MR. FRANK ALLEBONE (PENSION) (Hansard, 18 June 1968)

§ Mr. Harry Howarth (Wellingborough)

I am grateful for the opportunity to raise the unfortunate circumstances which have led one of my constituents, Mr. Frank Allebone, to believe that he has suffered an injustice. I appreciate the attention which my hon. Friend has given to the case in correspondence with me, but, nevertheless, I believe that I must draw attention to this matter in view of Mr. Allebone's complaint.

The circumstances are that, prior to the Second World War, Mr. Allebone was in good health and in regular employment in the boot and shoe industry. He enlisted in the Army in April, 1942, and was found to be Grade I medically on his enlistment. There was no question of his suffering from any disease. He served in Sicily and Italy for almost three years and it was whilst he was in Italy that, during a medical examination, it was discovered that he was suffering from diabetes mellitus.

I have seen a copy of Mr. Allebone's medical history from his enlistment to his dicharge on medical grounds and I am satisfied from what I have read that, from the first time that diabetes was discovered until his discharge—and I am sure that he would wish me to say this— he had the best of medical attention. I have had no complaint about the treatment he received.

However, during the proceedings on his invaliding out of the Army and while in the convalescent home, Mr. Allebone was asked the following question prior to his examination: If you are suffering from any disease, wound or injury, state what it is, the date upon which it started and what in your opinion was the cause of it". Mr. Allebone replied that he was suffering from diabetes and that it was first discovered during a medical examination in Italy on about 5th April, 1946. He further stated that the cause might be 1065 due to exposure, etc. A further question to which Mr. Allebone answered "No", was: Did you suffer from the disease or injury or anything like it before joining the service? In the report later issued by the officer in medical charge of the case, referring to my constituent's discharge, it was stated that the date of origin was approximately October, 1945, at Undine, Italy. Eventually, Mr. Allebone was discharged from the Army on 19th December, 1946, with no pension awarded. It is perhaps understandable that he appealed against this decision. He based his claim on the fact that before joining the Army he was fit and well and able to do a good day's work in a factory, whereas he was discharged with a recommendation for light work.

Mr. Allebone spent three years in the front line in Italy and Sicily and was exposed to all kinds of weather, as were many who were with him. For days on end he was soaked with no means of getting dry. He claimed that exposure and damp were the cause of his disability. I do not think that there is any disagreement that Mr. Allebone was a fit man when he joined the Army, but if there is, certificates have been issued by his previous employers saying that he was never absent from work because of ill-health. It is true that during his service in the Army there was no medical incident until the one in April, 1946, which led to his ultimate discharge. It is only fair to say that the medical officer acting for the Director General of the Services on behalf of the then Minister of Pensions discounted the fact that exposure and dampness were the causative factors of his disability and were not medically acceptable.

The Minister's doctors attached great importance to the fact that Mr. Allebone had not required hospital treatment during his service nor had he been aware of his condition until his routine medical examination, but I have no doubt that for some months he had been suffering, if only slightly, from this trouble, which was apparently then in its early stages. I have been talking of Mr. Allebone, who was discharged from the Army over 20 years ago, fit only for light work. What is the position today? He is now 60 years of age and is unable to work at all as a result of this disability, which he 1066 still maintains he contracted through his service in the Army. He has had to have a leg amputated. In addition, his other leg is causing some concern and his wife writes to me that he has suffered with his legs for over 15 years and has been able to walk only a few yards without a lot of pain.

Is it surprising that both my constituent and his wife feel very bitter about this whole business? He was perfectly fit when he went into the Army, he served most of his time overseas in the front line and then it was found that he had diabetes and he was discharged fit only for light work. I said that I appreciate the attention which my hon. Friend has given to this case. I know that there must be many cases such as this throughout the country where difficult decisions have to be made in the light of the circumstances surrounding each case, but are there so many of them that we must strictly observe the rules laid down, the necessity for the man to prove that he became disabled as a result of Army Service. How can he obtain such proof? Of course, he might have become disabled had he not been in the Army, but who is in a position to say definitely that that is so? It is purely a matter of conjecture.

Is it not possible in these cases for some payment to be made in order to help a man over what must be a very difficult period of his life? I know that my hon. Friend has sympathy and compassion in cases such as this, and I hope he will agree to look at the case of Mr. Allebone again in the light of all that I have said, and in the light of the difficulties which he has faced over the past 20 years, after serving his country so well during the last war, if only by an ex gratia payment, so as to give some comfort and hope to him and his wife for the future.

§ The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Social Security (Mr. Charles Loughlin)

My hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Harry Howarth) has raised a case which must command the sympathy of the House. As he has explained, Mr. Allebone, now aged 60, served during the war with the Royal Artillery for four and a half years, almost three years of that time with the Mediterannean forces. In April 1946, as 1067 my hon. Friend says, he had a routine examination in connection with his release from the Army and was then admitted to hospital in Italy for investigation of a finding of sugar in the urine. He gave a history of pleurisy several years before enlistment, and of inflammation of the gums in December, 1945; there was no other medical history at all. Diabetes mellitus was diagnosed, although, here again, there was no family history of diabetes, and he himself gave no history of symptoms relevant to the disease.

