Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 3 Dec 1930

Vol. 36 No. 7

Adjournment Debate. - Old Age Pensions.

Dr. Ward

Question 18, which was on the Order Paper to-day, and the subject-matter of which I desire to raise on the Motion for the Adjournment, was as follows:

To ask the Minister for Local Government and Public Health whether the claim of Mrs. Mary Finlay, Tullyvogey, Tydavnet, Monaghan, for an increase in her old age pension is now before him on appeal by the pensions officer; whether he will state the approximate date upon which this claim will be decided, and whether he will also state in detail the headings under which the pensions officer has assessed her income, and the amount attributed to her under each heading.

The Minister's reply was very brief. He said that such a claim was at present before the Department on appeal. I asked the Minister to come down to details, as in such a case as this the Old Age Pension Acts and the regulations governing them are complicated. From the knowledge of them previously displayed in this House by the Minister, I have been driven to the conclusion that he does not understand much about the matter. I do not think it is right that he should get away with such a discourteous reply as that which he gave in this particular case. I submit that it is not to the credit of the Minister, and that if he were as wise as he is discourteous in this particular instance he would not make such desperate attempts to secure economy at the expense of the class of the community involved in this question. It is hard to see any adequate reason why the Minister should not inform us as to the approximate date upon which this question will be decided. One would imagine that that was not too much to ask, yet the Minister refused to give that information. He refused to tell us how the pensions officer arrived at the amount of income attributed to this old lady and refused to tell us the headings under which each item of income was put down and the amount attributed to her under each heading. It seems extraordinary that such obstacles are put in the way of claimants to old age pensions, while every facility is placed at the disposal of pensions officers whose business it is to secure that old age pensions will cost the State as little as possible. When evidence is submitted on behalf of a claimant, whose case is appealed to the Local Government Department, by a Deputy or anyone else acting on behalf of the claimant, the evidence is sent to the pensions officer for his criticism. He is afforded opportunity to criticise, find fault, and pick holes in such evidence if he can. The claimant is not informed at any time of the case which, is being made against him or her by the pensions officer. I submit that that is utterly unfair.

General Mulcahy

It is utterly untrue.

Dr. Ward

The time at our disposal is limited and I do not propose to waste very much of it in dealing with the flimsy and futile interruptions of the Minister. He will have an opportunity when replying of proving the inaccuracies which he alleges are contained in my statement of the case. The pensions officer has to appeal in the case of an increase in the pension whether he is convinced that the claimant is entitled to an increase or not. Automatically such case is appealed arid the grounds of appeal are never placed before the claimant. It has actually happened—if the Minister states that this is untrue I will quote two cases for him—that an appeal against an award of a pension has been made by the pensions officer to the Local Government Department on the ground of age. The claimant was informed that an appeal had been lodged against the decision of the Committee on the ground of age. A notification was sent from the Secretary of the Committee and from the Local Government Department and, while evidence was submitted to the Department on the ground of age, the appeal was disallowed on the grounds of means, though the claimant was never informed that there was an appeal on the grounds of means.

That should not be allowed to continue. To my mind, a person of seventy years of age, or over, is entitled to an old age pension if he or she complies with certain statutory qualifications as to means. If it is alleged that the latter requirements are not complied with, surely, in all human justice the claimant is entitled to know the basis of calculation. In these old age pension cases the pensions officer is, for all practical purposes, a State counsel. Most of the claimants for pensions are people who are practically illiterate. It is the duty of the pensions officer, if he can possibly secure it, to see that as few pensions as possible are allowed. The Minister might, perhaps, put forward the argument that the sub-committee can make the necessary recommendation on behalf of the claimant whose case is appealed. The sub-committee may do that, but they are not bound to do it, and the appeal is very often laid against both the Committee and the pensions officer.

