This is an interim Bill. I have been working on a comprehensive Bill dealing with workmen's compensation. About six months ago I discovered that it would probably take a year or two to produce a comprehensive Bill in this connection. On being pressed by the Dáil, I decided to bring in this interim Bill, which is rather a simple measure. The Bill leaves the compensation for an injured workman at 50/- as it is at the moment—but it provides that where an injured man has a wife he gets 12/- extra and that if he has a child or two children, or more, he gets 7/- for the first two children but nothing for any child after the second.
That is more in line with the social welfare legislation we have brought in so far. The reason I have kept it in line is that it has not yet been decided whether the comprehensive Bill will proceed on the lines of social insurance or nationalised insurance, or whether it will follow the pattern we have been following up to this and deal with it by leaving the employer liable for his own risk. The employer, of course, can insure for that risk, if he likes.
There is also a limit of 75 per cent. No injured man can draw more than 75 per cent. of his ordinary wage. The age for a child, so far as this legislation is concerned, is 15 years. That has been the age in workmen's compensation legislation for many years and it would be a very big job to change it to 16, as was suggested in the other House. These supplementary allowances will be payable from the appointed day. Those men who have met with an accident and who are now drawing compensation as a result of that accident, if they have dependents, on the appointed day, the amount due in respect of dependents will be added on.
The Bill also provides for increasing the amount paid in the case of fatal accidents. All these amounts will be doubled. It also provides that the ceiling will be £600 instead of £500 as it is at the moment. That, again, is to bring it into line with the social welfare legislation we brought in last year. There are a few rather imporant changes which we considered to be rather urgent and they have been brought in, even though this is an interim measure.
There is a certain grievance from which the worker has suffered for many years, in that if he was injured in the course of his employment and accepted workmen's compensation, he was debarred from taking action under the common law against his employer for negligence. That is being amended to this extent, that if he makes up his mind within 12 months, he can take an action at common law, even though he has drawn workmen's compensation. It goes even further—beyond 12 months, but not beyond 24 months, if he proves to the court that he could not have been expected to take action during the first 12 months, his case will be heard by the court.