I move amendment No. 311 :—
Before Section 300 to insert a new section as follows :—
(1) Where—
(a) a person is, on or after the operative date, appointed to commissioned rank in the Permanent Defence Force and such appointment is for a specified period or is temporary, or
(b) a person is, on or after the operative date, appointed to commissioned rank in the Reserve Defence Force, or
(c) a person enlists, on or after the operative date, in the Permanent Defence Force or the Reserve Defence Force, or
(d) a person (not being an officer holding a permanent commission in the existing permanent force, as defined by sub-section (1) of section 291) becomes, on the operative date, by virtue of Part X of this Act a member of the Defence Forces,
that person shall be a person to whom this section applies.
(2) Where—
(a) no contribution is paid in respect of a person to whom this section applies, in any insurance year ended on or after the operative date, and
(b) during the whole or part of such insurance year—
(i) such person, being a member of the Permanent Defence Force, serves in the Permanent Defence Force, or
(ii) such person, being a reservist, is called out on permanent service, or
(iii) such person, being an officer of the Reserve Defence Force is employed on military service or duty during a period during which a proclamation authorising the calling out of reservists on permanent service is in force or during a period during which reservists are called out on permanent service under section 88.
then, such insurance year shall be disregarded in any application to such person of sub-section (4) of Section 8 of the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1920.
(3) Nothing in this section shall be construed as affecting the operation of Section 2 of the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1941 (No. 3 of 1941).
(4) This section shall be construed as one with the Unemployment Insurance Acts, 1920 to 1948.
This is one of a number of adaptations of the Unemployment Insurance Acts which have to be effected in order to cover the position which would arise if this Bill came into operation before the Social Welfare (Insurance) Bill. As Deputies are aware, the Social Welfare (Insurance) Bill, when it becomes law and comes into operation, will repeal the Unemployment Insurance Acts. In case, as I say, the Defence Bill comes into operation first, it is necesary to make these adaptations to bring the Unemployment Insurance Acts into line with the new terminology which this Bill introduces with regard to the Defence Forces.
This amendment is, in effect, a revised version of Section 2 of the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1941. The position prior to the enactment of that Act was that insurance contributors who served in the Defence Forces for a whole insurance year were, on discharge, prevented by Section 8 (4) of the Act of 1920 from obtaining unemployment benefit in respect of contributions to their credit in the Unemployment Fund before they joined the forces. Section 2 of the Act of 1941 remedied this position and enabled unemployment benefit rights acquired before joining the forces to be retained unimpaired.
Amendment No. 311 is Section 2 of the Act of 1941 re-written to bring it into line with the new terminology. It was found that amendment of the section in a piecemeal manner would be unsuitable and it was thought better to reproduce it in full. It is exactly the same in effect as Section 2 of the Act of 1941 and introduces nothing new in principle. It is merely, as I say, to bridge any possible gap between the coming into operation of this Bill and the Social Welfare (Insurance) Bill.