Clause 2 - Statutory paternity pay
Employment Bill
10:30 am
Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede and Weybridge, Conservative)
I can see, in the light of the Minister's explanation of the purpose of this part of the clause, that the amendment appears to have missed the target somewhat. As he says, it would have been better applied to clause 7, but it is not at all clear from the Bill that the term ''liability to make payments'' relates only to a liability to make direct payments. I interpreted reference to the board's liability to make payments as reference to the ultimate funder of the arrangements, and I thought that the clause was providing for the Secretary of State to apply the 92 per cent. rule or the 100 per cent. rule. Is the Minister comfortable in his own mind that the words
''circumstances in which . . . liability to make payments . . . is to be a liability of the Board''
could not be properly interpreted to mean circumstances in which the board was reimbursing the employer through the pay-as-you-earn system?