OVERSEAS PENSIONS BILL (Hansard, 18 April 1973)

§ Mr. Luce
Perhaps my right hon. Friend might, if it were possible, set up some kind of vetting committee, with serving on it, for example, the former Director of Establishments at the time of the mutiny, the former Advocate-General, perhaps the former head of the Aden forces, a representative of the GOC at the time, and perhaps one or two Arabs who were serving as officers and who could serve as witnesses. I hope that my right hon. Friend will consider some such vetting system to meet this very important point which my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Aberdeenshire, West has made about the minority of men who were disloyal to the British Government, so that we can give due justice to the vast majority who served the British people so well.
625 I feel that on this occasion the British Government have shown great generosity of spirit, and along with those of my hon. Friends who have been so strongly advocating some action in this direction, I am delighted to support the amendment.

§ Mr. James Allason (Hemel Hempstead)
I congratulate my right hon. Friend on coming to a satisfactory solution of the problem, and I am glad that the British Government are gradually taking over responsibilities that properly fall on the Governments of the South Yemen and Zanzibar, both of which have gone back on their own proper obligations. Here I quarrel with my hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and Shoreham (Mr. Luce) who spoke of out fulfilling our obligations. In this case we are fulfilling the obligations of the South Yemen Government.
I had the privilege of seeing some of the soldiers in action in Aden alongside our own forces so I know what excellent service they gave—or some of them, at any rate. But there are other people in either South Yemen or Zanzibar who should be receiving a pension from their Government but are not getting it. I know that my right hon. Friend is pressing hard to help all those categories who should have been helped by their own Governments.

§ Mr. Nicholas Winterton (Macclesfield)
I welcome my right hon. Friend's statement and assurances. I am one of only a very few hon. Members present this evening, perhaps the only one, who served on the Standing Committee which considered the Bill. On that occasion I found it impossible to support my right hon. Friend because I believed that the British Government were continuing an injustice and I wanted to see that injustice put right. The assurances which my right hon. Friend has just given fully meet the reservations I held on that former occasion, and I very much welcome the statement which rights a wrong and honours commitments we have to those many people who served Great Britain faithfully in South Arabia.

§ Mr. Wood
With leave of the House, may I reply very briefly?
I am grateful to the right hon. Member for Caernarvon (Mr. Goronwy Roberts) 626 and to my hon. Friends for what they said.
My hon. Friend the Member for Arundel (Mr. Luce) raised two questions. The first was the timing of the payments. He pleaded for retrospection. I must tell him clearly that I am afraid that I can give him no encouragement. I said that the date which the Government have decided was 1st April 1973, and we must remain quite firm about this, particularly because these payments, as I made clear earlier, are on hardship grounds and are therefore designed to meet the needs of the present and, as far as is necessary, of the future.
On the question of loyalty, my hon. Friend will no doubt be studying very carefully my words on this matter. I will certainly study his words, but I would not want to commit myself to any particular means of satisfying myself about loyalty or disloyalty. I would merely like to leave it that I will try to reach my own judgment in as effective a way as I possibly can. I hope that my hon. Friend will therefore study that part of what I have said, while I will study what he has said, without being able to commit myself to any means of reaching this kind of decision.