Mr. Allebone was put on a diet to control the condition, and was returned to the United Kingdom, where, in May, 1946 he was admitted to Whitchurch Emergency Hospital, Cardiff, later to a hospital nearer his home and then to a convalescent depot. After his condition had been stabilised by diet—he did not require insulin—the Army started invaliding proceedings in June, 1946 and he was formally discharged from the Army three months later.

As I explained to my hon. Friend when I wrote to him in April, Mr. Allebone's entitlement to a war pension was thoroughly considered following his discharge from the Army, but, after studying all the evidence, our doctors were unable to certify that his condition had been caused or made worse by service. They said that the diabetes mellitus was a constitutional metabolic disease, the onset of which had not been affected by any factor arising from war service. In the circumstances, his claim to a war pension had to be refused.

Mr. Allebone appealed to the pensions appeal tribunal against this decision, and we prepared a statement of case setting out all the evidence, together with the medical reasons for refusing his claim. Mr. Allebone stressed, as my hon. Friend stressed tonight, his fitness prior to enlistment, and attributed his condition to exposure and damp during the three winters spent in the front lines in Sicily and Italy.

Our doctors reaffirmed their earlier advice, explaining that diabetes mellitus is a disorder of the carbohydrate metabolism due to an inborn weakness of the pancreas. They pointed out that, as he had not required any hospital treatment during service, nor had he been aware 1068 of his condition until its discovery at his routine release medical examination, they remained satisfied that the onset and course of the disability had not been adversely influenced by any service factor, including exposure and damp. In view of this advice, we were still unable to admit the claim, and the appeal went forward to the pensions appeal tribunal.

The hearing of Mr. Allebone's appeal was adjourned on three separate occasions; the first time to obtain an independent specialist's opinion; the second time to await the decision on a test case with the emphasis on obesity, from which Mr. Allebone also suffered; and the third time for the consideration of fresh evidence given orally by Mr. Allebone, and of the decision on another test case with the emphasis on stress and strain which had shortly before been decided in the High Court. Mr. Allebone was assisted throughout by the British Legion, which of course, has a wide experience in appeal cases of this kind. The tribunal, which had before it all the evidence, including the arguments put forward by Mr. Allebone, finally ruled in February, 1950 that the diabetes mellitus was neither attributable to nor aggravated by service, and it disallowed the appeal.

The tribunal is a statutory body coming within the jurisdiction of the Lord Chancellor and is entirely separate from and independent of my Ministry. The ruling of the tribunal is legally binding upon both the Minister and Mr. Allebone and can be overruled only by the High Court on a point of law. I think that my hon. Friend will accept that there has never been any question of the possibility of taking the case to the High Court on a point of law.

My hon. Friend has suggested that my right hon. Friend should exercise her powers to make ex gratia payments to Mr. Allebone, having regard to his good service and to his fitness on enlistment and taking account of the fact that he was invalided. He has explained that Mr. Allebone is now unable to work and that, as a result of his disability, has had to have a leg amputated.

The position in relation to ex gratia payments is that, under the Royal Warrant of 1884, the Minister has power, with the concurrence of 1069 the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury, to grant a pension in exceptional cases to a person who does not qualify for a pension under the normal Royal Warrant. However, it would not be a proper use of this power to use it to override the decision of an independent Tribunal which has decided that there is no connection between a person's disability and his service in the Armed Forces. The remedy which the law provides where revision of a tribunal decision is sought lies either in an appeal to the High Court on a point of law or, where vital fresh evidence has been adduced, in an application to the High Court for the case to be remitted for rehearing by the pensions appeal tribunal.

It has been the policy of successive Governments to provide preferential benefits under the War Pensions Scheme which reflect the country's awareness of its indebtedness to those who have been disabled or bereaved as a result of service. The justification for a preferential scheme is an insistence on the causative effect of service, and if we were to abandon this causal link as a basis for admission to the benefits of the War Pensions Scheme, we should be abandoning the case for such a scheme.

I appreciate that my hon. Friend has pleaded that there may not be many of these cases and, therefore, that we ought to be able to be generous, and that, even though there is no causal link between the disability and the service, we ought to 1070 give some form of ex gratia payment. However, he must accept that there are an enormous number of these cases and, in any event, the causal link is the key to the whole pensions scheme.

I am very sorry that I cannot give my hon. Friend better news. In the correspondence to which he referred, I have already explained to him Mr. Allebone's right of appeal on a point of law to the High Court. I can only add that I would certainly consider any fresh evidence produced which might form the basis of an application for a rehearing, with the leave of the High Court. But that evidence would have to be fresh and cogent evidence for this purpose.

It is not very easy for a Minister to examine cases of this kind where it is known that the applicant is in ill-health and has a disability. I can assure my hon. Friend that I have the greatest sympathy with all those people who served in the Armed Forces and who, although not caused by such service or by war service, are suffering illness in consequence of a constitutional defect or a degenerative condition. Unhappily, there are only some areas in which one can operate and, although I have every sympathy with Mr. Allebone I am sorry that I cannot concede to my hon. Friend's request.