I move that the Bill be now read a Second Time.
When the Electricity Supply Board took over the electricity undertakings of the Dublin Corporation, the Pembroke Urban Council and the Rathmines Urban Council, persons employed in the undertakings passed to the employment of the board— that is, the Electricity Supply Board. Some years afterwards the corporation and the board came to an agreement by which certain maintenance and operation services in connection with public lighting in the enlarged Dublin City area would be taken over by the corporation. In consequence of this agreement, the board transferred to the corporation a number of employees who had been engaged on these services and who would otherwise have become redundant. These employees had been originally in the service of local authorities whose electricity undertakings had become vested in the board in 1929.
The Bill will enable the corporation to treat the whole service of these employees as continuous service for pension purposes, whether it has been service with a local authority or the Electricity Supply Board. If a superannuation allowance is granted, the board will make a contribution proportionate to the time the employee was in the service of the board. There are only seven persons affected. Five were originally in the Rathmines electricity undertaking, one in Pembroke and one in Dublin City.
