I move:—
Before Section 7 to insert a new section as follows:—
(1) Where the claim of any officer or soldier under this Act is rejected or revised by the Army Pensions Board, an appeal shall lie to a Pensions Appeal Tribunal established under this section whose decision shall be final.
(2) The Pensions Appeal Tribunal shall be composed as follows:—
(a) There shall be constituted a Panel consisting of four duly qualified medical practitioners nominated by the President of the Royal College of Surgeons, four duly qualified medical practitioners nominated by the President of the Royal College of Physicians, four legal representatives, being barristers or solicitors of not less than seven years standing, nominated by the Minister for Justice, and four officers of the National Army nominated by the Minister.
(b) The Pensions Appeal Tribunal shall consist of not more than five nor less than three members of the Panel, of whom at least two shall be duly qualified medical practitioners, nominated by the President of the Executive Council.
(c) Casual vacancies in the Tribunal shall be filled from the Panel on the nomination of the President of the Executive Council.
Amendments 9 and 10 both provide for the establishment of a Pensions Appeal Tribunal which will have power in case of necessity to review the decisions of the Army Pensions Board. It is intended by each of these sections to give the applicant a right to an appeal, and I would be prepared to give way to Deputy Bolger and allow him to move his amendment but for the fact that he expressed the wish that I should move mine, and also but for the fact that my amendment deals with a case of either rejection or revision, while Deputy Bolger's amendment only deals with rejection. The Pensions Board might revise a claim. A claim might be made to the extent of a one hundred per cent. disability. The Army Pensions Board might reduce it to 80 per cent. I think it desirable that there should be an appeal in such a case. My wording is taken from the English Pensions Act. I need not state the case for an Appeal Board at any length. I have already told the Dáil on more than one occasion —I fear in a rather wearisome manner —of the state of mind of men who are appealing for these pensions. They are appealing for them in a resentful, suspicious frame of mind. They will not be wholly satisfied with the decision of a Board appointed by the Minister and liable to be removed by the Minister at his pleasure. Both Deputy Bolger and I seek to give them some further appeal to a Board not established by and not responsible to the Minister. There may, and may rightly, be differences as to the constitution of that Board. I have suggested what is possibly too elaborate machinery. Deputy Bolger's machinery is simple, but his Board is wholly composed of medical men. I must attach a certain importance to the provision in my suggested new section which places an officer of the Army on the Board, because I believe officers of the Army have the interest of their men, including those men who served them in the past and are not serving them now, at heart, and that they will do justice to the claims that come before them.
I am not tied to any definite composition of the Appeal Board, I will take Deputy Bolger's suggested composition. I will take an alternative suggested by the Government or by anybody else, but I do hold to this principle that the Appeal Board should not be appointed by the Minister for Defence. It should be an appeal from the Minister for Defence. The Minister for Lands and Agriculture has just told us that you must hear both sides of the case. But in this case the judge who will hear the appeal side of the case is the Minister for Defence himself, who is one of the parties to the action. A similar difficulty arose in Great Britain. It was found necessary to appoint a Pensions Appeal Board there. That Pensions Appeal Board is not appointed by the Minister for Pensions; it is appointed by the Lord Chancellor. The Lord Chancellor is both a judicial and a political officer. We have no equivalent here, and I was interested to see that both Deputy Bolger and myself, without previous consultation, decided that the most suitable authority to appoint an Appeal Board was the President of the Executive Council, acting in his capacity as head of the machinery of the State. The British Pensions Tribunal is more favourable to the applicant than the tribunal Deputy Bolger has suggested or that I am suggesting. The British Tribunal is composed of one medical practitioner, one person of legal experience, and one wounded or disabled soldier or officer. I think there will be difficulty here in finding any authority to appoint a wounded or disabled soldier or officer. There are, if my information is correct, two or three competing bodies speaking on behalf of the ex-National Army men, and there probably will be some difficulty in that respect. Therefore I do not ask the Dáil to appoint a representative of the disabled men on the Appeal Tribunal.
I suggest a panel to be formed of four surgeons to be named by the President of the Royal College of Surgeons, four physicians to be named by the President of the Royal College of Physicians, and four persons with legal experience to be named by the Minister for Justice and four officers of the National Army. I think from that panel an Appeal Tribunal of not more than five or less than three members should be chosen, and at least two of that panel must be doctors. It may seem rather cumbersome machinery. I have taken it, as I have taken most of my models, from the inspired legislation of the Government; I have taken it from the Railways Act. It contemplates the position that doctors will not be willing to give up the whole of their time serving on a tribunal of this kind, but that you will have a tribunal varying in composition from time to time, but at the same time willing to give free part-time services to investigating these cases. They need not be very numerous. As I said, I can imagine other suggestions for a tribunal which may be better, but what I want to put to the Dáil is that there should be some appeal from what I may call the Court of First Instance, that a disabled and wounded man should be allowed to say: "I do not think I got fair play from the Minister's board and I will go to an independent body on which the Minister will be represented by National Army officers." He can appoint officers of the medical service or other services, as he thinks fit. Nothing else will induce a man who has been wounded or disabled to feel that he is getting a fair deal than the acceptance of this principle, an independent appeal from the Minister.