples, Richard

    Brown, Alan (Tottenham)

    Hollingworth, John

    Shaw, M.

    Bryan, Paul

    Hope, Rt. Hon. Lord John

    Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'd & Chiswick)

    Buck, Antony

    Hopkins, Alan

    Stainton, Keith

    Bullus, Wing Commander Eric

    Hornby, R. P.

    Stodart, J. A.

    Campbell, Gordon (Moray & Nairn)

    Hughes-Young, Michael

    Studholme, Sir Henry

    Carr, Compton (Barons Court)

    Hulbert, Sir Norman

    Summers, Sir Spencer

    Cary, Sir Robert

    Hutchison, Michael Clark

    Taylor, Edwin (Bolton, E.)

    Chataway, Christopher

    Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)

    Taylor, Frank (M'ch'st'r, Moss Side)

    Chichester-Clark, R.

    Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)

    Taylor, Sir William (Bradford, N.)

    Clark, William (Nottingham, S.)

    Kerans, Cdr. J. S.

    Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret

    Clarke, Brig. Terence (Portsmth, W.)

    Kerr, Sir Hamilton

    Thomas, Sir Leslie (Canterbury)

    Cooper-Key, Sir Neill

    Kershaw, Anthony

    Thomas, Peter (Conway)

    Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.

    Lagden, Godfrey

    Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon, S.)

    Cordle, John

    Lilley, F. J. P.

    Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin

    Corfield, F. V.

    Litchfield, Capt. John

    Touche, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon

    Costain, A. P.

    Lloyd, Rt. Hon. Selwyn (Wirral)

    Courtney, Cdr. Anthony

    Longden Gilbert

    Turner, Colin

    Curran, Charles

    Loveys, Walter H.

    van Straubenzee, W, R.

    Dance, James

    Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh

    Vosper, Rt. Hon. Dennis

    Deedes, Rt. Hon. W. F.

    MacArthur, Ian

    Walder, David

    Digby, Simon Wingfield

    McLaren, Martin

    Walker, Peter

    Eden, Sir John

    Maclay, Rt. Hon. John

    Wall Patrick

    Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)

    Marshall, Sir Douglas

    Williams, Dudley (Exeter)

    Elliott, R. W. (Newc'tle-upon-Tyne, N.)

    Marten, Neil

    Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)

    Emery, Peter

    Mathew, Robert (Honiton)

    Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)

    Errington, Sir Eric

    Maude, Angus (Stratford-on-Avon)

    Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)

    Farey-Jones, F. W.

    Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.

    Wise, A. R.

    Farr, John

    Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C.

    Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick

    Finlay, Graeme

    Mills, Stratton

    Wood, Rt. Hon. Richard

    Fraser, Ian (Plymouth, Sutton)

    Miscampbell, Norman

    Woodhouse, C. M.

    Freeth, Denzil

    More, Jasper (Ludlow)

    Gardner, Edward

    Morgan, William

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

    Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, Central)

    Heave, Airey

    Mr. Peel and Mr. Pym.

    New Clause.—(FURTHER SUPPLEMENTATION OF WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION FOR POST-1923 CASES.)
    Section 1 of and the First Schedule to the Family Allowances and National Insurance Act, 1961 (which make provision for new supplementation of Workmen's Compensation for post-1923 cases) shall have effect with the omission in sub-paragraph (1) of paragraph 2 of the said Schedule (which sub-paragraph imposed on a new allowance a limit of the difference between in certain cases two-thirds and in other cases seven-eighths of a weekly loss of earnings and the amount of workmen's compensation) of the words "two-thirds of" and "seven-eighths of".—[Mr. Finch.]
    Brought up, and read the First time.
    Mr. Harold Finch: I beg to move, That the Clause be read a Second time.
    We are seeking to remove a restriction under the Workmen's Compensation Acts by which an injured person is entitled to only two-thirds of the difference between his pre-accident and post-accident earnings. That means that if a man's pre-accident earnings were £10, and he is now only fit for light work and earns £9, he gets two-thirds of £1–13s. 4d.
    8.15 p.m.
    I must emphasise that we are dealing with a limited number of men—those who sustained accident or industrial disease prior to 5th July, 1948. Some of those for whom this new Clause would provide suffered their accidents thirty or forty years ago. The matter goes back over a number of years when pre-accident earnings were very low. Two-thirds of these disabled people come from the mining industry. In 1958, there were 24,000 of these partly-disabled men; today, the number has fallen to 12,000.
    Most of these are elderly men, who have given their working lives to mining and to other industries at a time when wages were low and when they were faced with periods of trade depression. Time lost because of depression was taken into account in arriving at the average wage on which to base pre-accident earnings, so that a man might find his pre-accident average earnings of £4 reduced to, say, £3 10s. because a number of weeks were held to be lost on account of trade depression.
    For the benefit of the Committee, I should give a brief history of the matter.
    626
    The payments for disablement under the Workmen's Compensation Act differ from those made under the Industrial Injuries Act. This is important. A man who was injured and received compensation under the Workmen's Compensation Act had his compensation based on the difference in earnings, without any reference to the extent of his disability. Under the Industrial Injuries Act, if a man loses an arm, an eye or a leg, his loss of faculty is assessed; he is given so much for the loss of a limb, and it is a pension for life, irrespective of earnings. Once the medical board or the tribunal has assessed the pension for the loss of a leg or whatever it may be, a man can go and earn more wages, if he is in a position to do so, and, indeed, in many cases men do that. It is a pension for life.
    Because the principle under the Workmen's Compensation Act was quite different, there has for long been the anomaly that a man who lost a leg and whose pre-accident earnings were very low, say, £3 a week, received no compensation because the light job which he was able to do thereafter brought him in £5 a week. There was for him no two-thirds of the difference. On the other hand, a skilled collier, for instance, who had been earning fairly high wages but who, as the result of the loss of a finger, could not go back to work as a collier was able to get compensation because his subsequent wages at light work would be rather lower and he would have the benefit of the two-thirds of the difference.
    The Committee will appreciate that the relationship between pre-accident and post-accident wages have continued to be very important for these men. Originally, as I have said, the compensation was based on half the difference and, later, it was increased to two-thirds. However, it has never been increased beyond that in spite of the changed conditions in society and the general rise in wages.
    There is another limit, a ceiling above which the compensation must not go. Originally, a man's compensation could not exceed £2 10s. Thus, although the two-thirds of the difference might have been more than £2 10s., the actual compensation was restricted to £2 10s. a week. Later on, the Government raised

    627
    the maximum to £3, and then, at the time of the last debate we had on the subject, last year, the Minister agreed to raise the maximum to £4. But he declined to remove the anomaly of the two-thirds of the difference.
    It must be realised that the men who are subject to this anomaly have no chance of getting a proper review of their pre-accident wages. In the early days to which I have referred, wages were low. A skilled collier or some other skilled man would have been earning about £2 10s. or £3 a week. In 1943, when wages had risen, the Government realised that the situation was very unfair because a pre-accident wage of £2 10s. or £3 had become quite unrealistic in the new conditions. They agreed that a disabled man could have his pre-accident wage reviewed if he could show that there had been a change in the rates of pay in the work at which he had been employed.
    When this change was put into operation, it was soon found—the courts decided it in interpreting the Act—that for a man to succeed in proving an increase in rates of pay he would have to show, if he had been a collier, that there had been a change in the price list and conditons. If, for instance, the rate had previously been 2s. 6d. for a ton of coal, he would have to show that it was then 3s. 6d. Many men were not in a position to do this.
    The trouble is that there have been changed methods of working in many industries. Mining is now highly mechanised. The old pillar and stall method of working has gone. The price list under which some old chap had worked in the 'thirties is no longer in existence. In some cases, it would have no relevance at all. My hon. Friend the Member for Mansfield (Mr. B. Taylor) can speak of the great changes which have taken place in the Nottingham coalfield, for example.
    The point is that, in claiming a review, a man could not found his claim on changed conditions. The law has decided that changed methods of working do not help him at all. He may know very well that, if he had not sustained his accident, he would now have been working the same seam of coal, by highly
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    mechanised methods, and earning about 18 or £20 a week. For compensation purposes, however, he is restricted to his original wage. If he is on light work now earning £8 or £9 a week, his compensation is confined to the difference between the two, and he gets nothing.
    The Government cannot have it both ways. They cannot say, on the one hand, that the review of a man's earnings will be restricted for compensation purposes and, on the other hand, say that they will not budge from the two-thirds. The proper way to tackle the problem is to review pre-accident wages, but, when I and others of my hon. Friends have raised this on many occasions, the Government have said that there would be great difficulty in doing it. By the Amendment, therefore, we seek to abolish the two-thirds proportion. It is a perfectly reasonable proposal. There would be no difficulty. The proportion has already been raised once, from one-half to two-thirds.
    I remind the Committee that some of these men are not in employment now, not even light work, and their compensation for partial disablement is based on notional earnings, on what the law would say a man is deemed to be able to earn. The law says that, on medical evidence, a man is capable of doing a sitting-down job and at that job he could earn so much a week, if he had it. His compensation is accordingly based on the different between his pre-accident wage, his non-reviewed wage, and his post-accident wage which is hypothetical.
    The consequence of all this is that men are being treated very unfairly, and my hon. Friends and I, particularly those of us who represent mining areas, are seriously concerned. These men have given a lifetime to industry. They have derived no advantage from changes in conditions of working. They can claim nothing as a result of mechanisation. Yet they know that, if they had been able to carry on their work in present conditions they could have been earning a comparatively high wage, or, on the other hand, if their average pre-accident wages were to be assessed in the same way, according to modern conditions, they could be drawing quite high partial compensation. But, as I explained, the

