asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance whether it is the sole purpose of the War Pensioners' Welfare Service to ensure that pensioners receive all the monetary benefits that are available to them; and what steps have been taken to ensure that the availability of the service is known to all war pensioners.

No, Sir. It is also intended to secure for them any help which they need, and it works for this purpose closely with the voluntary bodies.

While thanking my right hon. Friend for that reassuring reply, may I ask him whether he will bear in mind that older people often tend to be forgetful and that periodic outbursts of publicity or reminders of this excellent service would not come amiss?

I agree with what my hon. Friend says. It is a good deal with that in mind that I am this summer taking the step that I outlined in my Answer.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance whether, whether, in view of the anomalies brought to notice as a result of the recent recession in the motor industry and the sense of unfairness resulting from these, he will appoint a committee to review the conditions under which unemployment benefit is paid to those working short-time.

No, Sir.

Is not the right hon. Gentleman aware that there is a widespread feeling of unfairness about the anomalies between five-day and six-day weeks and day shift working and night shift working? I recognise that it is difficult to deal with one anomaly without uncovering another, but will not the right hon. Gentleman take some steps, whether by a committee or a more informal means of proceeding, to see whether this matter can be reviewed and something substituted which strikes the great body of people involved as much more fair and equitable?

As I am sure the hon. Gentleman knows, this matter was thrashed out fully by the National Insurance Advisory Committee some years ago, and this was followed by the enactment of Section 4 of the National Insurance Act, 1957. I do not think that his suggestion for a committee would be helpful in the circumstances.

Is not the right hon. Gentleman aware that he has received repeated representations from the Trades Union Congress on this matter and that there is, as my hon. Friend says, great dissatisfaction? Will not he reconsider the matter, because with the extension of five-day week working there is no doubt that existing regulations give rise to many anomalies and much discontent?

As the hon. Gentleman is aware, a great many people still work a six-day week, and the system clearly must also take that into account.

Is the right hon. Gentleman saying that his mind is completely closed on this matter and that he thinks that there is no problem worth considering?

No, Sir. I am only replying to the hon. Gentleman by saying that I do not accept his suggestion for a committee.

Or any other suggestion?

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance whether he will prescribe emphysema on the Schedule of Industrial Diseases.

No, Sir.

As emphysema among people who work in dust, like miners and pottery workers, is so close to pneumoconiosis, will not the right hon. Gentleman obtain further advice to see whether emphysema may be scheduled for people who are working in dust industries?

I have certainly studied this matter closely, because, as the hon. Lady knows, this is far from the first time that the suggestion has been made. Part of the problem is that a very large amount of the emphysema that we find has nothing whatever to do with pneumoconiosis and clearly is one of those risks of the population at large which, as the hon. Lady will recall, are excluded by Section 55 (2) of the Industrial Injuries Act.

Will the right hon. Gentleman consider this problem from another angle and, instead of using an isolated word like emphysema, will he consider pulmonary disability in all those engaged in certain industries after a specified number of years in those industries in the way that South Africans do in gold mining? If he did this, he would probably do justice to so many of our constituents who find that it is quite wrong and unconscionable to them that they should not receive compensation although they suffer from this disease?

As the hon. Gentleman knows, considerable research work concerning pneumoconiosis and related conditions is being done at the moment by the Pneumoconiosis Research Unit of the Medical Research Council at Llandough, which I hope to see again in a week or two. However, the hon. Gentleman will understand if I show a certain unwillingness to accept a medical formula from him across the Floor of the House, as I have not his medical qualifications.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance if he will make a statement, giving the number of persons and the amount of money involved, about the position of persons who paid their full insurance contributions and thereby become entitled to retirement pensions while in Great Britain and who later went to the Republic of Ireland and were there-for no longer eligible for the increases made in the rate of retirement pensions; why they were made ineligible; and in what circumstances such persons can become entitled to retirement pensions at the present rates.

I have no statement to make or figures to give on this subject. In general, under arrangements starting from the beginning of the scheme, pensioners leaving the United Kingdom to take up residence elsewhere have taken with them pensions payable at the rates current at their departure; these have always exceeded substantially the level of pensions earned by their contributions. But pensioners continuing to reside outside the United Kingdom do not, except in cases where reciprocal agreements so provide, receive increases in pensions made subsequent to their departure.

