I move "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."
This Bill provides that service pensions and disability pensions payable under the Connaught Rangers (Pensions) Acts, 1936 to 1953, shall be increased by 15 per cent. which is the percentage appropriate to pensions not exceeding £100 under the scale of increases generally applicable in respect of other classes of State pensions. In no case do pensions affected by this Bill exceed £100 so that the setting out of a scale of increases is unnecessary.
The increases become effective from 1st August, 1956, and are in fact being paid since that date on the authority of a Supplementary Estimate for pensions passed in this House on the 25th July, 1956. The estimated annual cost is £194 and provision for this expenditure has been made in the Army Pensions Estimate for the current year which has already been approved by the House. The Bill is, of course, necessary in order to give statutory authority for the increases.
There is nothing else I think for me to say on the matter unless any Deputy wishes to raise a point.