    629
    law does not allow it. The compensation is tied to their low pre-accident earnings which, as everyone knows, are quite out of keeping with conditions in mining and many other industries now.
    Seeing that for the moment we are not in a position to make a proper review of his pre-accident wages, we therefore propose by this new Clause to abolish the two-thirds limit and to say to this fellow, "Never mind; you have lost to some extent, but we will make it up to you by giving you the whole of the difference". In other words, if there was a difference of £1 between his pre-accident and post-accident wages, he would be paid £1. However, we should have to say to him, "Under the last Act, you cannot receive more than £4 a week". This proposal would involve only a limited liability. The number of the men concerned is declining year by year. In addition, many of these men could not come within the Act as it is.
    I therefore ask the Minister to consider this case and to agree with the proposed new Clause. The Industrial Injuries Fund is well able to bear the small additional payment to these men who have devoted their lives to industry. Under the Industrial Injuries Act this is not such a difficult matter. If a man is unfit to return to his old work and is on a light job he can be paid a special hardship allowance. If the difference between his pre-accident and post-accident wages is £2 6s. a week, he gets the whole of the difference if the circumstances warrant it. Are we asking too much by saying that the men affected by this new Clause should be given the full difference?
    8.30 p.m.
    Mr. Bernard Taylor: When speaking of the partial compensation cases during the Second Reading debate last week I said:
    "I am sure that something could be done, and I am convinced that something should be done for them."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 22nd January, 1964; Vol. 687, c. 1127.]
    Because my hon. Friends and myself believe that with conviction and are profoundly sincere in it, we have tabled this proposed new Clause in the hope that the Minister will give consideration to the men we are discussing.
    I know that so much has been said about these cases that it is very difficult to find anything new to say, but we
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    on this side who represent many men affected by the two-thirds limit feel that we are under an obligation to continue to press their cases in this Chamber. We hope by argument and persuasion to prove to the Minister and the Committee that in tabling this new Clause we have been prompted only by the desire to obtain simple elementary justice for these men who appear to have been forgotten.
    Who are these people? In the light of what has been done for other workmen's compensation cases, I think that we can truthfully describe them as the "left-overs". They are the residual victims of the old workmen's compensation legislation. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bedwellty (Mr. Finch) said, many of them have had no increase in their benefits for many years. In fact, there has been no basic alteration in the status of many of these men since the passing of the Workmen's Compensation Act, 1943. It is true that in recent times the totally disabled men who come within the workmen's compensation scheme have had some increase in benefits, which we appreciate and welcome. Other cases who receive benefits under the scheme, including the pneumoconiotics, have also received increases under recent legislation. It should be emphasised that some partial compensation cases have quite recently received benefits, beginning in 1961. However, there are many men who come within the operation of this two-thirds limit and who have not received any increase at all.
    Let us take as an example the person whose partial compensation was settled, say, 20 years ago. That is not a preposterous proposition. Unless one of two things has happened—that is, unless there has been a decline in his post-accident earnings or there has been a successful review of his pre-accident earnings—he is still on the same payment of 10s. a week as he was, perhaps, twenty or more years ago.
    Over the years, that type of person has witnessed an increase in wages and in living standards. He has seen increases in social benefits, in war pensions, sickness benefit unemployment benefit and benefits under the Industrial Injuries Act—all except one, and that is for the 20s. 0d. widow. I take this opportunity

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    Of saying how pleased I am that the step announced last week by the Joint Parliamentary Secretary has been taken. In spite of all these advances, however, this man whose compensation was fixed many years ago is still getting 10s. 0d. a week. What is that worth today when we compare present values with those of 20 years ago?
    Since Second Reading, I have been looking at some interesting figures relating to the mining industry. Leaving aside the latents, who are another problem, there are in mining alone slightly more than 12,000 partial compensation cases. About one-third of them are receiving maximum compensation for partial incapacity, but two-thirds of them are receiving less than the maximum amount of compensation. By no stretch of the imagination can they ever hope to reach the ceiling of two-thirds difference between their pre- and post-accident earnings.
    Of those 12,000 partial compensation cases who are the victims of the two-thirds ceiling to which the Amendment refers, nearly 7,000 are unemployed. I wonder why they are unemployed, particularly in areas like mine, where the volume of unemployment is tow? In the main, it is because of the nature of the disability. That is a factor which the Minister should take into consideration.
    There is one other point which I wish to make. My hon. Friend the Member for Bedwellty spoke about it, but I should like to reinforce his argument. These partial compensation cases fall between two stools. The formula that is used when these partial compensation cases are reviewed, instead of being related to the level of earnings in the job in which a man was employed before his accident, is based upon rates of remuneration. Our experience is that whilst some reviews are successful, many are not, but even in successful cases, because the formula is related to rates of remuneration and not to the level of earnings, the beneficiaries do not get much out of it. In addition to looking at the question of the two-thirds, the Joint Parliamentary Secretary might, perhaps, give us an idea whether it is in the Minister's mind to look at Section 6 of the Workmen's Compensation Act, 1943.
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    I hope that the Minister will make a sympathetic approach to this issue. I should like to hear him announce tonight that he has come to the conclusion that the ceiling of two-thirds between pre- and post-accident earnings will be removed. Whilst it would not wholly solve the problem of all the partially disabled under the Workmen's Compensation Act, it would go a long way to help. For that reason, I am privileged, proud and pleased to support the Amendment.
    Mr. Edwin Wainwright: I support this proposal and I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for having put down such a worthy new Clause. It is almost the least that we could ask for. There is really nothing in the suggestion when we make a comparison between those whom it will help, if the Government accept it, and those suffering today under the old Workmen's Compensation Act. Nevertheless, it is a worthy proposal, and I hope that the Government will do something about it.
    When the Beveridge Plan was first issued, the basis behind the thoughts of Sir William Beveridge was that nothing ought to be done in connection with workmen's compensation which would bring those men under the benefits that would come from the recommendations of the Beveridge scheme. If that is true and the 1946 Act was based on those recommendations—and I think that they had a very influential part in how that Act was framed by the Labour Government of the day—we are not carrying out what the Beveridge Plan recommended to the country. These partial compensation men, with two-thirds maximum of the difference between their post-accident earnings and pre-accident earnings, are suffering a penalty that we ought not to tolerate today.
    I think that the Government are afraid of tackling the problem from which these men are suffering because they are afraid that it will be extended into the whole field of workmen's compensation. Why should the Government be afraid? If it is an injustice today to leave men who have been injured in industry in a worse off condition, with payments which are below social security rates and benefits, the Government ought to do something for these men.

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    When I think about cases of which I know at the present time and of how men have been injured in the industry that I worked in, and who are today receiving no benefits whatsoever, or are being prevented from receiving the maximum, I wonder what kind of justice that is. Are we really thinking about those people who have suffered or just contemplating that in so far as their numbers are dwindling each year they will eventually be erased from the memories of us all, and therefore we need do nothing about it but simply wait?
    8.45 p.m.
    I know the case of a haulage truckman who lost a leg below the knee in 1930. He never even had the opportunity to draw compensation except for the period of time when he was not working. If that accident happened today he could claim damages under the 1948 Act. There are, indeed, various things that he could have done which would probably have given him some money as recompense. He has been able to get none, however.
    There are numerous cases like his. There are men who have lost legs or arms, fingers or eyes but who, because their wages were below even the average for those days of £2 10s. a week and because the time that they worked was only short, were unable to get compensation. I do not want to draw tears to the eyes of hon. Members by talking about the kinds of cases we know in the coal industry, but I hope that the Government will look into this because the provision we suggest in this Clause would be the least of many things that they could do for workmen's compensation.
    If we have any feeling of justice, of sympathy, for these men we should do something for them. I hope that the whole gamut of workmen's compensation will have the attention of the Government and that they will ensure that the real intention of the Beveridge Plan, which the country accepted with open arms when it was published, is carried out in its entirety and that justice is done to these men.
    Another class badly affected is those men who worked in the mines during the war and suffered injury. They receive little or no benefit today. A man selected for the mines by ballot instead
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    of going into the Armed Forces could be one of these men receiving no benefit for a serious injury because his wages today are equivalent to the wages he earned at the time. But he would have been on a lower wage then because of inexperience, for he would not go to the coal face until he had spent time—usually six months—on other work. It may be that he would have preferred to serve in the Forces but he had to go into the pits instead.
    Then there were the Bevin boys, the volunteers who went into the mines instead of going to war and who could have been involved in accidents. There were men who were brought from other industries, ex-miners who were compelled to return to the pits, men who were too old to be called up and who were sent back to the mines where they were later injured.
    These are among the people who are not getting justice and fair play. I hope that the Government will take our appeal on their behalf seriously. If they do, they will not only accept our proposals, but will look into the whole problem of workmen's compensation and bring the benefits of these men into line with those which they would have received if their accidents had occurred after 5th July, 1948.
    Mr. J. Griffiths: I pay tribute to the persistence of my hon. Friend the Member for Bedwellty (Mr. Finch) and my hon. Friend the Member for Mansfield (Mr. B. Taylor). They have raised this issue at every opportunity on every Bill of this kind which has come forward in recent years. I congratulate them upon the tenacity with which they have fought for these men. I know that their work and their fight have been warmly appreciated by the men of every industry, particularly the coal miners, and I hope that they succeed. If they do not succeed tonight, I hope that they will do so in the course of this year.
    I have a personal reason for supporting the proposal. I am very proud of the industrial injuries scheme and deeply conscious of the fact that in many ways it was our biggest experiment in social insurance, our biggest venture and our biggest success. It is interesting after the many years during which it has been in operation that only very few

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    now suggest that we should depart from its basic principles. This is not to say that there are not many improvements which could be made, nor that there are not anomalies. But we have heard no one suggest that we should go back to the old system which was regulated by wages, not even at a time when earnings are high and when there is full employment. We can he proud of having found a way generally acceptable to both sides of industry and to the country as a whole.
    I shall not go over all the history, but I want to explain that one of the things which I very much wanted to do was to find a way by which all the old cases, those occurring before 5th July, 1948, could be brought within the new legislation. At the time I felt that as the old cases were the responsibility of the employers and the insurance companies, I ought not to take them over without a contribution from the employers and insurance companies. I thought that otherwise I would be unfair to the fund. They had a responsibility placed on them by Parliament and I thought that they ought to make a contribution. We tried, but failed, to reach a settlement.
    That was one problem and the other was trying to equate an injury assessed under the old workmen's compensation provisions with the provisions of the new benefits. That raised all kinds of problems, but I wish that it could have been done. What has been done in recent years—including what has been done by right hon. Gentlemen opposite—has been to use the funds available under the Industrial Injuries Act to meet these hard cases. There are now very few left, only 12,000.
    What would it cost to implement the new Clause? Would it be more than £1 million a year? If it is, this is something about which we need not bother the Treasury. We can meet this without a penny from the Treasury. While these discussions have been taking place I have had a look at the latest report issued by the Government Actuary on the Industrial Injuries Fund. It makes interesting reading, and because of what it says I should like to leave the matter under discussion to be decided by the free vote of the Committee. The money in this Fund has been provided by
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    employers and employees, and hon. Members should realise that this Fund is different from the National Insurance Fund.
    During the year 1961–62, employers and employees contributed £57 million to that Fund, while the Exchequer contributed only £11 million. That means that workmen and employers contributed £5 for every £1 contributed by the Exchequer. It has not only been able to meet its commitments year by year, but has been able to build up a reserve, and during the year 1961–62 totalled £12 million income from investments, which was more than the Exchequer contributed. The money to meet the commitment under the proposed new Clause could be provided out of the interest on investments. At the end of 1961–62 the Fund had a balance of £288 million, and during that year money in the Fund increased by £16 million. That money was contributed by employers, employees, and the Government, and I am sure that not a single worker would wish to vote against the new Clause. I go further and say that I am sure that the bulk of employers would not vote against it either.
    The Industrial Injuries Act, which I had the privilege of piloting through the House, has been a money saver for the employers, because under that Act both workmen and the State make contributions, whereas under the old Workmen's Compensation legislation the financial burden rested entirely on the employers and the insurance companies that covered them. A number of hon. Members—though not many of them are present at the moment—are associated with employers and employers associations and I am sure they would agree that no employer would wish to vote against the new Clause.
    The men involved are mainly in the mining industry, for two reasons: First, because of the nature of the industry itself. The work is extremely dangerous. Secondly, because before the war the industry was in the doldrums. Wages were low, unemployment was high, and short-time working was rampant.
    I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Merthyr Tydvil (Mr. S. O. Davies) remembers the famous Dowlais case. It had the effect of leading to a terrific wangle of earnings. Hundreds

