§ 60. Mr. Haleasked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance whether he is aware that in the case of part-time working in the textile industry workers normally employed on a Saturday are paid at the rate of 50s. a week and workers who were not normally employed on a Saturday are being paid at the rate of C2 Is. 8d. a week; and what action he proposes to take to remedy this anomaly.
§ Mr. Boyd-CarpenterNo. The hon. Gentleman is apparently misinformed. Unemployment benefit to which 1 assume his Question refers is calculated on a142W daily basis and no one still in employment, even though on short-time, would be in receipt of the weekly amounts of personal benefit he mentions. The amount of benefit payable weekly to a wholly unemployed worker is the same whether he has ordinarily been employed on Saturdays or not.
§ 62. Mr. Haleasked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance whether he is aware of the decision of an umpire that, where short-time unemployment has continued for a considerable period, an applicant for unemployment benefit may be refused benefit on the ground that his normal full working week should be computed on the basis of his period of weekly employment during the preceding twelve months; and, in view of the effect of this decision in the textile industry, what action he proposes to take to remedy the disclosed anomaly.
§ Mr. Boyd-CarpenterIt is a longstanding rule that unemployment benefit is not payable to a person who has been employed in any week to the full extent normal in his case. The application of the rule to individual claims is a matter for the independent statutory authorities whose case law on this question has, I understand, remained substantially unaltered for many years. I have, of course, no power to interfere with their decisions.