I am obliged to the Minister for that detailed reply, but is it not a fact that pensioners of the type mentioned in my Question paid their full insurance contributions and thereupon became entitled by Statute to full pensions of the same category and type as other pensioners, and that to discriminate against the pensioners mentioned in my Question is unfair, unjust and illegal as far as the Statute is concerned? Will the right hon. Gentleman look into this matter again with a view to seeing that the discrimination is avoided and that justice is done to this class of person?

These pensioners receive in full the pensions for which they contributed and, as I said in my main Answer, they receive very good value for money indeed. Concerning the hon. and learned Member's suggestion of illegality, this procedure has been followed since the original increase under the National Insurance Act in 1946 and, if the hon. and learned Gentleman is right on the law of the matter, I should have thought that it would have been challenged by someone before now.

Mr. Houghton, Question No. 7.

The fact that murder has existed from the time of Cain does not mean——

Order. These illuminating interventions occupy time which is not at the disposal of the hon. and learned Gentleman.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance how many applications for certificates of non- participation are awaiting attention by the Registrar; how many employees are covered by them; and what numbers of new applications are now coming in.

At Friday, 5th May, there were in the Registrar's office 224 elections, covering 2,137 employees, for which certificates had not been issued. Of these, 132 can be dealt with only after further action by the employer. Since 4th April, 1,891 applications for certificates covering 23,650 employees have been received.

Can the Minister make any estimate of the likely flow of applications for contracting out? Does he think that it is now drying up, or are we to expect that the figure may rise to a total of, say, 5 million?

At present, as the figures I have given make clear, the flow is quite small, most of the applications being in respect of very small schemes. I would prefer not to make any long-range forecast.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance how many letters of protest he has received from or relating to insured persons who are paying graduated contributions from which they cannot derive any graduated pension benefit.

I know of 26 such letters. Analysis of them indicates that only four of them clearly establish that the person concerned has no possibility of contributing enough to earn some graduated pension.

Is the Minister aware that fewer protests appear to have reached him than have reached me and my hon. Friends? Can it be that people consider it a waste of time writing to the right hon. Gentleman?

The hon. Member knows very well that all serious complaints are seriously considered.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance the total cost to date of providing publicity and information in connection with the new graduated pensions scheme.

While it is not possible precisely to separate expenditure on the necessary publicity for the graduated scheme from that simultaneously effected in respect of the simultaneous increase in flat-rate benefits, the best estimate I can give is about £64,000.

Will the right hon. Gentleman tell us how much money has been wasted on printing expensive booklets twice over because the first were out of date before the scheme began?

There has been very little nugatory expenditure indeed, because, as the hon. Member will understand, leaflets with a large circulation like this in any event require second and third editions.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance what additional pension he estimates will be earned during his normal working life by a man, aged 42 and earning £10 per week on entering the graduated pensions scheme, making allowance for a 2 per cent., annual increase in earnings; and what, on the same assumptions, would be his weekly earnings immediately before retirement.

About 12s. a week if the man retired at 65, and about 21s. 6d. a week if he deferred his retirement until 70. His earnings by age 65 would, on the assumption made in the Question, be about £15 10s. a week and by age 70 about £17 a week.

Do not these figures reveal that on retirement there will be a very great reduction from earnings to pension? That is precisely what we assumed it was the aim of the Government to eliminate or reduce. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree with the promise of the right hon. Gentleman who is now the Home Secretary that the standard of living would be doubled in 25 years, and, in view of that, does he seriously say that the standard of living of this man will be doubled at 65, as compared with his standard of living at 40?

The hon. Member bases all that first of all on ignoring the flat-rate pension at whatever rate it may be and, secondly, ignoring the rapidly growing body of voluntary provision. It is only by adding those two factors to the third one which he has posed in his Question that it is possible to form any sensible view on this matter.

Was not the right hon. Gentleman extremely successful in the election in confusing the public?

At least when I put a question I put all the facts and not one-third of them.

