HC Deb 09 November 1964 vol 701 cc653-6
20. Brigadier Clarke

asked the Minister of Public Building and Works why men working in Portsmouth Dockyard inadvertently overpaid 3s. a week by his Department are now required to repay at the rate of 5s. a week.

Mr. C. Pannell

In many cases the overpayment was much more than 5s. a week. Each employee will be asked to agree to a weekly repayment of 5s. If any employee represents that this will cause him hardship, we are ready to consider a lower weekly amount.

Brigadier Clarke

Does the right hon. Gentleman appreciate that a teacher who was overpaid £1 3s. a month for three years was told that there was no legal way of getting it back? Will he say why employees in the dockyard who have been overpaid a lesser sum are asked to repay when a teacher does not have to repay?

Mr. Pannell

This was a case of genuine mistake within the Ministry made by people acting in good faith, and it was so recognised by my predecessor; but we are always willing to hear any news about hard cases.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

Is it not unusual in the public service, particularly in the case of workers on a fairly low level of payment, to expect repayments at a higher rate than that at which the payments were made? Will not the right hon. Gentleman have another look at it?

Mr. Pannell

I am largely dealing with something which was almost a closed book by the time I reached the Ministry. I think that the right hon. Gentleman's intervention is addressed to the wrong person. But there were discussions with the employees' union, which is prepared to leave things on this basis and will raise any individual case of difficulty that may arise, which I shall receive sympathetically.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

What I asked was that the right hon. Gentleman himself should have a look at this matter, which from my experience is unusual in the public service. Wherever the original responsibility lay, it is the right hon. Gentleman's responsibility to deal with it now, and I hope he will do so.

Mr. Pannell

Of course I will deal with any case that may be put to me. But one would normally assume that the employees' trade union would be more sensitive to these things than hon. Gentlemen opposite.

Hon. Members

Oh.

21. Brigadier Clarke

asked the Minister of Public Building and Works why he has not yet replied to the letter from the hon. Member for Portsmouth, West, dated 12th October.

Mr. C. Pannell

I have not received this letter.

Brigadier Clarke

I am still awaiting a reply. Would the Postmaster-General have something to do with this? The Minister has already replied to somebody else but has not replied to an hon. Member. Are we to put my opponent's name on the same list as Gordon Walker, Frank Cousins and other members of the Government who are not in the House?

Mr. Pannell

The question asked was whether I had received a letter from the hon. and gallant Member for Portsmouth, West, dated 12th October, when he himself was not a Member of the House. [HON. MEMBERS: "He was."] No, the hon. and gallant Gentleman was not. None of us was until 15th October.

However, I had better get this clear for the sake of the record. The hon. and gallant Gentleman wrote a letter, dated 9th October, to my predecessor about the recovery of wages overpaid to the Ministry's employees in the Portsmouth area. A reply was sent on 12th October by the Minister's Private Secretary as my predecessor was in his constituency at the time. At that time the hon. and gallant Member was not a Member of this House. During the election campaign I received a letter on the same subject, dated 13th October, from the Labour candidate at Portsmouth, West. I replied to this letter on 26th October. The hon. and gallant Gentleman wrote to me on 3rd November, in somewhat intemperate terms, to protest that I had replied to the Labour candidate. I have written to the hon. and gallant Gentleman to explain to him that I am well aware of the courtesies due to Members of this House and that I am in the habit of replying to correspondents on matters on which they are entitled to a reply from me.

Brigadier Clarke

May I ask why I have still not had a reply?

Mr. Speaker

Order. This correspondence for the moment would appear to have been adequately prolonged.

Brigadier Clarke

Mr. Speaker, may I raise the matter on the Adjournment in view of the unsatisfactory nature of the reply?

Mr. Speaker

Yes.