Take, for example, the case of school records. If there is not statutory evidence as to age, the pensions officer searches for any possible clue which would show that the claimant is not of age. He sometimes turns up the old school records, and on such records a claimant may be deprived of a pension. It has been proved time and again, and I personally proved it in many cases, that the records are inaccurate to the extent of even ten years. Will the Minister tell us, when the pensions officer submits such evidence against a claim, that the claimant is ever informed that such a document has been submitted and used against him? I have never known it to occur. I think that the Minister's attitude on this whole question of old age pensions appeals is nothing short of a public scandal. There is a motion in my name and in that of another Deputy of our Party which will give the House an opportunity of dealing with that particular aspect of the question. If Deputies were allowed, as they were allowed up to 1929, to make personal representations on behalf of claimants and know the case made by the pensions officer behind the back of a claimant, they could deal with the case there and then, and the necessity to raise such matters as this on the Motion for the Adjournment would not arise. The Minister should not be allowed to get away with this. We will continue to raise such matters and we will see that this section of the community will get justice whether the Minister likes it or not.

General Mulcahy

The Deputy is not quite clear what exactly he wants to talk about or what he wants to complain about. On the 4th December last year, almost exactly a year ago, a question was raised here complaining of the arrangements that I had introduced that third parties would not have approach to the Deciding Officer in connection with old age pension appeals. We had a lot of talk about that here—that twenty-five questions would be asked by one Deputy and 47 by another and questions were to be raised on the adjournment and the whole place was to be filled up by all the terrible cases arising out of old age pension appeals that Deputies wanted to deal with so very much. But now on the 3rd December, twelve months with the exception of one day after that, we are now discussing an old age pension question.

I have been asked by a Deputy in connection with the case under appeal to state here what the claimant's means were. I do not think that the Deputy, much as he suggests about my ignorance with regard to the operations of the old age pension appeal system, knows anything about it. I would suggest to him and to the Deputies who are really interested in the proper deciding of old age pension appeals that they refer to the report of the Committee set up to examine the old age pension system in 1925, which Committee reported in December, 1926. Their report is now in the library. I think, sir, that if Deputy Ward had ever looked at that report on the whole question of old age pension appeals his attitude would now be quite different.

Dr. Ward

Did that report recommend that claimants should be supplied or served with a copy of the case made by the pensions officer against them?

General Mulcahy

It was not necessary for that report to recommend it. That report by the Committee showed——

Dr. Ward

Did that report recommend or did it not recommend that claimants should be served with a copy of the case made by the pensions officer against the claim?

General Mulcahy

It was not necessary.

Dr. Ward

Did that report recommend that or did it not—answer the question straight?

General Mulcahy

It was not necessary. The report showed that the procedure followed in connection with old age pension claims was this—that the applicant got a form at the post office and filled up the claim. That claim then went to the pensions officer who filled a very elaborate form which gave all the details as to how the applicant's means were arrived at. That form passed through the supervisor's office and it came to the Committee. The old age pensioner at that time got two days' notice—I think he now gets longer notice—that his claim had been appealed against, if there was an appeal against it. He gets notice that the Committee is going to deal with the matter on such-and-such a date. Anything that the old age pensions officer has to say in the case is down in black and white in a very elaborate form. Then before the appeal comes on, the claimant gets notice that the matter is before the Committee, and he is asked to attend at the hearing when his claim is to be adjudicated upon.

Mr. Maguire

Does it not deliberately state that the full evidence of the means of the claimant is to be submitted to the sub-committee, and I would like to know if, when the case comes before the sub-committee, the pensions officer is prepared to answer questions by the sub-committee as to how he arrived at the calculation of means?

General Mulcahy

Has the Deputy read the report of the Old Age Pensions Committee?

Dr. Ward

Will the Minister answer my question?

General Mulcahy

Will the Deputy please read the report of the Committee? All the information that is put up by the pensions officer on the question of means is before the Committee. The pensions officer can be asked to come there and the consideration of the claim can be postponed until he is present. It is an important question. It was fully investigated by the Committee of which, I think, sir, you were a member at the time.

Mr. Maguire

Will the Minister please answer the question I put—I will repeat it. The calculation of means is submitted by the pensions officer and the sub-committee is dealing with it, the pensions officer being present. Will the pensions officer answer the questions put by the sub-committee as to how he arrives at the means he submits to them on paper?

General Mulcahy

I am sure he will answer all reasonable questions, and if the Deputy will refer to the very elaborate form——

Mr. Maguire

I wish I could get an answer to my question.