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    of people—miners as well as others—were denied even partial compensation because of the relationship of the earnings rule to the short time worked in the mines. I venture to make a guess that this would not cost more than £1 million a year. Perhaps the Minister can tell us what the figure is. We can surely afford £1 million a year from a fund which is accruing at the rate of £16 million a year, and now has £288 million in it.
    This £288 million would now have been well over £300 million; indeed, it would have been getting on for £330 million, and interest would have been accruing at the rate of £18 million a year, if the Government had not reduced contributions from employers and workers by 1d. a week. I protested at the time and said that it was a great mistake. No workmen would have missed a penny. No employers or workmen have gained from that decision. It would have been far better to use those pennies to improve the situation.
    My hon. Friends have shown a great deal of tenacity and ingenuity in finding a way in which to bring some partial redress to the grievance felt by these men, and I appeal to the Parliamentary Secretary to accept the Clause. I hope that he will also accept the suggestion made by my hon. Friend that he should consider the whole problem of these few hundred left-overs. The least we can do is to support the Clause, and I hope that we shall hear the Minister say that he accepts it.
    9.0 p.m.
    Mr. Joseph Harper: I know that everything that has been said by my hon. and right hon. Friends today has been said many times before in the past fifteen or sixteen years, but I offer no apology in supporting the Clause. Amendments of this description have been supported over the years in an effort to bring some measure of justice and satisfaction to those people who happen to have been unfortunate enough to be injured when the Workmen's Compensation Act was in operation.
    When I worked in the coal industry, we arrived at many an agreement with the Coal Board, but no sooner was the ink dry upon the paper than we found that we had different interpretations of
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    the agreement, and we had to have an interpretation of the interpretations. Funnily enough, we then found that we had to have a clarification of the interpretation of the interpretations of the agreement. When I entered Parliament I thought that I had finished with all that, but every time I listen to my hon. Friends discussing various Acts I find that more anomalies have been created by them than ever existed in the agreements arrived at between the Coal Board and the National Union of Mineworkers. Here we are trying to iron out some of those anomalies.
    I speak primarily as a representative of the mining industry, but this Clause will benefit not only the miners but workers in other heavy industries—steel and iron—and even agricultural workers. I cannot understand why a person who was injured at one time and is dealt with under one Act should receive worse treatment than his counterpart who was injured at any time and is covered by another Act.
    I am sorry that the Minister has had to leave. I appreciate that he must leave sometimes. He has sat in his place and has had to bear the heat and burden of the day. But prior to his present position he was fortunate to be Minister of Power. Furthermore, he and his family before him have had an intimate connection with the mining industry. He does not need to read it from any books, or carry out any research on the subject. The right hon. Gentleman has gained his knowledge first-hand and in a practical way. He and his family have had to pay out some of this compensation and so they know all about it.
    Some people who are drawing compensation have been penalised twice. My hon. Friend the Member for Bedwellty (Mr. Finch) reminded the Committee that there were people whose cases had not been properly reviewed. They were injured at a time when there was work in the pits on only three or four days a week, or less, and the wages paid were atrocious. When wages improved, the question of partial compensation did not apply. In 1961 10s. was put on to the maximum and a further 20s. has been added. We are pleased to accept these scraps. In this situation we are like Lazarus and glad to accept any scraps. But the number affected was infinitesimal

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    because there are only a handful of people receiving the maximum payment. Far more are getting 5s., 7s. 6d., 10s. and so on.
    I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will be able to tell us how much it cost the Government to raise the maximum. There is also a category of people who are latent compensation cases and they suffer a greater hardship even than those about whom we have been talking. The best thing is to strip all the verbiage from this legislation. Let us get down to earth and discuss the matter in a way which everyone can understand.
    Recently a man came to see me and told me that when he was 19 years of age—back in the bad old days—he lost a leg. He was a big, strapping man and he said that at the time of his accident he was a haulage hand. He told me that he did not receive a penny by way of compensation. Today a man suffering a similar accident would receive the industrial injuries benefit. He would be paid according to how much of the stump of his leg was left. This is a grisly subject, but we all know what we are talking about. If there were five inches of the stump left the victim would receive 70 per cent. of 115s. partial disablement benefit which is £4 0s. 6d. Now there is an extra contribution amounting to 26s. 10d. giving a total of £5 7s. 4d.
    The man who came to see me told me that but for his accident he would have been engaged in contract work in the same way as his three brothers, and so he has been penalised twice. He has to face life with no compensation and is able to do only a light job. Everyone who works in industry knows that a light work means "light" money. I do not say that things have not improved in industry. There have been enormous improvements. But there are always hardship cases of the kind to which I have referred.
    I hope the Parliamentary Secretary will take note of what I have said. I do not suppose it will bear much fruit, but we are always trying and if we fail this time we shall come back in twelve months because we from the mining industry feel deeply about this. One has to work in the industry to know about this problem. We see powerful
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    men who have been injured and who could have earned good money in this mechanised age of automation. The present situation makes it doubly hard for them. I know there are difficulties about accepting this new Clause, but, given the right spirit, the Government could make a start in the right direction by adopting it.
    The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance (Lieut.-Commander S. L. C. Maydon): This new Clause affects workmen's compensation for partial incapacity. It would affect only those men who sustained injury by accident or industrial disease between 1st January 1924 and 4th July 1948.
    The intention of the Clause is to increase the supplementary allowances which were given under the Family Allowances and National Insurance Act, 1961, and the National Insurance Act, 1963. The Act of 1961 gave a maximum supplement of 10s. a week to men who had already reached maximum compensation under the Workmen's Compensation Acts. Last year's Act increased the maximum supplement to 30s., but again it was only for those who had reached maximum compensation under the 1943 Act. The maximum compensation under the 1943 Act was 40s. for a single man and 50s. for a married man.
    These supplements were based on the normal workmen's compensation rules. They provided two-thirds of the loss of earnings less the amount that the man was already receiving as workmen's compensation, this extra provision being subject to a maximum of 30s. The new Clause would enable full loss of earnings to count for the supplement, but again subject to the 30s. maximum. I think we can dismiss the seven-eighths rule, which applies to men with children, as none of those children will be eligible after July this year. When I say that we can dismiss the rule, I do not mean that in any derogatory manner, but the problem is so small that I do not think we need consider it here.
    9.15 p.m.
    Having dealt with the problem, what has been done in the past and what hon. Members opposite want done, I turn to the comments which they have made. From listening to the debate one

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    gathers that the large majority of these men are colliers and although this is true, I was very glad that the hon. Member for Pontefract (Mr. Harper) said that other industries are also concerned.
    The hon. Member for Bedwellty (Mr. Finch) referred to low pre-accident wages, which obviously acted to the disadvantage of men who suffered accidents when wages were low and when there was much short-time working. The right hon. Member for Llanelly (Mr. J. Griffiths) mentioned this problem and said how difficult he had found it to be when the Industrial Injuries Act was being drafted. It is a most insoluble problem. In 1943, when the new Workmen's Compensation Act was passing through the House, an Amendment to that Act was withdrawn because the Government gave an undertaking that they would then, in the middle of the war, examine possibilities of devising a method to assess fairly the earning power of workmen who had been on short time at the date of their injury.
    It is common knowledge that no fair formula could be found. There was the difficulty of men on day work, shift workers, piece-rate workers, dockers, and building workers whose hours of work were badly affected by weather conditions. The best that could be done was to make an attempt to recalculate pre-accident earnings at present-day rates. That is where we get the formula of rates of remuneration, which we must all admit is a rather unsatisfactory way of facing the difficulty.
    Obviously some did well and some did not so well under these conditions. The problem was recognised as not easily soluble but, in fact, as almost insoluble. I must ask hon. Members opposite this question. Would it be right, as they seem to suggest in the Clause, to spend money indiscriminately on all the partials to compensate hard cases which we are unable to identify? We were unable to identify those cases in 1943 and it is all the more difficult to identify them 21 years later in 1964.
    Mr. Finch: I do not understand the Joint Parliamentary Secretary. We are not attempting to discriminate. We are asking for the abolition of the two-thirds rule, The hon. Gentleman has referred, as we did, to recalculating the pre-
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    accident wages at present-day rates. We merely say that a man's pre-accident wages can be reviewed by taking the present earnings of a man in the grade he was in. I do not see the difficulty. The Parliamentary Secretary is making heavy weather of it.
    Lieut.-Commander Maydon: I do not think that the hon. Gentleman can have listened to what I have told the Committee. An attempt was made to remedy this on an undertaking given by the Government in 1943. It was found insoluble then and it would seem even more insoluble today, 21 years later. What the proposal does, as I will show, is to distribute money, by the abolition of the two-thirds rule, indiscriminately and most unfairly among partially disabled men.
    Mr. Finch: How does it do that indiscriminately?
    Mr. Leslie Hale: Surely the Joint Parliamentary Secretary is not referring to the Committee of 1943 which, after all, was considering this matter before the National Insurance Act was contemplated, drafted or passed. We are now considering a situation in which coal-mining workers have had full employment since 1945. They are working five, five and a half, and even six days a week. Nearly all the people in the early cases had at the most the chance of three days' work a week at ten bob a day. If the wages are adjusted for three days a week one does not bring them into the picture in comparable conditions.
    Does not the hon. and gallant Gentleman realise that this is not just a question of changed conditions. Only a very limited number of cases succeeded. We are doing nothing for the sufferers from industrial disease and disablement who lost their cases and who had no right of retrial—which is at least one of the best things about the present Act.
    When the hon. and gallant Gentleman uses the word "indiscriminately" I am sure that he really does not want to use that word. Will he think about that word a little further, and realise that we are talking about people who have suffered disablement for many years and who have had miserable rates of compensation? When one talks about