Only a part.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance if, in the light of latest figures of persons participating and contracted out of the graduated pension scheme, he will issue revised estimates of future income and payments out of the National Insurance Fund and a revised analysis of National Insurance income.

I will circulate in the OFFICIAL REPORT revised figures for the current year. These figures do not differ significantly from those in the Government Actuary's Report on the National Insurance Bill, 1960 (Cmnd. 1197) and the variation is insufficient to justify at present the production of revised figures for future years.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance what is the latest information of the number of persons in non-participating employments as regards the graduated pensions scheme.

Up to 5th May, the number of employees covered by certificates of non-participation was 4,289,000.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance what he estimates will be the payment from the National Insurance Fund to the Inland Revenue Department for the two years 1960 to 1962 in respect of the collection, etc., of graduated contributions under the National Insurance Act, 1959.

£299,000 for 1960–61 and £721,000 for 1961–62.

Has the Minister any idea of how many more times this sum it will cost the various firms which have to do the extensive calculations to arrive at how much money must be paid?

I think the hon. Gentleman underrates the resilience and skill of British industry.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance what will be the additional pension earned at normal retirement age by a man earning £15 a week who enters the graduated scheme at the age of 40 years; and what would be his weekly earnings immediately before retirement assuming a 2 per cent. annual increase in his earnings.

About 22s. a week if the man retired at age 65 (and about 36s. a week if he deferred his retirement until age 70). On the assumption made in the Question, his earnings by age 65 would be about £24 a week and by age 70 about £26 10s. a week.

Does the Minister not think that this addition to the pension, 57s. 6d. on the present basis, is quite derisory? Does he not think that by this time National Assistance must surely have been much more extensively raised than by what may perhaps be the price of a couple of packets of cigarettes? Does he not think something better than this could be done?

I think it is very good value for money, but on scale or size I think the hon. Member appreciates as well as any of us that there is a very deep cleavage of principle between his point of view and mine.

On the question of value for money, can the right hon. Gentleman give us any idea of what this 22s. will be worth by the time this man retires?

Provided, as seems likely, we have a continuation of Conservative Government, at least 22s.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance what estimate he has made of the total cost to date of the graduated contribution and pension scheme.

It is estimated that the total cost to 30th April, 1961, is about £1,600,000. This includes the costs of the Inland Revenue and other Government Departments.

Does the Minister not think that this is a shocking waste of public money when many of the benefits paid out are not commensurate at all with the contributions paid and when in some cases there will be no return at all on the contributions paid?

I think it is a very reasonable provision, whose amount must be looked at on the basis that the total expenditure to date is less than 1 per cent. of the expected yield of contributions for the first year.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance what proportion of those persons who apply to the National Assistance Board for a refund of National Health Service charges subsequently obtain a supplementary pension.

I regret that those figures are not available.

Will my right hon. Friend consider endeavouring to obtain these figures, or, at least, figures that would give an indication of the proportion of people who are obtaining such a supplementary pension, as that would provide us with an indication of the number of people who are entitled to National Assistance but are not at present receiving it?

It is the fact, so the Assistance Board tells me, that in a number of cases where an application is made for a refund, the discussions with the person concerned enable a supplementary pension to be put into payment. The reason why there are no figures is that records are not kept showing the number of these individual applications which have such a sequel. I will, however, discuss with the Board whether it is possible to meet the point raised by my hon. Friend.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance if he is aware that a widowed mother is subject, under the National Insurance Act, to the limitations on earnings rule, while a widowed mother receiving a war pension or allowance under the Industrial Injuries Act is not so subject, and that this difference has, in view of the rise in costs of fuel, medicines and other essentials, increased hardship on the former since November, 1960; and what steps he now proposes to take to remedy this.

The answer to the first part of the Question is, "Yes, Sir". But so far as the allegation contained in the latter part of the Question is concerned, I remind the hon. and learned Member that the rates both of widowed mother's personal allowance and of the allowances in respect of her children were substantially increased last month, that the latter are unaffected by the widow's earnings and that the total provision for a widowed mother with three children is now in real terms at a level 82 per cent. higher than in October, 1951.

Would the Minister agree that there is a conflict between these two sets of Statutes, giving rise to a real anomaly and discrimination between the two sets of beneficiaries in the respective circumstances? Will he look into this again with a view to ensuring that that anomaly is avoided?

