Clause 49
Child Maintenance and Other Payments Bill
12:00 pm
Andrew Selous (Shadow Minister, Work & Pensions; South West Bedfordshire, Conservative)
I thank the Minister for that clarification; I had slightly misunderstood her, so I apologise.
It is none the less important that we understand the mechanism that the Government use—absolutely rightly—in the clause. It involves using the compensation payments from solvent employers and their insurers, or from the insurers of insolvent employers, to compensate the Department—quite rightly—for the money that it pays out quickly up front, and about which we are all pleased.
New clause 21 is part of my attempts to be helpful, and I hope that the Minister will recognise its spirit and intention. It would have two benefits. It would benefit the sufferers of mesothelioma, because when an amount greater than the lump sum payment is payable by the employer or by their insurer, the new clause would speed up the compensation payment process. If there were any excess over and above the lump sum, it would get it to the sufferer more quickly. At the same time, it would come to the aid of the poor, beleaguered public purse—the finances of the Department for which the Minister is responsible—because it deals with the mechanism whereby the Department gets back the money for paying out the lump sum.
In a news release from the Department on 20 July 2006, no less a person than the former Secretary of State said:
“We are also continuing the essential work that is ongoing to speed up the full compensation payments due to many sufferers and their families through the civil claims process”.
Those words were very welcome and important, but it is not clear whether the Bill includes anything to aid that process. The new clause would give the Secretary of State the reserve power, when in his or her opinion employers or insurers were dragging their feet and not responding, to make a charge on them to ensure that they responded in a timely manner to inquiries.
The new clause was tabled in part because of my constituency experience, which I am sure is mirrored by that of other Committee members who have found employers and insurers incredibly slow and unresponsive when dealing with such claims, whether they are for mesothelioma or for similar issues. It gives me no pleasure to say that, because my background is in insurance. Before I came into the House, I was a chartered insurer, and I am generally extremely proud of the British insurance industry. It makes a major contribution to our balance of payments and the public purse, and it does a tremendous amount of good throughout the world. I spoke to the Association of British Insurers before tabling the new clause, and I know that it, too, seeks to guard the good reputation of the insurance industry.
I hope that the Minister will look sympathetically at the new clause. My experience as a constituency MP is that it is almost impossible to get movement on some cases. We know that the former Secretary of State was exercised about such matters. The new clause gives the Department a stick with which to prod or cajole employers or insurers as and when necessary.