Dáil Éireann debate -
Friday, 26 Jul 1974

Vol. 274 No. 13

Committee on Finance. - Defence Forces (Pensions) (Amendment) (No. 3) Scheme, 1974: Motion.

Minister for Defence (Mr. Donegan)

I move:

That the Defence Forces (Pensions) (Amendment) (No. 3) Scheme, 1974, prepared by the Minister for Defence with the consent of the Minister for the Public Service under sections 2, 3 and 5 of the Defence Forces (Pensions) Act, 1932, and section 4 of the Defence Forces (Pensions) (Amendment) Act, 1938, and laid before the House on the 23rd day of July, 1974, be confirmed.

The object of this scheme is to enable payment of a gratuity to be made in the case of an officer who marries at any time before his retirement and to provide enhanced benefits in respect of certain officers who die while serving.

Under the Defence Forces (Pensions) Scheme a married officer is entitled to a gratuity in addition to his retired pay only if he has been in receipt of a married rate of pay for not less than two years before his retirement. Article 5 of the scheme provides that the gratuity will be payable if the officer was married at any time before the date of his retirement.

Under the existing schemes, a gratuity equal to one year's pay is payable in respect of an officer who dies while serving and who had more than five years' service. Article 6 (1), paragraph (1) (a) (ii), provides that, in the case of such an officer with more than 30 years' service, the gratuity will be a year's pay plus one-thirtieth of his annual rate of pay at the date of death for each year of service in excess of 30 years but not exceeding 45 years. This is in line with the Civil Service code.

If a married special service officer, that is a medical, legal, engineer, et cetera, officer, dies while serving at any time within two years of the retiring age prescribed for a line officer of similar rank, a gratuity equal to one-and-a-half years' pay is payable in respect of him. A special service officer may, however, in accordance with Defence Force regulations, continue to serve beyond the retiring age prescribed for a line officer of similar rank and up to the age of 65 years. If he does so and dies while serving, the gratuity of one-and-a-half years' pay is payable under the schemes in respect of him only if his death takes place within two years of the revised retiring age, 65 years. Otherwise a smaller gratuity is payable. Article 6 (1) paragraph (1) (b) provides that if such an officer dies in service at any time during the extension the maximum gratuity will continue to be payable.

As the scheme does not relate to increases in retirement benefits arising from service pay increases or general increases in public service pensions, it requires the approval of both Houses. The scheme will benefit a small number of existing cases and I commend it to the consideration of the House.

Mr. Meaney

As far as we are concerned the Minister is working in the right direction. When we were discussing the Defence Estimates here I made the point that we should update our legislation to make the Defence Forces more appealing to young people. As the Minister knows when a young person comes into the Army he must look forward to the day of his retirement, to what his widow will have if he is killed while serving and to his position if he continues to serve after the usual retiring age. This motion is concerned with pay, pensions and gratuities. In view of what is happening in this country at present it is only right that there should be better pensions and gratuities for personnel. They are now much more exposed to danger than they were 20 or 25 years ago. The world is not very peaceful at present and is not likely to improve as we would all wish in the years ahead. The Minister is working in the right direction but I would exhort him to go much further and to bring in other cases. I have cases in mind but I understand that I would not be in order in discussing them now. After the Recess we may bring them in under another heading.

The Minister has mentioned the qualifying period for a married officer's gratuity. Previously it was necessary for him to have been married two years prior to his retirement. The two-year period has been reduced to one day. Is that retrospective to January of this year?

Mr. Donegan

Yes.

Mr. Meaney

I am sure the Minister has all the information on hand. Could he tell me whether many people were deprived of gratuities because of the fact that the qualifying period was two years instead of one day? In going back to January, 1974 I hope we are not depriving any person we are trying to accommodate because of a few days or a few weeks. Is the Minister quite satisfied that there is nobody within a few days or a few weeks of qualifying? If there is anybody we should not be rigid about this.