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    discriminating in cases of very grave hardship, one should not split hairs and try to talk about them in terms of being grave or graver.
    Lieut.-Commander Maydon: I am grateful for the hon. Member's intervention, but what I mean by indiscriminately—and I do not withdraw the word—is that this extra money, if the two-thirds rule were abolished, would be spread over all these cases, whether or not they were the sort of hardship cases we have in mind. That would be a very indiscriminate expenditure of Government money and would create far more anomalies than it set out to abolish.
    Mr. Finch rose—
    Lieut.-Commander Maydon: I have given way many times already. I would like to complete this part of my speech and then the hon. Member for Bedwellty can speak again, when I will attempt to answer him.
    This problem has been discussed between the National Coal Board and the National Union of Mineworkers. The N.C.B. does not accept that a man employed on piece work 20 or 30 years ago would be able nowadays to enjoy the earnings of a young man engaged in present conditions on piecework. This, the Board contends, is a matter of fact rather than a matter of law—which would not be evaded by amending Section 6 of the Workmen's Compensation Act, 1943.
    Mr. J. Griffiths: The Parliamentary Secretary said something about consulting the National Coal Board. Presumably he consulted the N.C.B. about the Workmen's Compensation Act. We do not propose to touch that Act. Did the hon. Gentleman consult the N.C.B. about this proposed new Clause? I would be surprised—indeed, I would be shocked—if the N.C.B. advised him to reject it.
    Lieut.-Commander Maydon: The right hon. Gentleman is trying to misrepresent me. Of course the National Coal Board was not consulted about the proposed new Clause. What I have been saying is that the Board had talks about this old problem of short-time working.
    Mr. Finch: That is a different thing.
    Lieut.-Commander Maydon: If the hon. Member for Bedwellty will contain himself we will get on a little faster.
    Mr. Hale: On a point of order. Before we get on a little faster, I should like to know from where the Parliamentary Secretary is quoting. Is he quoting from memory or from a document? If there has been a document setting out these figures and conclusions by the N.C.B., on working conditions and so on—
    The Chairman: Order. That is a matter for debate. It is not a point of order.
    Mr. Hale: With respect, Sir William, if the Joint Parliamentary Secretary quotes from a document which is relevant to the debate, then it should be laid on the Table. I submit that that is a part of the established rules of the House. It is true that the hon. and gallant Gentleman has not said that he is quoting from a document, but he has said, in effect, that he is quoting from a communication. My point of order is that the hon. and gallant Gentleman should say whether the communication was a telephone message or a decision of the N.C.B. If he is quoting from a document should it not be laid upon the Table?
    The Chairman: I did not hear any quotation that compelled a document to be laid upon the Table.
    Lieut.-Commander Maydon: I think that I understood correctly what the hon. Member for Mansfield (Mr. B. Taylor) said which was that, because of this two-thirds rule, large numbers of men cannot receive any benefit. If I have misunderstood him and he wishes it, I will gladly give way to him.
    Mr. B. Taylor: I intended to convey that those who were under the ceiling of 50s. because of the operation of the two-thirds rule could not participate in the 1961 and 1963 supplements.
    Lieut.-Commander Maydon: That is absolutely correct, because those two supplements only come into operation when men reach the ceiling. I apologise for misunderstanding the hon. Member. He added that 7,000 of these

    645
    men in the mining industry are at present unemployed, but he should remember that, of those, three-quarters are now over 65.
    The hon. Member for Dearne Valley (Mr. Wainwright) spoke of the "ballotees" and the "Bevin boys", who did such excellent work in the pits during the war, but it is very unlikely that there would have been many or long periods of short-time working for those men, so it is unlikely that their wages would be greatly depressed at the time of accident.
    I am glad that the right hon. Member for Llanelly (Mr. J. Griffiths) paid a tribute to the Government for our action in recent months and years. As he says, we can identify 12,000 of these men but, beyond that, there is a very much larger number of "latents" whom we cannot identify, and that adds to the problem. He asked what the cost of accepting the Amendment would be; it would cost £400,000 per annum and, of that sum, £250,000 would go to "partials" who are on less than the maximum. He also returned to his former hobby-horse of the 1d. reduction in the Industrial Injuries contribution, but I do not think we need go over that argument again.
    The purpose of this Amendment is very far removed from the purpose of the Bill, which concerns widows with children. Many men on workmen's compensation never contributed to the Industrial Injuries Fund so as to justify drawing benefit from it, but they should be relieved of genuine hardship, as we all recognise. Those who have not reached the maximum under the Workmen's Compensation Acts—that is to say, 40s. for the single man and 50s. for the married man—have their remedy under the Workmen's Compensation Acts. When they reach the maximum, they qualify for the supplementary allowance to a maximum of 30s., and supplements are paid only to those who reach the maximum under the former Act.
    If, therefore, there is hardship, it must be amongst men who reached the workmen's compensation maximum and are getting the maximum supplement under the 1963 Act—those, in fact, with loss of earnings of about £5 5s. a week, or more—but the Amendment would do absolutely nothing for them. It would give the most benefit to the man whose
    646
    loss of earnings happened to be the arbitrary figure of £3 10s. I am here talking of single men; the figures for the married men with 50s. benefit would be slightly different. The man with a loss of earnings of between 1s. and 30s. would get the same benefit from this Amendment as would the man whose loss of earnings was between £4 10s. and £5 5s. I think that hon. Members opposite now realise what I mean by discrimination, for this would be unfair discrimination between one man and another. It would be very rough justice indeed.
    The present rules, within the limits which I have tried to outline, do work fairly. If a man's loss of earnings qualifies him for maximum workmen's compensation, he is automatically eligible for the supplementary allowance. If the loss of earnings is not big enough to qualify for the maximum rate of workmen's compensation, then there is a remedy under the Workmen's Compensation Acts through the courts or outside, should the man's disability worsen. There is, therefore, no kind of hardship which can be properly compensated from the Industrial Injuries Fund in this way.
    Mr. B. Taylor: The effect of the two-thirds does apply in regard to the supplement. If a man is on the maximum of 50s. and that is two-thirds of the difference between his pre-accident and post-accident earnings, he would not get any supplement at all, neither the 10s. of 1961 nor the 20s. of 1963. It is only to bring him up to the two-thirds of the difference between pre and post-accident earnings.
    9.30 p.m.
    Lieut.-Commander Maydon: I think that either I am misunderstanding the hon. Gentleman or he is wrong. Under the 1943 Act, a man is allowed two-thirds of his loss of earnings. May we consider a single man with a maximum of 40s. because the calculations are much easier? He is allowed two-thirds of his loss of earnings up to a maximum of 40s. If he reaches that maximum and two-thirds of his loss of earnings has not been reached, he then comes into the category for supplementary allowance, by which he will get his 30s. less the workmen's compensation which he has received under the 1943 Act.
    Mr. B. Taylor: Let me put a case. Let us suppose that the two-thirds difference between pre-accident and post-accident earnings is 46s. Under the Workmen's Compensation Acts, he can only get 40s. because that is the maximum. What I am saying is that he would not get the 30s. supplement; he would only get the 6s. which would bring him up to two-thirds of the difference.
    Lieut.-Commander Maydon: That is perfectly correct. That is the way it works, and I am sorry if I misunderstood the hon. Gentleman. In the first place, he put it in another way. However, that does not alter the fact that, if we were persuaded to do what the Amendment is intended to do, it would work most unfairly, with the results I have already given.
    Mr. Hale: I shall not keep the Committee long, but I want to make a brief comment on the speech which the Joint Parliamenetary Secretary has just made, which—I do not wish to be discourteous—I thought was deplorable. The hon. and gallant Gentleman was replying on behalf of the Government to a new Clause put down by my hon. Friends, with some ingenuity, to call attention to a grievance within the ambit of a Bill which called for considerable ingenuity in the drafting. The hon. and gallant Gentleman says, "First, you are asking me to be absolutely indiscriminate. Second, you are asking me to discriminate between hard cases and cases not so hard and give the benefit to some but not to others".
    Then comes an astonishing disclosure, astonishing not because of its content but because of its indiscretion in disclosing a general reaction to our social services which one hears so often. The Parliamentary Secretary says, "These people did not contribute to the Fund. What right have they to expect anything?". We could say the same about war pensioners. These men went down the pit, risking life and limb to work. I accept the hon. and gallant Gentleman's correction, of course, that we are speaking not only about men in the pits but about workers in the cotton mills as well. I have referred to coal mining only because the debate has proceeded on that basis, led with great ability by my hon. Friends from mining constituencies which have probably the
    648
    highest proportion of the cases affected. The Parliamentary Secretary tells us that we must remember the cotton mills too, and then he says that he went to see the National Coal Board about it to find out what its view was. Apparently, no one suggested that an approach should be made to employers of other kinds.
    I have lived in amity with my right hon. Friend the Member for Llanelly (Mr. J. Griffiths) for many years and 'I have always had great respect for him. There was an occasion on which I ventured to criticise him, namely, when he relieved employers of the burden of contribution under the Workmen's Compensation Acts and said that the State would take it over. Now, we have the Parliamentary Secretary saying that, since the State has taken the burden over, we must remember that these men did not contribute the 3d. a week towards the cost of the insurance, although, economically speaking, they did because their wages were based on what was left after the insurance contribution had been paid.
    It is shocking to hear the Joint Parliamentary Secretary say that we should remember that these men did not pay anything in 1923 out of their 30s. since they were not permitted to do so. I do not believe that he would go to a Conservative Party Conference and use that argument in respect of war pensioners. Those unfortunate enough to survive the war crippled, bleeding or broken were not permitted to pay money into a fund to move the cost of war pensions, and the public conscience would not have permitted them to do so.
    Lieut.-Commander Maydon: Perhaps the hon. Member will let me remind him precisely of what I said, because I have a note of it here. When he reads HANSARD tomorrow he will find that it is not very different from this. I said that many men on workmen's compensation had never contributed to the Industrial Injuries Fund. To justify benefits from that Fund there must be relief from genuine hardship.
    Mr. Hale: I was coming to that point. I am obliged to the hon. and gallant Member for calling attention to it.
    Let me turn to what is called the academic or technical objection. My

    649
    right hon. and hon. Friends have drafted a new Clause in which it is proposed that the money should come from the Fund because no other way of dealing with the matter was possible within the terms of the Bill. The Joint Parliamentary Secretary knows that, and therefore he should not try to mislead the Committee. He knows that if we want to raise this matter at all under the terms of Parliamentary order we must say that the money must come out of the National Insurance Fund. We cannot say that it must come from the Exchequer, because that would not be in order.
    Mr. Wainwright: But is it not true that many of these men have paid into the Industrial Injuries Fund? If these men are partial compensation cases they are probably working now. Those who have been working since 5th July, 1948 and who, due to an old accident, are receiving partial compensation have obviously contributed towards the fund.
    Mr. Hale: That is true. I was talking largely in terms of 1926, 1927 or 1928 and of the older cases to which the Joint Parliamentary Secretary made his final unfortunate reference.
    Mr. B. Taylor: Does my hon. Friend realise that of the 12,000 partial compensation cases more than 5,000 are at work now and are contributing to the fund?
    Mr. Hale: Certainly. I make the same reply that I made before. I was trying to concentrate my remarks on those people receiving compensation who suffer the maximum hardship from the present method of computing the supplements.
    I was about to say that the Joint Parliamentary Secretary made what I thought was his other unfortunate reference when he said, "We have consulted the National Coal Board and it has advised us that the men who were injured or diseased in 1926 or 1927 would not, almost 40 years later, be earning on piece work comparable figures, making adjustments to allow for the variation in wage rates over the period". In 1926 the mining industry was not the industry that it is today. I speak from personal experience of the Midlands. I was then dealing with lads of 15 years of age doing the job of pit ponies.
    Mr. Harper: Does my hon. Friend realise that we had nine months "holiday" in 1926?
    Mr. Hale: I realise that in 1926 there was the mining lock-out. Over the whole of the area which we are considering, and certainly in Leicestershire, pits were being closed down permanently. Those which remained open were working, if they were lucky, for three days a week and the maximum wages of the men were 10s. Do not let us hesitate about the figures.
    However, the jobs were not the same. We were not talking about mechanised mines with conveyor belts or even the more modern methods of transport. I was dealing with lads of 15 years of age who were "tramming", dragging loaded tubs and doing the job of pit ponies—because pit ponies can come expensive. What is the good of the Joint Parliamentary Secretary saying that a lad of 15 years of age who was "tramming" in 1926 would not be a highly skilled loader-operator at a mechanised face in 1964? This is a tragic way of considering the matter.
    9.45 p.m.
    There was a day, even while I have been a Member of Parliament, when in courtesy to the House of Commons Ministers would say, "We appreciate that, hon. Members not having the benefit of expert legal assistance, there may be some mistake in the drafting. But we understand the objects of the Clause, and if we are to accept it, we will amend it so that it suits the case. If it may not be appropriate for the money to come from the National Insurance Fund, we shall see that this piffling little payment, relatively speaking"—I never thought that the day would come when I would talk about £400,000 a year as a piffling little payment, but we have cases which are sub judice which add up to scores of millions of money in respect of which no check appears to have been made. What Shakespeare called our "sumless treasury"—and he was referring to the sea—appears much more to apply to Whitehall. Very few sums have been computed.
    If the Government are saying that they could do substantial justice to a