No. That question is founded on a misapprehension as to the totally different nature of National Insurance, on the one hand, and war pensions and industrial injury benefits, on the other hand.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance why the provision for his Department of publications, office machines, printing, paper, office supplies, etc., by Her Majesty's Stationery Office has risen from £894,500 in 1959–60 to £1,207,250 in the current year.

As the published Estimates show, almost all this increase is referable to greater expenditure on office machinery. This is primarily due to the equipment required for recording contributions under the Graduated Pensions Scheme.

Since the right hon. Gentleman appears to admit that this staggering increase is due to complications of the straightforward twist involved in the new pensions scheme, will he admit that muddle, confusion and chaos have resulted in his Department following changes in Government decisions?

No; it is just the opposite. It derives from the decision to use the most up-to-date machinery. Part of this additional expenditure relates to part of the cost of the new computer, which is to record contributions and is being installed at Newcastle.

Did I understand the Minister aright to say that this applied mainly to office machinery? Will he not break this matter up and tell us how it applies to other items—paper, for example—which, I believe, have considerably increased?

The substantial increase is in office machinery. The increase in printing, paper and supplies is about £12,000, and in publications £1,000. The substance, about £300,000, is office machinery.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance why the 1961–62 Estimates for his Department show an increase of 1,404 persons employed in administration.

The figures quoted by the hon. Member relate to the increase in staff forecast for the financial year ended 31st March, 1961. The actual increase at 1,143 was somewhat smaller. Apart from some increase due to the increased number of beneficiaries, the main reason for the increase was work connected with the introduction of the provisions of the National Insurance Act, 1959.

Can the right hon. Gentleman tell what this will be in increased salaries? Can he further say how many of them will be temporary, how many will be dismissed, in other words, when the scheme gets under way? Does he not regard this as a very costly swindle?

So far as salaries are concerned, perhaps the hon. Member will study the Estimates of my Department. So far as the question of temporary provision is concerned, perhaps he will put it on the Paper. So far as the third part of his supplementary question is concerned, it is an extremely economical and efficient method of making any real progress.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance if he will promote legislation to make payment of pensions to, and the welfare of, blind persons the direct responsibility of his Department.

No, Sir. I see no justification for the transfer to my Department of functions in respect of blind persons at present discharged both by my right hon. Friends and by local authorities.

Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that there is a vast body of opinion which is convinced that his Department should be responsible for the payment of blind pensions and also for the care and welfare of blind people? He will be aware that all other disability pensions, are his responsibility. Why should a person in receipt of a blind pension not be taken under the right hon. Gentleman's wing and looked after by him instead of having the National Assistance Board to look after his interests?

The hon. Member's question goes far further than that. He himself has referred to these people's welfare, which is partly the responsibility, admirably discharged, of local authorities and of my right hon. Friend the Minister of Health. The question of training is for my right hon. Friend the Minister of Labour. It would be a retrograde step to try to create some new pyramid of organisation on top of various functions which are perfectly adequately performed on the present basis.

The right hon. Gentleman is trying to confuse the House. Obviously, the point of my question was the payment of blind pensions by his Department. Of course, local authorities and the Minister of Health would be involved, but it could be delegated responsibility, as is the case with so many other things, with the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance being ultimately responsible for Questions in this House.

The hon. Gentleman has a Question on the Paper—and that is what I must answer—in which he refers specifically to the welfare of blind persons——

Yes.

—and I have answered that.

Will the right hon. Gentleman, apart from the welfare aspect, be willing to look at the first part of the Question about the pension, and treat it in exactly the same way as, say, war pensioners' pensions are treated?

Yes.

No, because I think it would need the creation of a wholly new organisation in my Department, and for the hon. Gentleman to take that point is hardly consistent with the point of view on staffing and expenses which was taken by his hon. Friends behind him a moment ago.

It is a different matter.

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance if he will give consideration to the provision of separate offices for retirement pensioners drawing National Assistance in all cases where this is possible, especially when new offices are constructed.

No, Sir. Pensioners applying for or receiving supplementary assistance have in general no need to call at the Board's offices.