Article 6 applies for all the increases. I understand that that means bringing the Army into line with the Civil Service. Is that the Minister's general idea? Is it his intention to carry that right through the Army, the Permanent Defence Force especially? I believe what he is doing is good. I approve of it and I will not delay the House on it. I just want the Minister to tell me whether he is happy that there is nobody left out by a small margin and whether it is his intention to give the Army the same benefits as the Civil Service. I do not think the Minister is going far enough but we will be making some move after the Recess to deal with a few other matters.

Mr. Molloy

I am disappointed that the Minister did not make any provision for the payment of widow's pension to the widows of deceased non-commissioned officers and soldiers. I have brought this to his attention on numerous occasions over the past 12 months. There was a certain amount of confusion as to what his intentions were. There were differences between replies which came from his Department and replies to Parliamentary Questions. I would like the Minister to clarify for us whether it is his intention to provide in the not-too-distant future for the widows of non-commissioned officers and soldiers. Is he working on this? Provision has been made for the widows of officers.

Minister for Defence (Mr. Donegan)

It might perhaps be more appropriate if I gave Deputy Molloy the information he requires in the next scheme which we will be dealing with in a few moments. It would be more in order if I waited until replying on that scheme. Deputy Meaney referred to the question of gratuities for single officers and men. The previous argument that single officers should not receive gratuities was that their pensions were paid on a higher percentage of their serving pay than in the case of married officers. Whatever the validity of that we are now working away from it and gratuities for single officers and soldiers, in addition to their pensions, will be introduced on a phased basis to correspond with the various stages in the equalisation of pay for single and married personnel. It is hoped eventually to achieve complete equality of retirement benefits as between married and single personnel. That includes serving soldiers as well as officers.

The first stage of the equalisation of pay as between single and married personnel took effect from the 1st June, 1973, when single officers and men were given 17½ per cent of the difference between the single and married rates of pay. When the pay equalisation process has been completed I hope to make an amending scheme which will reflect the various stages of the process by providing:

(a) that single officers and men who left the Army on or after the 1st June, 1973, will receive 17½ per cent of the difference between the single and married rates of pension and 17½ per cent of the gratuity payable to married personnel; and

(b) for the levelling up of retirement benefits as between single and married personnel in accordance with the subsequent stages in pay equalisation.

In relation to the question asked by Deputy Meaney about how many people the first provision in the particular order applies to, that is the person who got married within two years of retirement, the answer is only one in recent years. It was felt it was quite unjust to this particular serving officer and that is the reason for that order. I will certainly look into the question of whether or not there were others. My information is there probably are no others but if there is an injustice there we will look at it.

Deputy Meaney asked the question a few times about whether or not this order was in line with the Civil Service code. He qualified that by using the words "more in line" and "almost in line" with the Civil Service code. He is absolutely accurate in this. We have got to accept that the Army and Civil Service codes are, of necessity, different because the service is different. At the various levels, whether it be private soldier, major general or anything else, you have different periods of service. In the Civil Service everybody theoretically retires at 65 years. The result is you start off on the basis that these particular codes are of necessity different and then you do your best to equalise them and be fair to everybody.

The Army and Civil Service codes are based on different principles and so are not strictly comparable, no matter how much we want to compare them. No matter how much our desire is to bring them in line we find that with clear, straight, mathematics we cannot do it. These people serve for different periods of time. The Defence Forces Pensions Schemes are adapted to the special circumstances of military services. The Army code has features which are unique. Strict equivalence with the Civil Service would not be practicable or indeed beneficial. There are lots of things, like for instance, an officer who could have attributed to his service overseas, an illness, which might be a chronic illness while on active service which affect the situation. He is in an absolutely different situation from any civil servant. The different things are length of service, what happens when a man unfortunately has a chronic illness as a result of active service. These different things make it impossible to make them exactly similar. The desire is to be fair to everybody and this scheme is a small improvement. The next scheme is a greater improvement so far as numbers are concerned and it brings in greater equity. I am grateful for the remarks made by Deputy Meaney and Deputy Molloy. I will deal with Deputy Molloy's worries in relation to the next scheme.

Question put and agreed to.