    651
    much suffering section of the community for £400,000 a year, which would be reduced year by year, and rapidly, because, unhappily, people who got this benefit would be dying off, after the sums which we have had to deal with are not the Government prepared to say that here is an opportunity of doing belated justice for some? Even if they cannot do justice for those who are dead, those who failed, those who for some technicality lost their case or the many who lost it because medical opinion in those days was different from medical opinion today, or for those who failed to establish a claim for diseases like silicosis or miner's nystagmus because of a conflict of medical opinion, we can, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Llanelly says, do tardy justice to a small section of the community for this small sum. Cannot the Minister at least say that he will consider our proposal and hope to come back and say that suggestions can be made which would do justice, even if it is necessary to introduce a minor measure of discrimination to satisfy the difficulties to which he has referred?
    Miss Herbison: In his reply, the Joint Parliamentary Secretary took us right back to 1943, when we had the Workmen's Compensation Act, and said that at the time of the review no fair formula could be found to deal with the type of cases which we have been discussing under the Amendment. The hon. and gallant Gentleman showed clearly that he recognised that amongst the cases covered by the Amendment there is real hardship—he has not denied it—but what does he do about it? He accepts that there is real hardship, but he tells us that since those cases of real hardship cannot be isolated from those which he considers not to be suffering real hardship, he will do nothing whatever for those who are suffering hardship. That is a wrong attitude for any Minister in the Government to take.
    To back up his case, the hon. and gallant Gentleman says that outside the cases covered by our Amendment there are worse cases. What have the Government been doing for 12 years? If they realise that there are much worse
    652
    cases than those covered by our Amendment—
    Mr. B. Taylor: And so there are.
    Miss Herbison: Of course there are—no Minister should come to the Box after his Government have been in power for 12 years to support his case for not accepting the Amendment on the ground that there are other cases outside it in which the hardship is much worse.
    The Joint Parliamentary Secretary brought forward the statement about the National Coal Board and the attempt to make a comparison of wages. My hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) has shown clearly that the Coal Board could not possibly answer what the Minister asked. Nobody in that position could possibly answer it. That does not mean that the Coal Board was against anything being done for the cases covered by the Amendment or for the harder cases which are not covered by it. The Board gave the answers to the specific questions asked by the Minister. The Board was not asked what it would do if it had the chance to help these people. I hope that this makes the position of the Coal Board perfectly clear.
    The hon. and gallant Gentleman told us that money from the Industrial Injuries Fund could be used only for the relief of genuine hardship. He stated that it is a fund to which these people will not have contributed. I take grave exception to that statement because, again, that Fund has been raided—that is the only word one can use in the context of the Minister's speech—to help old pneumoconiotic cases and many other different types. The Minister used that as an argument to prevent justice being done to people who are suffering real hardship. As he cannot isolate them, he will do nothing.
    Lieut.-Commander Maydon: Does the hon. Lady contend, therefore, that the old pneumoconiosis cases are not cases of real hardship—
    Miss Herbison: Of course they are.
    Lieut.-Commander Maydon:—and that it is raiding the Fund to do justice by those cases which can be identified as opposed to those cases which cannot?
    Miss Herbison: I do not contend that at all. I was referring to the fact that many of these people might have been said not to have contributed to it. My objection is that because the Minister tells us he cannot isolate the cases of real hardship, he will not do anything to help these cases.
    The Minister has told us that if our Amendment were accepted, a sum of £400,000 per annum would be involved. That £400,000 would cover the real cases of hardship that the Minister cannot isolate and give perhaps a little extra to those whom he thinks are not suffering hardship. Would there be anything desperately wrong in doing that? Most of these men, injured in heavy industry, deserve to get the justice that this Clause would give them.
    The Joint Parliamentary Secretary took up the point made by one of my hon. Friends who said that 7,000 of this small number were unemployed. The hon. Gentleman thought he had a smart answer by saying that three-quarters of that 7,000 unemployed were over 65. We are thus, in the main, talking about older people. How many of them are over 60? Does not the hon. and gallant Gentleman realise that this will be a dwindling responsibility year by year? If he had any feelings, as we from the mining and other heavy industrial areas have about these people, he would have been ready to accept the Clause at once. Since the Government will not accept the Clause, we shall divide the Committee in the knowledge that it will not be many months before we have a Minister acting on behalf of a Government who will give justice to these people.
    Mr. Finch: We understand from the Joint Parliamentary Secretary that there is £288 million in the Industrial Injuries Fund. We are told that this Clause would cost £400,000. There is, therefore, no financial ground on which he can rest his argument.
    Earlier, I reminded the Committee of the difference between the pre-and post-accident
    accident wages under the Workmen's Compensation Acts, including supplementation, and that the workman is entitled to two-thirds of the difference. I quoted a case where the difference was £1 but where the man was receiving only 13s. 4d. He should be receiving the full £1 In support of my contention, I said that these men had never been able to obtain an adequate review of their pre-accident wages. The Joint Parliamentary Secretary admitted that, but said that there were immense difficulties. He recalled that a committee had found great difficulty in adequately reviewing pre-accident wages. If we accept that, it means that these men are forever tied to low pre-accident wages.
    In these circumstances, it is not unreasonable to say that, out of the £288 million in the Fund, these men should have £400,000. Their number is declining year by year until, in a few years' time, few will be left. Would not the Minister consider increasing the difference to say, seven-eighths at least. It is seven-eighths today for a married man with children, but these men had their accidents many years ago and no children are now involved.
    Let the Government give a few shillings to these older men who had their accidents so many years ago and have not had the advantage of changing rates of wages and who today are crippled and will never work again. He has £288 million in the Fund. All we ask for is £400,000 a year for a dwindling number of men.
    Mr. B. Taylor: This problem has not been tackled by the Government, and time is not on our side. Wiith the passage of time the hand of death will have removed the problem, and history will record that it was not very creditable to us that we did not do justice to these unfortunate people.
    Question put, That the Clause be read a Second time:—
    The Committee divided: Ayes 108, Noes 161

    Division No. 15.]

    AYES

    [9.59 p.m.

    Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)

    Blyton, William

    Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)

    Barnett, Guy

    Boardman, H.

    Carmichael, Neil

    Beaney, Alan

    Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G.

    Castle, Mrs. Barbara

    Bennett, J. (Glasgow, Bridgeton)

    Bowden, Rt. Hn. H. W. (Leics, S. W.)

    Cliffe, Michael

    Blackburn, F.

    Bray, Dr. Jeremy

    Cronin, John

    Cullen, Mrs. Alice

    Hynd, John (Attercliffe)

    Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)

    Dalyell, Tam

    Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hilt)

    Price, J. T. (Westhougton)

    Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)

    Janner, Sir Barnett

    Probert, Arthur

    Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)

    Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)

    Randall, Harry

    Diamond, John

    Jones, Dan (Burnley)

    Redhead, E. C.

    Doig, Peter

    Kelley, Richard

    Rees, Merlyn (Leeds, S.)

    Edwards, Robert (Bilston)

    Kenyon, Clifford

    Reynolds, G. W.

    Edwards, Walter (Stepney)

    Ledger, Ron

    Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)

    Evans, Albert

    Lee, Frederick (Newton)

    Robertson, John (Paisley)

    Finch, Harold

    Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)

    Rodgers, W. T. (Stockton)

    Fitch, Alan

    Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)

    Ross, William

    Fletcher, Eric

    Loughlin, Charles

    Silkin, John

    Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)

    Lubbock, Eric

    Snow, Julian

    Galpern, Sir Myer

    MacColl, James

    Sorensen, R. W.

    Ginsburg, David

    McKay, John (Wallsend)

    Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank

    Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. C.

    Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)

    Spriggs, Leslie

    Grey, Charles

    Manuel, Archie

    Steele, Thomas

    Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)

    Mapp, Charles

    Stonehouse, John

    Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W.)

    Mayhew, Christopher

    Symonds, J. B.

    Hamilton, William (West Fife)

    Mendelson, J. J.

    Taverne, D.

    Hannan, William

    Millan, Bruce

    Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)

    Harper, Joseph

    Milne, Edward

    Thomas, Iorwerth (Rhondda, W.)

    Hayman, F. H.

    Mitchison, G. R.

    Thornton, Ernest

    Herbison, Miss Margaret

    Morris, Charles (Openshaw)

    Wainwright, Edwin

    Hill, J. (Midlothian)

    Morris, John

    Warbey, William

    Holman, Percy

    O'Malley, B. K.

    Wilkins, W. A.

    Houghton, Douglas

    Oram, A. E.

    Willey, Frederick

    Hoy, James H.

    Oswald, Thomas

    Williams, D. J. (Neath)

    Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)

    Owen, Will

    Yates, Victor (Ladywood)

    Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)

    Padley, W. E.

    Hunter, A. E.

    Paget, R. T.

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

    Hynd, H. (Accrington)

    Pavitt, Laurence

    Mr. Charles A. Howell and

    Mr. Ifor Davies.

    NOES

    Agnew, Sir Peter

    Finlay, Graeme

    Marten, Neil

    Allason, James

    Fraser, Ian (Plymouth, Sutton)

    Maude, Angus (Stratford-on-Avon)

    Anderson, D. C.

    Freeth, Denzil

    Mawby, Ray

    Atkins, Humphrey

    Gibson-Watt, David

    Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.

    Awdry, Daniel (Chippenham)

    Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, Central)

    Maydon, Lt-Cmdr. S. L. C.

    Barber, Rt. Hon. Anthony

    Glyn, Sir Richard (Dorset, N.)

    Mills, Stratton

    Barlow, Sir John

    Goodhew, Victor

    Miscampbell, Norman

    Barter, John

    Gough, Frederick

    More, Jasper (Ludlow)

    Batsford, Brian

    Grant-Ferris, R.

    Morgan, William

    Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton

    Gresham Cooke, R.

    Neave, Airy

    Berkeley, Humphry

    Grosvenor, Lord Robert

    Oakshott, Sir Hendrie

    Biffen, John

    Gurden, Harold

    Osborn, John (Hallam)

    Birch, Rt. Hon. Nigel

    Hall, John (Wycombe)

    Osborne, Sir Cyril (Louth)

    Bishop, Sir Patrick

    Hamilton, Michael (Wellingborough)

    Page, Graham (Crosby)

    Black, Sir Cyril

    Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N. W.)

