SOCIAL SECURITY (CONTRIBUTIONS) (MARRIED WOMEN AND WIDOWS) AMENDMENT REGULATIONS 1977

HL Deb 17 March 1977 vol 381 cc155-8

3.53 p.m.

Lord WELLS-PESTELL rose to move, That the draft Social Security (Contributions) (Married Women and Widows) Amendment Regulations 1977, laid before the House on 9th February, be approved. The noble Lord said: My Lords, I hope the House will permit me to deal with these two sets of regulations together, since both are concerned with amendments to the same Statutory Instrument—namely, the Social Security (Contributions) (Consequential Amendments) Regulations 1975. The regulations being amended are largely concerned with laying down the rules under which those married women and widows who already pay reduced-rate contributions will be able to go on doing so, if they wish, when the new pensions contributions start on 6th April of next year.

The date, 6th April 1978, was expressed in several places in the original regulations as the date on which Section 2 of the Pensions Act comes into force. Section 2 gives the Secretary of State power to prescribe the actual rates of contribution to the new pensions scheme. But Section 2 has been found to be inadequate and, as some noble Lords will know, proposals to repeal it are included in the Social Security (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill so that references to the date on which it comes into force will become meaningless. The draft (Consequential Amendments) Amendment Regulations have the sole object of replacing those references with the date intended; that is, 6th April 1978.

The other regulations for which your Lordships' approval is sought—the (Married Women and Widows) Amendment Regulations—make small technical adjustments to the contribution arrangements for women who are or have been married. These arrangements commence on 6th April 1977, a year ahead of the general start of the new pensions scheme, and Regulation I accordingly bring the amendments into force on the same day.

Regulation 2 amends the definition of a "qualifying widow"—that is, a widow who can continue to have reduced contribution liability if she wishes. It affects only war and industrial widows and ensures—as has always been the intention—that such a widow will have to start paying the full rate of contribution if her war or industrial widows pension is reduced below the level of a basic National Insurance retirement pension. This can happen after some months of widowhood in the case of a young widow who has no children. She will usually be able to support herself, but she will need National Insurance benefits when she cannot work and only full contributions will be able to provide these.

Regulation 3 is a new provision. The general pattern of the regulations requires a woman who wishes to change from reduced liability to full liability to revoke her earlier election by written notice. Her existing election for reduced contributions has to continue in effect until the end of the tax year in which she gives the notice. This would bear hard on a woman who, on going out to work after a break of a year or two, started paying the full rate although, unknown to her, an earlier election was still in force. The Department would not know of her mistake until her contributions were brought to account, when she would probably be well into her second year of paying at the full rate. By then it would be too late to give her written notice of revocation for that second year.

This amendment will allow her to let the full-rate contributions in the second year stand as correctly paid, if that is what she wishes, so that they will count towards future benefits. It puts her in the same position as if she had revoked her election at the time when the mistake arose. The reduced rate will remain due for the first year and the excess contributions will be refunded. And of course she can choose to have a refund for the second year if, on being told of her mistake, she prefers to let her reduced liability run on.

I will mention Regulation 5 next. It merely makes the necessary consequential amendments to other regulations which arise from Regulation 3. Regulation 4 makes a minor amendment to clarify one of the transitional provisions of the main regulations, as applied to the new pension arrangements. It can fairly be described as a drafting point and I do not think I need say more because of that. I beg to move.

Moved, That the draft Social Security (Contributions) (Married Women and Widows) Amendment Regulations 1977, laid before the House on 9th February, be approved.—(Lord Wells-Pestell.)

Lord SANDYS

My Lords, the House will be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Wells-Pestell, for explaining these two sets of regulations which, on the face of it, are helpful towards the widows. To be a widow in 1977 one needs the assistance of a great deal of advice to pilot oneself through a mass of very complicated statutory details within the new social security scheme. In view of the fact that the Government have admitted mistakes through the introduction of the Social Security (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill—an amending Bill which corrects what took place in 1975—I hope that they will recognise that there is a very real need to discuss and to inform organisations concerned with those who are dealt with in these regulations and to publicise what they have in mind. Speaking from this Dispatch Box only a short while before the noble Lord's right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer introduces his Budget in about a fortnight's time, one can only hope that in formulating his proposals the Chancellor will see the very real need to take the widow's position into consideration.

Lord WELLS-PESTELL

My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Sandys. I am not sure whether it was the noble Lord or somebody on the Liberal Benches who fairly recently drew attention to the complication of all these benefits, and one must admit to having considerable sympathy with this point. I think that I said at the time, although I am trusting entirely to memory, that I thought that the only people who really understood these matters were the social workers who had made a point of trying to understand them so that they could advise the various people who came to them, and if I may say so they are doing it very successfully.

We have given an undertaking in relation to these matters to have widespread Press publicity to draw the attention of the married women and widows who are involved. The noble Lord and others may have seen some of the publicity upon which we have embarked in the national Press. We are proposing to carry out similar publicity in the Radio Times and rather extensively in women's papers, as well as the national Press. We are very alive to this point, and having seen some of the advertisements myself I can say that they are worded in simple English. I believe that with widespread coverage it should be possible for people to understand the situation.

On Question, Motion agreed to.