I move:—
That, in view of the great hardship inflicted on applicants for unemployment assistance in receipt of small pensions attributable to military service or superannuation from trade union funds by the rigidity of the existing means test, this House requests the Government to submit to it proposals for exempting from the means calculation any income not exceeding 20/- per week possessed by an applicant otherwise qualified to receive unemployment assistance.
I hope that while we are discussing this motion we will have our minds free from all thoughts of parties, political or otherwise. I am trying to put before the Minister some of the many reasons for doing something in this matter. I may mention there are three classes of applicants for unemployment assistance that I have in mind: Men who are in receipt of pensions from the Irish Government; men who are in receipt of military pensions from the British Government or from the American Army or Navy, as the case may be, and men who are in receipt of superannuation allowance from their different trades unions. I want to say that, first of all, I am dealing with our own people who are in receipt of small pensions, and I have in mind men who have families of six, seven and eight children, and I have in mind one or two men who have even as many as ten children.The maximum amount that they receive from unemployment assistance is 23/-, that is, for the cities, and 14/- for the country towns. Some of those men have got pensions varying from 8/- to anything up to 12/- or 13/-. For the first 1/- out of that 8/-, 10/- or 13/-, as the case may be, that he has, there is 1/- not counted. The remaining amount is deducted from his unemployment benefit. We have also the cases of men in receipt of pensions from the British Government, and we have one or two men in my own city who have a pension from the American Government.They are rather small pensions, but since they have got them they have married and settled down in life and have families. I know of cases where men have been offered 1/- a week and they have refused to continue signing at the labour exchange for it.
There is a double disadvantage. There is such a thing as work on relief schemes throughout the year, and when men are recruited from the labour exchange the men who are drawing the greatest amount from the labour exchange are the men who are employed. You will find that the man who may have eight or nine children, who has 8/- or 9/- pension from this State or the British Government, is only drawing 10/- or 12/- from the labour exchange, and you will find that he is never considered for employment because he is not drawing the big amount, up to 23/-, from the unemployment assistance fund. Then we have the very regrettable position—it is somewhat different to the others—of the man who is in receipt of superannuation from his trade union, superannuation for which he has paid dearly, having contributed possibly over a period of 30 or 35 years. When he reaches 60 years of age he is superannuated, not being considered fit for active participation in the labour market. If he is in receipt of 6/- or 10/- from his organisation, that amount is deducted from the benefit he will receive through the labour exchange.
I hope in the discussion of this matter that no Deputy will regard it from the point of view of taking any political advantage from it. These cases that we are setting out to remedy are very exceptional cases. Last year there was brought to my notice the case of a man in Dublin who took part in the fight for freedom in 1916, who was, in fact, engaged in the attack on Dublin Castle. That man had a big family but they settled down eventually and then he and his wife were left together. He was receiving 13/6 by way of unemployment assistance. He was then awarded a pension. This necessitated a visit to the labour exchange and there he discovered that all he would be entitled to get in the way of assistance, by reason of the pension award, was 6d. a week. That is actually on the records of the labour exchange. That man never went to the trouble of collecting the 6d. a week.
I have in mind a number of cases in the Cork area where men became entitled to unemployment assistance of only 2/- a week by reason of the fact that the pensions they had been awarded for military service were taken into consideration in the course of the means test. I should like to quote one other case. It is the case of a man with ten children. He was in receipt of a pension of 12/- a week from the British Government and he is drawing 11/- from the labour exchange in Cork. The labour exchange officials have instructions that, when they are sending men out on relief schemes, the men drawing the greatest amount of unemployment assistance are to be sent out first. The man in this case is not given an opportunity of doing work on relief schemes until all the others on the list are employed.
One could quote many cases pointing to the disadvantages in the case of men of that type when the means test is applied. I could instance cases from Midleton, Fermoy and Mallow where individuals have pensions of 12/-, 13/- and 14/- a week from the British Government.They are not registered in the labour exchange because they find that no purpose is served by registering.They are not entitled to be sent out on relief schemes when they are not drawing unemployment assistance.
We have this fact to bear in mind, that the benefit itself is rather meagre, altogether inadequate at a time like the present. People find that the food that could be bought for 23/- six or seven years ago could not be bought to-day for 40/-. We really believe that where men are in receipt of pensions, granted to them for what they did in the fight for the freedom of this country, there should not be a means test applied and it is with a view to getting agreement on that that we have mentioned the sum of 20/-. If we are prepared to give money towards military defence we should also be prepared to help the men who have done so much to bring about freedom in this country and we can help them materially by relieving them of this means test. I hope every Deputy, irrespective of Party, will give this motion the support that it so richly deserves.