    Pannell, Norman (Kirkdale)

    Bourne-Arton, A.

    Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)

    Partridge, E.

    Box, Donald

    Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere (Macclesf'd)

    Pearson, Frank (Clitheroe)

    Braine, Bernard

    Harvey, John (Walthamstow, E.)

    Peel, John

    Brewis, John

    Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel

    Percival, Ian

    Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. Sir Walter

    Henderson, John (Cathcart)

    Pickthorn, Sir Kenneth

    Brown, Alan (Tottenham)

    Riley, Joseph

    Pitman, Sir James

    Browne, Percy (Torrington)

    Hill, J. E. B. (S. Norfolk)

    Pounder, Rafton

    Bryan, Paul

    Hirst, Geoffrey

    Powell, Rt. Hon. J. Enoch

    Holland, Philip

    Prior-Palmer, Brig. Sir Otho

    Buck, Antony

    Hollingworth, John

    Rawlinson, Rt. Hon. Sir Peter

    Bullus, Wing Commander Eric

    Hope, Rt. Hon. Lord John

    Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin

    Campbell, Gordon (Moray & Nairn)

    Hopkins, Alan

    Rees, Hugh (Swansea, W.)

    Carr, Compton (Barons Court)

    Hornby, R. P.

    Rid dale, Julian

    Cary, Sir Robert

    Howard, Hon. G. R. (St. Ives)

    Roberto, Sir Peter (Heeley)

    Chataway, Christopher

    Hughes-Young, Michael

    Roots, William

    Chichester-Clark, R.

    Hutchison, Michael Clark

    Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard

    Clark, Henry (Antrim, N.)

    Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)

    Sharples, Richard

    Clark, William (Nottingham, S.)

    Johnson, Eric (Blackley)

    Shaw, M.

    Clarke, Brig. Terence (Portsmth, W.)

    Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)

    Shepherd, William

    Cole, Norman

    Joseph, Rt. Hon. Sir Keith

    Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'd & Chiswick)

    Cooper-Key, Sir Neill

    Kerans, Cdr. J. S.

    Stainton, Keith

    Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.

    Kerr, Sir Hamilton

    Stodart, J. A.

    Costain, A. P.

    Kershaw, Anthony

    Studholme, Sir Henry

    Courtney, Cdr. Anthony

    Lagden, Godfrey

    Summers, Sir Spencer

    Curran, Charles

    Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry

    Taylor, Edwin (Bolton, E.)

    Dance, James

    Lilley, F. J. P.

    Taylor, Frank (M'ch'st'r, Moss Side)

    Deedes, Rt. Hon. W. F.

    Litchfield, Capt. John

    Taylor, Sir William (Bradford, N.)

    Digby, Simon Wingfield

    Lloyd, Rt. Hon. Selwyn (Wirral)

    Teeling, Sir William

    Eden, Sir John

    Longden Gilbert

    Thatcher Mrs. Margaret

    Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)

    Loveys, Walter H.

    Thomas, Peter (Conway)

    Elliott, R. W. (Newc'tle-upon-Tyne, N.)

    Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh

    Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon, S.)

    Errington, Sir Eric

    McLaren, Martin

    Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin

    Farey-Jones, F. W.

    Macley, Rt. Hon. John

    Touche, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon

    Farr, John

    Marshall, Sir Douglas

    Turner, Colin

    656

    657

    van Straubenzee, W. R.

    Williams, Dudley (Exeter)

    Wood, Rt. Hon. Richard

    Vosper, Rt. Hon. Dennis

    Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)

    Woodhouse, C. M.

    Walder, David

    Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)

    Yates, William (The Wrekin)

    Walker, Peter

    Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)

    Wall, Patrick

    Wise, A. R.

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

    Ward, Dame Irene

    Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick

    Mr. MacArthur and Mr. Pym.

    it being after Ten o'clock, The CHAIRMAN left the Chair to report Progress and ask leave to sit again.
    Committee report Progress.

  BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
  Ordered,
  That the Proceedings on the Family Allowances and National Insurance Bill may be entered upon and proceeded with at this day's Sitting at any hour, though opposed.—[Mr. Hughes-Young.]

  FAMILY ALLOWANCES AND NATIONAL INSURANCE BILL
  Again considered in Committee.
  FAMILY ALLOWANCES AND NATIONAL INSURANCE BILL

    New Clause.—(INCREASE OF BASIC PENSION OF CERTAIN WIDOWS.)
    A widow's basic pension to which a woman has become or becomes entitled by virtue of paragraph (2) of regulation 7 of the National Insurance (Pensions, Existing Beneficiaries and other persons) (Transitional) Regulations 1948 (which paragraph confers a right to pension on widows who had a prospective right to a widow's pension under the Fourth Schedule to the Contributory Pensions Act of 1936) shall be at the rate of 30s. a week instead of at the rate of 10s. prescribed by paragraph (2) of Regulation 9 of the said Regulations.—[Mr. Mitchison.]
    Brought up, and read the First time.
    Mr. Mitchison: I beg to move, That the Clause be read a Second time.
    This is a matter about which we know, or ought to know, and in the absence of the Prime Minister I assume that we do know. It is the 10s. widow, The 10s. widow is the widow of someone who had accrued rights under the Contributory Pensions Act, 1936. She had a right to a widow's pension when she reached it. She was given a pension of 10s. in certain circumstances into which I need not go now because she had that vested right, and for no other reason. There she is. There are many of her. She has had this now, one way or the other, ever since the 1946 Act was introduced, and I am not here to discuss whether she is an anomaly or not. There was a perfectly good defence for what was done. It was rightly done.
    658
    However that may be, the question raised by the Clause is this: she has been given 10s. She was held by Parliament, and has been held by the country, to be entitled to that 10s. When it was awarded it was worth a great deal more than it is now, and all that we propose to do is to give her something like the equivalent of what that 10s. was worth when it was awarded.
    This jungle of National Insurance is peopled by anomalies—and a nasty lot they are. It is a jungle haunted by widows, and one of the most aggressive is the 10s. widow. She has a sister—the 20s. widow, who comes under the Industrial Injuries Act. She has had the compliment, at any rate, of being referred to the Industrial Injuries Advisory Committee for an opinion, and presumably for some action, but the 10s. widow has had nothing, and it is about time she was given something like the real value of what she was intended to have.
    This is the simplest possible question and I hope that the Committee will allow us to test it in the Lobby as quickly as possible. I know what the Government will do. They do not give a penny. That jungle is thick with stinking pinchwort.
    Mr. Cole: The hon. and learned Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison) said that the 10s. widow has been aggressive. I do not agree, although I agree with the rest of his speech. But she has not been at all aggressive. I would remind my right hon. Friend that some hours ago he said that we were not trying to compensate widows for the loss of their husbands, because that could not be done; we were trying to make up to them something of their earning power, to enable them to look after themselves for the rest of their lives. No one in his senses would suggest that this 10s., given under the residual powers of the 1936 Act, helps to any great extent in making up for a widow's loss of earnings as a result of her husband's death.

    659
    Secondly, if it was right when the 10s. was given—whether purely gratuitously or legally, under the Act—it is right that we should make the figure commensurate with the present-day cost of living, whether it be 30s., or more or less. I feel very strongly about this matter, as the hon. and learned Member does. This is not the first time that I have raised it. I know most of the arguments that are produced in reply, from the days when my right hon. Friend's predecessor was in office, but I do not think that we should give up the fight. If not now, then one day we should do something about it. At any rate, we should tell the 10s. widows that their cause is not forgotten by many of us.
    Mrs. Thatcher: As hon. Members know most of the arguments, I will not detain the Committee by repeating them. I merely point out that the vast majority of the 10s. pensions now in payment have come into payment since 1948. They are still coming into payment this week, and they will go on coming into payment for the next 20 years or so, although the scheme under which they were pay-
    able ceased on 5th July, 1948. That scheme set out to compensate widowhood, of itself, and to pay a pension of 10s. because a person was widowed, whether she was 21, 25 or any other age. It was replaced by another scheme which had a different concept.
    Nevertheless, although the old scheme has ceased, new pensions are still coming into payment. They are an anachronism, and the right comparison is between the 10s. widow and her modern sister, who would get nothing under similar circumstances after 13 weeks' benefit. The Clause would cost roughtly £7 million. I hope that the Committee will reject it.
    Mr. Mitchison: All I say is that if these widows became entitled to 10s. under the Act of 1946 they should get 30s. now, and I invite my hon. and right hon. Friends to support that argument in the Lobby.
    Question put, That the Clause be read a Second time:—
    The Committee divided: Ayes 103, Noes 148.

    Division No. 16.]

    AYES

    [10.15 p.m.

    Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)

    Herbison, Miss Margaret

    Oswald, Thomas

    Barnett, Guy

    Hill, J. (Midlothian)

    Owen, Will

    Beaney, Alan

    Holman, Percy

    Paget, R. T.

    Houghton, Douglas

    Pavitt, Laurence

    Bennett, J. (Glasgow, Bridgeton)

    Hoy, James H.

    Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)

    Blackburn, F.

    Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)

    Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)

    Blyton, William

    Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)

    Probert, Arthur

    Boardman, H.

    Hunter, A. E.

    Randall, Harry

    Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G.

    Hynd, H. (Accrington)

    Redhead, E. C.

    Bowden, Rt. Hn. H. W. (Leics, S. W.)

    Hynd, John (Attercliffe)

    Rees, Merlyn (Leeds, S.)

    Bray, Dr. Jeremy

    Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)

    Reynolds, G. W.

    Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)

    Janner, Sir Barnett

    Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)

    Carmichael, Neil

    Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)

    Robertson, John (Paisley)

    Castle, Mrs. Barbara

    Jones, Dan (Burnley)

    Rodgers, W. T. (Stockton)

    Cliffe, Michael

    Kelley, Richard

    Ross, William

    Cronin, John

    Kenyon, Clifford

    Silkin, John

    Dalyell, Tam

    Lee, Frederick (Newton)

    Snow, Julian

    Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)

    Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)

    Sorensen, R. W.

    Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)

    Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)

    Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank

    Diamond, John

    Loughlin, Charles

    Spriggs, Leslie

    Doig, Peter

    Lubbock, Eric

    Stonehouse, John

    Edwards, Walter (Stepney)

    MacColl, James

    Symonds, J. B.

    Evans, Albert

    McKay, John (Wallsend)

    Taverne, D.

    Finch, Harold

    Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)

    Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)

    Fitch, Alan

    Manuel, Archie

    Thomas, Iorwerth (Rhondda, W.)

    Fletcher, Eric

    Mapp, Charles

    Thornton, Ernest

    Galpern, Sir Myer

    Mayhew, Christopher

    Wainwright, Edwin

    Ginsburg, David

    Mendelson, J. J.

    Warbey, William

    Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. C.

    Millan, Bruce

    Wilkins, W. A.

    Grey, Charles

    Milne, Edward

    Willey, Frederick

    Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)

    Mitchison, G. R.

    Williams, D. J. (Neath)

    Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W.)

    Morris, Charles (Openshaw)

    Yates, Victor (Ladywood)

    Hamilton, William (West Fife)

    Morris, John

    Hannan, William

    Noel-Baker, Rt. Hn. Philip (Derby, S.)

