§ Mr. Watkinsonasked the Secretary of State for Defence what would be the cost to the Exchequer of extending the pension rights of deceased Service men to those widows who are presently denied these transfer rights.
§ Mr. DuffyI take it that my hon. Friend is referring to the widows of Service men who were discharged or had died before September 1950. We have no records of widows without entitlement to an Armed Forces family pension, and we therefore know neither their number nor the ranks held by their late husbands and the lengths of service they completed. Consequently, we cannot tell how many of them would be entitled to a pension if the present rules and rates were retrospectively applied. The cost cannot therefore be calculated.