HC Deb 11 July 1977 vol 935 cc189-96

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Snape.]

11.30 p.m.

Mr. David Hunt (Wirral)

I want to raise on the Adjournment the subject of compensation for the death of Bombardier Pisarek in Northern Ireland. In doing so I want to stress that this case is one of a number of which certainly I am aware and which give rise to a good deal of public concern about the general issue of compensation for Servicemen in Northern Ireland.

It is easy to see the subject in emotive terms, but tonight I am hoping merely to relate the facts of the case and to give as much time as possible to the Minister to give what I hope will be a sympathetic response to my case.

Mrs. Pisarek, my constituent, lives in Hassall, Wirral, on Merseyside. Her husband, Bombardier Heinz Pisarek, was murdered by the IRA in Northern Ireland at the age of 30, on 24th November 1973, whilst on active service. He left his widow Mrs. Pisarek, now aged 33, and two sons, Karl, born on 30th March 1966, and Dwyan, born on 3rd March 1969. At the time he was murdered Bombardier Pisarek had a promising career in front of him and was already earning a good and substantial salary, with additional benefits. Mrs. Pisarek has received no compensation and has been informed that it is not possible to make any offer of compensation to her arising out of her husband's death.

One of the most disturbing aspects of the case is that Mrs. Pisarek has been told that she is now better off as a result of her husband's death and that this is why no damages will be paid to her. She tells me that she was told by Army officials soon after the death of her husband that she would receive between £8,000 and £15,000 compensation within 18 months.

Mrs. Pisarek is in receipt of a weekly war widow's pension of £17, together with an Army pension of £28. She received a gratuity of £2,000 from the Army, together with £500 compensation for the way in which her husband died. She also received the proceeds from a death policy, which I understand is not taken into account in assessing compensation. The way in which compensation is calculated, however, is for the benefits that she is now receiving to be capitalised on a forward projection basis, producing a considerable lump sum, which is then set against the compensation that she would otherwise have received.

Mrs. Pisarek, but for this calculation, would receive very substantial compensation for herself and her two boys. Her situation compares most unfavourably with the compensation that she would have received had her husband been killed during the course of his employment with any other employer. If her husband had been killed whilst working in a factory, such a massive deduction for pension would not have been made. It is clear that any family who have just lost their wage earner and breadwinner desperately need a lump sum by way of compensation, both as security for the future and to meet the very substantial bills which always accrue in such a situation. The shameful result of this case and a number of others that have appeared in the Press is that persons working in the service of the Crown cannot do their work without worrying about the future for their families if they are killed.

This is a tragic case. Mrs. Pisarek has been fighting for compensation for nearly four years. Her husband served his Queen and country proudly and with honour. He was in Northern Ireland for the second time, after having been wounded on the first occasion.

I quote from a letter from my constituent, which emphasises the effect of the death of her husband. She said: All of a sudden my life was shattered. I am a young widow with two young children. I expected help. I found that no one gave a damn about me or my family. No one seemed to want to know. I could not even get a house from the council of the city where I was born and bred. I was told I would receive a lot of compensation, but after three and a half years I was told I was better off without my husband. This is a case which troubles me considerably. I believe it to be a scandal that someone in Mrs. Pisarek's position should have been treated so badly. The case raises a number of disturbing issues. It is now over three and a half years since Mrs. Pisarek's husband died on active service, and she still has no compensation. No words of mine in this short debate could do justice to the tragedy with which this family have been faced.

I have got to know the family over the time they have been consulting me, and I know that they have done their best to overcome all the serious financial difficulties with which they have been confronted. They have been using what few savings they have in order to continue to be able to make ends meet. It is with great regret that I have to raise the matter tonight, but I felt it right to bring to the attention of the House a specific case of this nature in view of the many reports which have appeared in the Press of similar cases, though perhaps without the detailed factual content which I am able to give of Mrs. Pisarek's position. There was a good deal of publicity given to the case of a widow in Southampton, but I shall not go into that now because I recognise that the Minister knows a great deal about that and other cases.

It may well be the result of misunderstandings that there is so much discontent over the question of compensation for widows of Service men killed in Northern Ireland, and in the hope of removing those misunderstandings I eagerly await the hon. Gentleman's response to this short debate. If we cannot create a state of affairs in which members of our forces serving in Northern Ireland can go about their duties without worrying about what will happen to their familities if they are killed or seriously wounded, we are not doing our duty.

As a solicitor, I have had a great deal of experience in civil compensation cases. I know that in accident cases in factories one has to prove negligence on the part of the employer, but that is not difficult to do nowadays, and the lump sums which are paid by way of compensation serve to highlight by their size the serious nature of the deficiencies of the compensation arrangements for widows such as my constituent and others. Surely, this is something of which we should all be ashamed and about which action ought swiftly to be taken. No one can really compensate this family for the loss they have suffered, but at least we should try.

11.40 p.m.

The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr. J. D. Concannon)

The first and real tragedy in this case is that Bombardier Heinz Pisarek had to die at all, at the appallingly early age of 30, serving his country and defending the citizens of Northern Ireland against terrorism.

Immediately after her husband's death Mrs. Pisarek lodged a claim for compensation, through her solicitors, and this debate gives me an opportunity to speak on the operation both of the Criminal Injuries to Persons (Compensation) Act (Northern Ireland) 1968 under which the claim was lodged and of the new Criminal Injuries (Compensation) Order, a draft of which was approved by this House on 1st July.

We have been debating this subject for the best part of this Session, and it has caused some concern in Northern Ireland since the Act which was passed by Stormont came into effect in 1968. We have also had the Waddell Report, and the order passed by the House on 1st July.