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

    Harper, Joseph

    O'Malley, B. K.

    Mr. Charles A. Howell and

    Hayman, F. H.

    Oram, A. E.

    Mr. Ifor Davies.

    NOES

    Agnew, Sir Peter

    Grant-Ferris, R.

    Pannell, Norman (Kirkdale)

    Allason, James

    Gresham Cooke, R.

    Partridge, E.

    Anderson, D. C.

    Grosvenor, Lord Robert

    Pearson, Frank (Clitheroe)

    Atkins, Humphrey

    Hall, John (Wycombe)

    Peel, John

    Awdry, Daniel (Chippenham)

    Hamilton, Michael (Wellingborough)

    Percival, Ian

    Barlow, Sir John

    Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)

    Pickthorn, Sir Kenneth

    Barter, John

    Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere (Macclesf'd)

    Pitman, Sir James

    Batsford, Brian

    Harvey, John (Walthamstow, E.)

    Prior-Palmer, Brig. Sir Otho

    Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton

    Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel

    Pym, Francis

    Berkeley, Humphry

    Henderson, John (Cathcart)

    Rawlinson, Sir Peter

    Biffen, John

    Hiley, Joseph

    Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin

    Bishop, F. P.

    Hill, J. E. B. (S. Norfolk)

    Rees, Hugh (Swansea, W.)

    Black, Sir Cyril

    Hirst, Geoffrey

    Ridsdale, Julian

    Bourne-Arton, A.

    Holland, Philip

    Roberts, Sir Peter (Heeley)

    Box, Donald

    Hollingworth, John

    Roots, William

    Braine, Barnard

    Hopkins, Alan

    Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard

    Brewis, John

    Hornby, R. P.

    Sharples, Richard

    Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. Sir Walter

    Hughes-Young, Michael

    Shaw, M.

    Brown, Alan (Tottenham)

    Irvine, Bryant Gorman (Rye)

    Shepherd, William

    Browne, Percy (Torrington)

    Johnson, Eric (Blackley)

    Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'd & Chiswick)

    Buck, Antony

    Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)

    Stainton, Keith

    Bullus, Wing Commander Eric

    Joseph, Rt. Hon. Sir Keith

    Stodart, J. A.

    Campbell, Gordon (Moray & Nairn)

    Kerans, Cdr. J. S.

    Studholme, Sir Henry

    Carr, Compton (Barons Court)

    Kerr, Sir Hamilton

    Summers, Sir Spencer

    Cary, Sir Robert

    Kershaw, Anthony

    Taylor, Edwin (Bolton, E.)

    Chataway, Christopher

    Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry

    Taylor, Frank (M'ch'st'r, Moss Side)

    Chichester-Clark, R.

    Lilley, F. J. P.

    Taylor, Sir William (Bradford, N.)

    Clark, Henry (Antrim, N.)

    Litchfield, Capt. John

    Teeling, Sir William

    Clark, William (Nottingham, S.)

    Lloyd, Rt. Hon. Selwyn (Wirral)

    Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret

    Clarke, Brig. Terence (Portsmth, W.)

    Longden, Gilbert

    Thomas, Peter (Conway)

    Cooper-Key, Sir Neill

    Loveys, Walter H.

    Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon, S.)

    Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.

    Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh

    Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin

    Costain, A. P.

    McLaren, Martin

    Touche, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon

    Courtney, Cdr. Anthony

    Maclay, Rt. Hon. John

    Turner, Colin

    Curran, Charles

    Marshall, Sir Douglas

    van Straubenzee, W. R.

    Dance, James

    Marten, Neil

    Vosper, Rt. Hon. Dennis

    Deedes, Rt. Hon. W. F.

    Mathew, Robert (Honiton)

    Walden, David

    Digby, Simon Wingfield

    Maude, Angus (Stratford-on-Avon)

    Walker, Peter

    Eden, Sir John

    Mawby, Ray

    Wall, Patrick

    Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)

    Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.

    Williams, Dudley (Exeter)

    Elliott, R. W. (Newc'tle-upon-Tyne, N.)

    Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C.

    Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)

    Errington, Sir Eric

    Mills, Stratton

    Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)

    Farr, John

    Miscampbell, Norman

    Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)

    Fraser, Ian (Plymouth, Sutton)

    More, Jasper (Ludlow)

    Wise, A. R.

    Freeth, Denzil

    Morgan, William

    Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick

    Gibson-Watt, David

    Neave, Airey

    Wood, Rt. Hon. Richard

    Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, Central)

    Oakshott, Sir Hendrie

    Woodhouse, C. M.

    Glyn, Sir Richard (Dorset, N.)

    Osborn, John (Hallam)

    Yates, William (The Wrekin)

    Goodhew, Victor

    Osborne, Sir Cyril (Louth)

    Gough, Frederick

    Page, Graham (Crosby)

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

    Mr. Finlay and Mr. MacArthur.

    Schedules 1 to 4 agreed to.
    Bill reported, without Amendment.
    Motion made, and Question proposed, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
    10.25 p.m.
    Miss Herbison: We on this side of the House welcome the improvements contained in the Bill. We feel that some widows—widowed mothers—will receive substantial benefits under the Bill, and we welcome this. I would be less than frank with the Minister if I did not say at this stage that we are very disappointed that he did not see fit to accept any of our Amendments. I am particularly disappointed that my hon. Friend the Member for Wallsend (Mr. McKay) did not have the chance to move his
    662
    new Clause, because we all believe, not only that there are some hardships which have been to some extent ameliorated by the Bill, but that there are other serious hardships being suffered by the unemployed and the sick, and particularly by their dependants. I hope that the Government will give more serious thought to these matters. I know that they have very little time now in which to make good all their defaults of the last twelve years, but they may have a little time. We should be most willing, as we have been on this Bill, to help to hurry things through the House.
    I wish that the present Leader of the House had sat in his place today when my hon. Friends from mining constituencies were making their case, as the previous Leader of the House once did.

    663
    The previous Leader of the House was so impressed with their case that he advised the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance to do something about it. If the present Leader of the House had listened to the almost unanswerable case advanced by my hon. Friends from mining constituencies, perhaps he also from a Cabinet point of view would have advised the Minister to do something about it.
    However, we were not able to convince the Government. We wish the Bill a speedy course through the other place, and hope that very soon we shall have a Bill which will contain provisions to meet the points contained in the Amendments, which we failed to get accepted today.
    Mr. Wood: I am very grateful to the hon. Lady the Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison) for the welcome that she has given to the Bill. She is entirely right that we shall not have a great deal of time before the General Election to do other things that we should like to do. We look forward to having several years after the election in which to carry on the good work.
    Question put and agreed to.
    Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.

  ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE [MONEY]
  Resolution reported,
  That, for the purposes of any Act of the present Session to make provision with respect to the administration of justice in the metropolitan area, it is expedient to authorise—

  (a) the payment out of the Consolidated Fund—

  (i) of any increase attributable to the provisions of that Act in the sums payable out of that Fund under any other enactment;

  664

  (ii) of any sums required under that Act for indemnifying metropolitan stipendiary magistrates in respect of damages, costs and other sums payable in or in connection with proceedings against them (other than proceedings falling within paragraph (b) (ii) of this Resolution);

  (iii) of any contributions payable by the Treasury under that Act towards superannuation benefits payable to or in respect of the chairman or deputy chairman of the court of quarter sessions for a London commission area:

  (b) the payment out of moneys provided by Parliament—

  (i) of any increase attributable to the provisions of that Act in the sums payable out of moneys so provided under any other enactment;

  (ii) of any sums required under that Act for paying costs awarded against justices, justices' clerks, clerks of the peace or any such clerk's assistants in proceedings for an order of prohibition, mandamus or certiorari or for indemnifying members of a court of quarter sessions, clerks of the peace or any such clerk's assistants in respect of damages, costs or other sums payable in or in connection with proceedings in respect of acts or omissions at quarter sessions;

  (c) any payments into the Exchequer.

  Resolution agreed to.

  POLICE BILL
  Ordered,
  That notwithstanding anything in paragraph (2) of Standing Order No. 59 (Standing Committees (Constitution and Powers)), Clause 56 of and Schedule 6 to the Police Bill shall be considered by the Scottish Standing Committee as if such Clause and Schedule had been a separate Bill, which after committal by the House had been so allocated; and that, when the provisions committed to the Scottish Standing Committee and the provisions committed to Standing Committee D have been reported to the House, the Bill shall be considered as if it had been reported to the House as a whole.—[Mr. Selwyn Lloyd.]

  CAPTAIN V. C. D. LEVY
  Motion made and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. MacArthur.]
  10.28 p.m.
  Mr. John Hollingworth: I am glad to have this opportunity to raise in the House the problems of my constituent, Captain Levy.
  Before I say another word on this case, I must congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Honiton (Mr. Mathew) on his well-deserved promotion to the Front Bench. On behalf of his many friends on both sides of the House, I wish him every possible personal success in his new office.
  In a way I am rather sorry that his baptism of fire tonight should be in connection with so complex a matter as the problems of this constituent. When I first arrived in the House four and a half years ago, I received correspondence from Captain Levy with regard to his outstanding difficulties, which are associated with the fact that he was forced to leave Egypt at the time of the Suez emergency. For the last 4½ years I have been in contact with both my constituent and the Foreign Office, and I fear that even at this late stage, some 7½ years after the crisis, Captain Levy's affairs are still not satisfactorily settled.
  My constituent, a man of 65, with a record of military service in the Armed Forces of the Crown, represented in Egypt prior to the emergency a substantial number of British and European manufacturers and had until the time of the crisis a very substantial and lucrative business connection. Like so many others at that time, he was obliged to leave Egypt at a moment's notice. I repeat that after 7½ years his affairs are still, to my way of thinking, not satisfactorily concluded.
  The Foreign Office, as my hon. Friend will know from his brief tenure of office, has a very substantial file on this case. I, too, have a very substantial file, and I know that this is a very complex and detailed matter. Because the Foreign Office has so much detail,
  666
  I do not propose to bore the House at this stage with the details of the case. I fear, though, in all fairness, that the success of my constituent's efforts to obtain some recompense for his lost assets have not been helped by the attitude of certain authorities in Egypt. I shall refer in a moment to the ex-gratia loan that was made to my constituent on his arrival in this country 7½ years ago, but I think that my hon. Friend would agree that the major problem lies in terms of the various assets in the form of stocks and shares that were left behind by my constituent and have not yet been effectively realised.
  This is a story, as I said, of great complication. In the first instance, one gathers from the mass of correspondence which has accumulated that a tax clearance certificate appears to be the key to desequestration. After many months of negotiation, however, employing no fewer than six solicitors in this country and Cairo, I believe that at last the certificate has become available. I am not quite sure, and I should be glad of my hon. Friend's advice on this point.
  This matter appears from the correspondence and from the conversations that I have had with my constituent to be blocked by virtue of a legal action by former partners of his in Cairo. Until not very many months ago this was still being used by certain authorities in Egypt to delay, or to appear to delay, final settlement, although in practice judgment on this matter was made in my constituent's favour in 1957. This illustrates the complication and detail of the case.
  There has also been considerable difficulty in obtaining up-to-date detailed statements of my constituent's accounts in the two Egyptian banks that he used prior to his leaving that country, the authorities I gather, not being prepared to divulge information about credits and debits during the period of sequestration. Several years ago it was suggested that only by a personal visit would my constituent really have an opportunity of putting his affairs in order, and I know, again from personal experience, that although he has, in the classic words, tried and tried again, he has still not been able to get a visa to return to his adopted home.

