Orders of the Day — Workmen's Compensation (Supplementary Allowances) Bill.

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at on 30 April 1940.

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Photo of Sir John Anderson Sir John Anderson , Combined Scottish Universities

We have to draw the line somewhere, and I think we have gone a long way back and taken a logical view in drawing it at 1924, but the point raised by the hon. Member is in the nature of a Committee point which one might look at then. If, like the Opposition, we had felt unable to proceed except by way of a flat increase, we should have been faced in regard to these old cases with the choice of either giving the really hard cases of the men with heavy family responsibilities far less than this Bill gives them, or pitching the all-round increase so high as to give the men without dependants something wholly disproportionate to their relative needs. In that case we could not have justified imposing on industry the burden involved in the retroactive application of the improved scales. Under our Bill every case in which an additional allowance will be given is a case in which hardship may be presumed, and that makes it easy to establish a claim in respect of past accidents. Moreover, I would point this out, that we have provided for dealing with past cases not merely where the workman is still totally disabled, but where he is partly recovered, and in doing that we have done something for which there is no precedent at all. In the Act of 1917 and 1919 provision was made for dealing with past cases, but it was limited to cases of total disablement.

Even after the Debate of 30th January, when we announced the lines on which we intended to proceed, doubts were expressed as to whether it was in fact possible to achieve our object without a means test. Well, those doubts have proved ill-founded. Not only is there to be no means test, but we shall, I hope, be able to avoid altogether anything in the nature of vexatious inquiry. The procedure proposed is of the simplest character, and it is dealt with in Clause 3—a declaration by the workman in a prescribed form, subject to a penalty for wilful false statement. The form will show whether he has a wife living and the number of his children below the age of 15, the particulars being given in a way which will be capable of verification from the Registrar. There will be no reference whatsoever in the form to means, and the right to allowances will not be subject to proof of dependency. Those are all, I suggest, features which should commend themselves to hon. Members opposite.

I want to be quite brief, but before I sit down I should like to say a few words about the Amendment on the Paper. As I have already indicated, the Amendment has one curious feature. It does not, it seems to me, condemn the Bill or anything contained in the Bill, and one might suppose that as far as the Bill goes it is an agreed Measure. The reason given why the House should refuse a Second Reading is that the Bill does not contain provision for single men and women and fails to recognise what is described as the admitted necessity for an immediate all-round increase. I should make it clear to hon. Members opposite, if it is not already clear, that if their Amendment is carried, this Bill is dead, and it might be many months before any satisfactory Measure could be found to put in its place. [An Hon. Member: "Another threat?"] There is no menace in that. If the House is to be asked to vote for this Amendment, I hope that its sponsors will at any rate be good enough to tell hon. Members exactly what they mean by "an all-round increase." Although hon. Members talked' in favour of an all-round increase throughout the Debate on 30th January, I have been quite unable to find any clue as to what they have in mind; I am reduced to the unprofitable and unaccustomed task of speculation. Possibly what hon. Members mean is an addition to the compensation of a flat-rate percentage such as was made by the War Additions Acts of 1917 and 1919. If so, what should be the amount of the addition, and on what basis should it be calculated?

The percentage additions made in those years were justified by an increase in the cost of living, amounting to a much higher percentage—an increase of, I think, 75 per cent. in the case of the first flat-rate increase and of 125 per cent. in the case of the second increase. In any case, if that is the sort of plan that hon. Members have in mind, I should like to point out that the highest percentage increase theoretically possible would be 33⅓ per cent. To add more than 33⅓per cent. would bring the compensation for loss of earnings to a figure in excess of the earnings themselves in the case of workers at the lower end of the scale—an absurdity that no one has yet suggested. [Interruption.] If hon. Members want to suggest compensation in excess of wages, let them say so. Yet a flat-rate increase of 33⅓ per cent. would mean that all workers in the higher range of the compensation scale would get less than this Bill gives them where there are a wife and two or more children. That is the sort of case that has always been brought forward.