General Mulcahy

The Deputy need not expect that every answer I will give him will be perfectly satisfactory to him, any more than I find it perfectly satisfactory or any more than the House finds it perfectly satisfactory, that we should be discussing this question twelve months after we discussed it before. If the Deputies who are supposed to be so terribly concerned about this whole machinery would read the very careful report that was rather elaborately prepared by the Special Committee set up five years ago to examine this matter, this discussion might not be now necessary.

I stated that the statement made by Deputy Ward was untrue, and that is, that the old age pension claimant is not informed at any time of the case made against him by the pensions officer or by the sub-committee. Deputies will find in that report that the Committee that investigated the matter emphasised that the local or sub-committee was the pivot on which was based this whole question of old age pension claims. I suggested to the Deputies, discussing this whole matter twelve months ago, that what they wanted was that the work of the sub-committees would be left undone. I still consider that the work of the sub-committees or committee is the pivotal point in this whole business of old age pension claims and appeals. The Department of Local Government has before it normally no information except the information that is before the committee, that was before the old age pensions officer and before the claimant, if he came to hear his case adjudicated on by the committee.

The Department cannot refuse to take the recommendations and statements of facts sent by Deputies. I have stated here that we will place all the machinery that a Deputy may require at his disposal to take down any statement of facts. It may be that statements can be sent in by a third party which would decide in the mind of the appeals officer whether it would be a case which should be handed over to a departmental inspector to investigate on the spot. We do that in very many cases, because we do send down an inspector to investigate cases on the spot. It may be that written representations made by a third party may, when other facts are turned up that have not been before the committee and the pensions officer, lead the officer to decide whether he should send an inspector down. What I ask Deputies to give further consideration to, before they take exception to the arrangements that we have made in the Department is, that it is unreasonable that any third party should have, behind the back of the pensions officer and behind the back of the sub-committees and behind everybody's back, direct personal appeal and approach to the person who is Deciding Officer and whose duty is to decide on the facts put up by the pensions officer on the one side and by the old age pensions sub-committee on the other side, and to judge on whatever contradictions there are in these two statements.

The Deciding Officer is responsible for deciding on a question of fact. I hold him responsible for doing his duty in a detached and thorough way. If I am to hold him responsible for doing that I must secure him against personal approach by third parties, whomsoever these third parties are. But no Deputy can complain that any scrap of information is not accepted in the Department for what it is worth, or that any case of any doubt is not referred to the local committee by means of sending down an inspector there. I do suggest this to Deputies that in spite of all said about this matter twelve months ago, there has not been a single sub-committee in the country that has made any representation to me on the whole business of appeals, that this business is not being thoroughly satisfactorily and reasonably dealt with.

When I say that that is so, I want to say that I would expect it to be so, because I do know that these appeals are thoroughly and carefully gone into. I know from the report of the Committee appointed to investigate this matter that that is only a continuance of the satisfactory conditions that obtained before 1925, when the Committee had been set up actually to investigate this matter. That Committee went into this question. They had evidence of complaints on all these questions with regard to means, age, delay and all that sort of thing. They went thoroughly into the matter and they stated the facts that came before their notice. They certainly had to admit that the matter was being thoroughly, systematically and sympathetically dealt with. If there was any thing wrong in the system I would expect to hear from the sub-committees who deal with these cases that there was something wrong. Nothing can be very wrong when it does not come to the Department's notice because, much as Deputies suggest that they have a very sympathetic interest in these matters, I do seriously suggest that the officers of the Department dealing with these matters take a more systematic and, at any rate, a more intelligent interest in them than the Deputies who are raising the question here now.

Mr. Smith

Will the Minister say that where a pensions officer appeals against a claimant on the grounds of means and when a Deputy requests the Department to send down an inspector to investigate the case, is it usual for his Department to refuse before deciding the case against the applicant?

General Mulcahy

The Deputy asks a very hypothetical question.

Dr. Ward

The Minister states that everything is being done and that cases are being dealt with in a thoroughly satisfactory and reasonable way. I would ask him if it is thoroughly satisfactory and thoroughly reasonable to notify a claimant that the pensions officer has appealed on the grounds of age and subsequently to decide that case on the grounds of means, where there was no question of the means at all intimated to the claimant? Is that satisfactory and reasonable?

