HC Deb 13 February 1918 vol 103 cc98-9W
Mr. JOWETT

asked the Financial Secretary to the War Office whether any decision has been arrived at with regard to the granting of separation allowance to parents of soldiers enlisted during apprenticeship; and, if so, to what effect?

Mr. HODGE

The parents of soldiers enlisted during apprenticeship can now be granted a special separation allowance, under the amended Regulations (Part II.) of the Special Grants Committee, in cases where the allowances can be regarded as necessary for the due upkeep of the home. This amended Regulation, which is now in course of issue, is in substitution for the former Regulation (9, b), by which parents were placed under the necessity of pleading "hardship" as a condition of the allowance.

General Sir IVOR PHILIPPS

asked the Pensions Minister whether Private Frank Brazier, B. 1151 (S.D.E.395), Dorsetshire Regiment, receives a pension of 4s. 8d. per week; why this soldier, who was at Mons, in France, in August, 1914, and was invalided out of the Service on account of broken health and loss of all his teeth, receives only this small pension; and what steps he should take to have his case reconsidered?

Mr. HODGE

Private Brazier was invalided out of the Service in June, 1915, for epilepsy, the disability being held to be neither attributable to nor aggravated by his military service. In accordance with this finding, a pension of 4s. 8d. a week for thirty months was awarded to him under the Warrants then in force. In December last his case was reconsidered, and it was decided that the disability could properly be regarded as "aggravated" by service. As a result of thin decision Brazier is now being awarded a pension (based on a 30 per cent. disability) of 8s. 3d. a week