There is a great deal of misunderstanding of the workings of the order. Any official who told Mrs. Pisarek that she would be getting between £8,000 and £15,000 was not doing her a great service if he did not explain the nature of the calculations of compensation awards. Someone from the Ministry of Defence owes the hon. Member for Wirral (Mr. Hunt) a letter on this score. If things were said to Mrs. Pisarek as he described, I am alarmed to think that that may be happening to other widows of Army personnel.

This is a difficult job—for me as much as anyone. I am an ex-Regular soldier myself and have served in some hot spots around the world. This is one of my jobs in Northern Ireland that I look on with particular reverence.

The 1968 Act provides that compensation is payable to the dependants of the deceased victims of crimes of violence for their pecuniary loss. Pecuniary loss is assessed in the first instance by reference to the family's dependency, that is to say, the share which it had of the victim's income after allowing for tax and similar commitments and for his own personal expenditure. The assessment can take account both of the record of past earnings and of the prospect of future earnings on promotion. Annual loss can be converted to a capitalised lump sum by the use of a multiplier reflecting the victim's age. This process is well established in the courts in relation to common law actions and indeed in relation to claims for criminal injuries compensation, which in Northern Ireland are all at present ultimately determined in court.

The 1968 Act then provides that deductions are to be made from the estimated gross pecuniary loss to take account of any State or occupational pensions and benefits payable to the dependants whatever the victim's employment whether he is working in a factory or in the security forces, or anywhere else. The effect is to ensure that losses are not recouped twice over by compensation as well as by pensions. A capitalised value is calculated for pensions in the same way as for pecuniary loss, again following the precedents of the courts, and the difference between the two amounts represents the net compensation payable.

Final details of the relevant elements of Mrs. Pisarek's claim were received from her solicitors in June 1976. We assessed the capital values of her dependency and of I her pensions and other benefits over a period of years. Since in this way her benefits exceeded her loss by almost £8,000 we were obliged in September 1976 to tell her solicitors that we could make no offer of compensation. There is no provision in the Act for ex gratin or consolatory payments.

I have different figures for Mrs. Pisarek's sums of money from the £28 and £17 that the hon. Gentleman gave. The figures that I have from the Army Pay Office and the DHSS are £40.62 and £29.60, giving a total of £70.22 a week, on top of the lump sum. I did not want to say that, but it was necessary to clear up the discrepancy between the hon. Gentleman's figures and mine.

At this stage it was open to Mrs. Pisarek's advisers either to suggest some alternative assessment or to have the claim determined by the court, which would, as I have said, have followed the same proces sof assessment. They did neither and, indeed, asked that the case should not be put to the court at the end of 1976. I say that without implying any criticism. It may be that they have been looking for further evidence of loss or were awaiting our proposals for the new order.

The new order—

Mr. David Hunt

Before the Minister moves on to the new order, may I put to him one point which I can do so appropriately as a solicitor specialising in civil compensation work? Has he considered the points I was making about the comparison between the widow of someone killed at work and the widow of someone killed in the active service of the Crown? If someone is killed at work, the pension payments or social security payments are not taken into account on a forward projection basis. What is the logic of having one system for civil compensation which affords very large lump sums to the widows and a completely different system for the widows of those killed in the active service of the Crown?

Mr. Concannon

We have been discussing this matter since January of this year. We had two long sittings in Committee and spent the whole of Friday 1st July discussing the issue. There was a report in Ireland and there was little criticism of it. No one can recoup twice. We are compensating for pecuniary loss. Even in the cases the hon. Gentleman mentioned the works pension or the industrial pension is deducted from any sum awarded.

The new order, which I hope will come into operation in August, makes no change in the method of calculating compensation in such cases. It will still be based on the difference between pensions and gross pecuniary loss. It does, however, provide that if compensation is reduced by the deduction of pensions and other benefits the Secretary of State may make a discretionary payment to a widow to bring compensation up to what she and any children would have received without any deductions up to a maximum of £5,000 for herself and £500 for each child. Moreover, these discretionary payments will be able to be made not only in cases arising under the new order but retrospectively in cases already determined under the 1968 Act.

If, therefore, we accept for the moment, subject to any submissions of new evidence and to the final decision of the court, that Mrs. Pisarek is not entitled to any compensation under the 1968 Act, I can say that on the face of it—there will obviously have to be a check —she would be given a discretionary payment of £6,000–£5,000 for herself and £1,000 for her two children—when the new order becomes law.

A formal decision cannot be made, however, until her basic claim is finally settled. This can be done in court in September, either on the basis of agreement between us, or by the court after a hearing.

Mrs. Pisarek's case is typical of several, particularly involving the widows of members of the security forces, where we recognise that the normal assessment of compensation, though quite defensible in terms of strict financial justice, can cause understandable distress by giving awards of little or no value. The new order, as I have said, has been specifically drafted to bring relief in such cases.

I hope that it will not be misunderstood in future as it has been misunderstood and misrepresented in the past.

This distressing case has given me the opportunity to give hope to those involved in cases where pensions have been deducted from the final sum. It is as a result of protests from hon. Members such as the hon. Member for Wirral that the new provision has been written into the order.

Mr. David Hunt

It would obviously assist my constituent and many others who are waiting on the Minister's words to know when he expects that the order is likely to come into effect. On the face of it, my constituent is entitled to £6,000 and it would greatly assist her to know when the order will come into operation.

Mr. Concannon

We can expect the hon. Gentleman's constituent to receive £6,000, but this will depend on her claim being settled by mutual arrangement or a decision of the court. The scheme will come into operation a fortnight after the passing of the order. I expect that it will be in effect by about the middle of August.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at eight minutes to Twelve o'clock.