Mr. Boland

The Minister stated that the Deciding Officer decided on the facts before him presented by the claimant and the pensions officer. I would like to know is there any other factor in the matter? Is it not a fact that at times the Department of Finance puts it up to him that he should go easy in the matter of old age pensions? Is not that done? When a certain number of claims have been admitted is it not a fact that representations are made to that gentleman to go easy—at least to pull up?

General Mulcahy

The Deputy suggests that the Department of Finance make representations to the Department of Local Government that they are going too easy in the matter of granting appeals and that they ought to reduce the percentage a bit?

Mr. G. Boland

The idea is that too many claims were getting through and that they should be tightened up—just the reverse of what the Minister has said. Cases were getting through too easily, and the idea was that the Minister's Department was giving too much in pensions.

General Mulcahy

It would be inconceivable that the Minister for Finance would interfere with the Minister for Local Government in the discharge of his statutory duty with regard to appeals. It has never happened. In reply to Deputy Ward, I say that it would be quite out of order, if at any time in the consideration of a claim it appeared that the claimant was not, under the heading of means, entitled to a pension, he should get it. Why should a person whose means can be shown to be above the statutory limit get a pension?

Dr. Ward

That is not the question. The question is: Is it reasonable or thoroughly satisfactory to decide a question on the ground of means when the claimant has been notified by your Department that the appeal rests on the ground of age?

General Mulcahy

I certainly would be very glad to get particulars of any case that was decided on the means point without the means point having been brought before the sub-committee as a matter of appeal and, therefore, before the claimant.

Mr. Smith

We will give you dozens of them.

Mr. T.J. O'Connell

In the case of an appeal on the ground of means or age, is it open to the pensions officer to submit new evidence that has not been before the local sub-committee and may not, therefore, he within the knowledge of the applicant?

Dr. Ward

Certainly.

General Mulcahy

I cannot conceive, and personally I have never come up against, a case in which a pension officer makes his report which then goes to his superior and to the pensions committee and in which a further report is submitted by the pensions officer direct to the Department. I certainly think that it could be returned by the appeals officer to the committee. If there were any cases in which there are claims like that, I feel I would have them brought to my notice by some sub-committee.

Mr. O'Connell

There is a very general impression that when an appeal is entered the pension officer does, in fact, submit new evidence which the applicant or even the sub-committee has no knowledge of, and I was anxious that the Minister would make that point clear. It is, undoubtedly, a general impression.

General Mulcahy

If Deputies would look at the report issued in 1925 they will see a general cleaning up, on the part of the committee, of general impressions.

Mr. Haslett

Might I ask the Minister if the pension officer at any time lets the local pension committee know on what basis he calculates the means?

Dr. Ward

The Minister has indicated, if he has not stated quite definitely, that the pension officer never makes a further report which is not submitted either to the claimant or to the sub-committee. When representations are made to the Department on behalf of the claimant whose case is appealed, are copies of the representations sent to the pension officer for his private report and does that private report ever come either before the sub-committee or the claimant?

General Mulcahy

Representations by whom?

Dr. Ward

By anybody on behalf of the claimant.

General Mulcahy

That is, by a third party—representations made by a person other than the sub-committee or the claimant?

Mr. Fogarty

Does the pension officer not send down the items on which this man is refused his pension and are not these items put before the old age pension committee? Does he furnish the pension committee with the items on which the claim is turned down?

General Mulcahy

Who does?

Dr. Ward

For example, representations made on behalf of the claimant.

General Mulcahy

I say it would be quite reasonable that representations that were an addition to the representations originally made by the claimant would be sent down to the pension officer. I cannot say that that is the general practice, but if the representations were material I say it would be reasonable to send them. Do not get away on the details of this thing; let us stick to the principle. If there is anything wrong in detail, if it does not arise between the Department and the sub-committee, it cannot be very much. In any case, we cannot arrive at a rectification of anything that might be improved in the machinery by approaching it in the manner in which it has been approached by the Deputy to-day.

The Dáil adjourned at 11 p.m. until 3 p.m. on Thursday, 4th December.