  667
  The result of all these difficulties, which I suggest again are mainly connected with the attitude of the Egyptian authorities, is that my constituent today finds himself living in most difficult circumstances. He was granted an ex-gratia loan on his arrival in this country to the tune of some £7,500. His assets in Egypt, including the good will of his connections as a manufacturers' agent, were valued by Her Majesty's Government at approximately £15,000.
  Right from the beginning of these negotiations my constituent claimed £32,000, by virtue of the loss of potential profit caused by sequestration by the Egyptian authorities. I have here tonight documents which seem to prove his case that he had a substantial business connection. I have with me—my hon. Friend may care to see them some time—letters of credit, in effect, from many companies in this country. When one is dealing with figures in relation to nationalisation of assets in Egypt, I must admit that they are a matter for negotiation; and I would not ask my hon. Friend to reply tonight in great detail on the matter of these figures, because, as I said, it is a very complicated one.
  Soon after his return to the United Kingdom my constituent gave as a gift £2,000 of the ex-gratia loan which he was granted on arrival in this country to his daughters, who were at that time living in severe financial difficulties. Although it was accepted at the time of the ex-gratia loan that when hardship could be proved repayment could be made over a long period of time, the authorities in London have deducted the loan figure from the total figure of compensation, which leaves my constituent with £6,200 compensation as opposed to the approximate valuation—in the Government's eyes—of £15,000.
  This matter is a sorer spot than perhaps it might have been simply because my constituent, as the years have passed by, has read in the newspapers in this country of other people in a similar position receiving substantially more than he himself has been granted. Naturally enough, unable as he is at the present time to obtain suitable employment because of his age, he feels very strongly about the whole matter.
  I return to the crux of the matter, which, in my opinion, is represented
  668
  by the assets which are still frozen in Egypt. I should like to make it perfectly plain that as long as these matters and assets remain unsettled the lower may be the value of the final settlement. This is because, as financiers and business men in the House will say, the value of many Egyptian stocks, both Government and private industry, has dropped substantially during the intervening period. This makes the whole thing more complicated than it need have been had it been cleared up five or six years ago.
  I ask that even after seven and a half years my hon. Friend and his colleagues in the Foreign Office should offer to give comprehensive reconsideration to the whole case, using the full facilities of the Foreign Office in this country and of the British Embassy in Cairo, in an attempt finally to bring to a close the problems of my constituent, who, through no fault of his own—I repeat—finds himself living in most difficult conditions, with no opportunity at his age of obtaining suitable employment in this country, and certainly, by virtue of the failure of the Egyptian Government to grant a visa, no opportunity whatsoever ever to return to his adopted home.
  I am quite sure that but for all the difficulties which have arisen in the past between our two countries—and I would not dream for one moment tonight of going into detail of what is still a highly controversial political subject—people of good will in both countries must surely agree that outstanding matters of this type should be settled as soon as possible, rather than remain as open sores to endanger the happier relationships which we hope will exist between the nations concerned.
  I have had 4½ years correspondence with my constituent. I am fully aware of the complications, and of the diversification of interests involved. I said earlier that I am confident that a very large measure of blame must rest upon the shoulders of those authorities in Egypt who have, in effect, gone out of their way in a very delicate and diplomatic manner to prevent the final settlement of this matter. But I am sure, too, that, given a little more good will on both sides and given an enthusiastic approach by the Foreign Office through

  669
  the British Embassy in Cairo, there is no reason why my constituent should not, before long, find himself adequately recompensed for what, after all, is a situation which was due to no fault of his.
  10.41 p.m.
  Mr. William Yates: I was delighted to hear my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, All Saints (Mr. Hollingworth) speak about the cases of those who have not yet been able to get their accounts settled under the agreement between Great Britain and the U.A.R. Nevertheless, I hope my hon. Friend will agree with me on the diligence of Mr. Fletcher in our Embassy in Cairo and on the efforts of the committee which has been responsible in Cairo and has done its best to investigate a large number of these cases.
  I can only say in support of my hon. Friend's case that I think it is a great mistake that the U.A.R. has not allowed his constituent an opportunity to go back and investigate the case for himself. But he can rest assured of one thing. The British Embassy in Cairo, as far as I have knowledge of other cases, has assisted my constituents and all those who have written to me. I hope that this case, like others, can be settled, because no good can come to Britain's future relations in the Middle East unless these matters concerning our constituents are settled properly, suitably and quickly.
  10.43 p.m.
  The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. Robert Mathew): May I first of all thank my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, All Saints (Mr. Hollingworth) for the kind words which he said about myself and for the good wishes which he expressed at the beginning of his speech. I appreciate them very much indeed. I am grateful, too, to my hon. Friend for giving me an opportunity of commenting on this case and explaining what steps my right hon. Friend has taken to help Captain Levy. Captain Levy has, over the past few years, furnished my Department, among others, and, as we now know, the hon. Member himself, with a wealth of documentation on every aspect of his affairs, so that his problems have been constantly before us.
  670
  As I understand it, his main difficulty is the delay in the granting of authority to transfer his liquid assets in Egypt into sterling in this country, which he has a right to do under Article V(i)(a) of the Financial Agreement of 1959. I am glad to be able to tell my hon. Friend that we received only yesterday a telegram from Her Majesty's Embassy at Cairo reporting that the tax dispute which has caused this protracted delay is now being submitted to the Tax Revision Committee, and Captain Levy's present agent has said that he is confident of obtaining a tax clearance certificate soon.
  Although, of course, these tax disputes are strictly an internal matter to be dealt with under Egyptian municipal law, Her Majesty's Embassy is doing everything possible to further Captain Levy's interests, and I am grateful for the words that were said about the Embassy by my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mr. W. Yates). The Embassy is trying to secure the effective release of his holding of 3½ per cent. War Loan held by the Ottoman Bank in London to the order of the Gumhuriya Bank in accordance with Article III(g) of the Financial Agreement.
  According to the exchange of Notes of 7th August, 1962, authority had been given for he release of these securities, but the Egyptian Bank appears still to be holding them pending settlement of the tax dispute which I have already mentioned. We are, of course, aware of the lawsuit to which my hon. Friend referred, although in two letters dated 30th August and 6th September, 1963, Captain Levy assured my Department that no such action was in progress. Her Majesty's Embassy reported this morning that the other parties to the suit were at present not to be found; but in any event this is also a domestic Egyptian issue in which Her Majesty's Government cannot properly intervene.
  As to the difficulty of obtaining bank statements, to which my hon. Friend alluded, I would remind him that on 7th August, 1962, the Egyptian Minister responsible authorised banks and other authorities to supply such statements either direct to applicants, through their agents or the Embassy. Some administrative confusion seems to have arisen through Captain Levy's maintaining

  671
  accounts with three separate banks. I understand that these were eventually amalgamated into one account with the Bank of Alexandria; and Captain Levy's solicitors in Birmingham sent to my Department on 30th January, 1963, a copy of a statement of account from the Bank of Alexandria which they had obtained for him, showing a balance of £E4,685 placed in a non-resident account.
  Captain Levy has been awarded compensation amounting to £7,016 through the Foreign Compensation Commission, £6,049 of which represents an award in respect of loss of income in Egypt. He has protested that this award is inadequate and has been invited to submit further evidence to enable his claim to be re-examined on review. This review is unlikely to take place for some time; and since the Commission is in its judicial functions an independent body it would be improper for my right hon. Friend to attempt to bring any influence to bear on it. Of these awards, £5,803 was withheld in partial liquidation of the ex-gratia, interest-free loans amounting to £7,500 made to Captain Levy. These loans were made through the Anglo-Egyptian Resettlement Board in 1957 and 1958 out of public funds against his undertaking to repay.
  As the then Foreign Secretary stated in the House on 15th July, 1957, these loans were repayable out of "returns from Egypt"—and awards by the Foreign Compensation Commission, since they came out of the money paid in compensation by the U.A.R. Government under Article IV of the Financial Agreement, are held to constitute such "returns". Captain Levy therefore still owes Her Majesty's Government £1,697; but the Egyptian Loans Advisory Board, which advises the Foreign Secretary on the amounts of these deductions, always takes account of any hardship that may arise. Captain Levy appealed for a lower sum to be deducted, but the Board, after a personal interview by one of its officers and after full consideration, found no satisfactory evidence of hardship and felt obliged to maintain its previous recommendation.
  From what I have said, I hope that my hon. Friend will agree that the figures he quoted were not all quite in context. The sum of £32,000 which he mentioned repre-
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  sents the amount of the original claim which Captain Levy lodged with the Foreign Compensation Commission for loss of income. He based it, I understand, on an average of £E3,000 a year income over 10 years. The Commission did not accept that basis of calculation and assessed and awarded his claim, as I have said, at £6,049.
  Similarly, the £15,000 which my hon. Friend quoted as the value of Captain Levy's assets in Egypt was not the valuation made by Her Majesty's Government; it was Captain Levy's own valuation—actually £E15,679 after the subtraction of certain irrelevant items—when, in common with some 8,000 other refugees in Egypt, he registered his assets for the information of the Foreign Office in 1957. I should, add, for the sake of completeness, that these "registrations" in no way constituted any kind of application or claim for compensation.
  Captain Levy also applied to the Egyptian Grants Committee for a grant on grounds of comparative hardship out of the fund whose establishment was announced in this House on 7th February, 1963. The Committee is actively studying his application—which, again, is amply documented—and will, I am sure, reach a decision as soon as possible.
  My hon. Friend has alluded to the repeated refusals of a visa to Captain Levy to revisit Egypt, and this matter was also referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin. It is, of course, the internationally recognised right of all sovereign States, and one which we ourselves exercise, to refuse entry to their territory. There is thus no way in which we can enforce the observance of Article VII (1) of the Financial Agreement.
  In conclusion, let me assure my hon. Friend once more that my Department, as well as Her Majesty's Embassy in Cairo, has always been fully informed of Captain Levy's difficulties. It is only fair to say that Her Majesty's Government are satisfied that, in failing to give prompt effect to some of the provisions of the Agreement, the United Arab Republic authorities are not acting in any spirit of ill will. On the contrary, we have received many indications that they are as anxious as we are ourselves to bring this unhappy and long-drawn-out

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  situation to a conclusion satisfactory to all concerned. In particular, they have recently set up a special department to deal more expeditiously with applications for tax clearances and, although it is still early to be able to assess results, we hope that this measure will prove effective.
  We have never ceased, either in this country or in Egypt, to do our utmost
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  to help all these unfortunate British subjects who had to leave property behind them in 1956, and we shall continue to take every action properly open to us to assist Captain Levy, as well as all those who are in similar difficulties.
  Question put and agreed to.
  Adjourned accordingly at seven minutes to Eleven o'clock.