The Rt. Hon. Sir John Major KG CH

Category: 1983-1987 Parliament

  • Mr Major’s Written Parliamentary Answer on Mrs. Barbara Bentley – 29 January 1986

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Mrs. Barbara Bentley on 29th January 1986.

    Sir Dudley Smith Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services when the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington may expect a reply to his letter of 10 April in connection with Mrs. Barbara Bentley of Leamington Spa.

    Mr. Major I wrote to my hon. Friend on 27 January.

  • Mr Major’s Written Parliamentary Answer on Social Security Fraud – 29 January 1986

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Social Security Fraud on 29th January 1986.

    Mr. Cohen Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services whether the electoral register is currently used in conjunction with the investigation of fraud by Department of Health and Social Security claimants; and whether there are any plans to use it in that respect when it is available in machine-readable form.

    Mr. Major Electoral registers are freely available to the general public and are on occasion referred to by the Department’s fraud investigators in the course of their inquiries. There are no plans to introduce information from the electoral register into any of the computer systems currently in use or being developed by the Department.

  • Mr Major’s Written Parliamentary Answer on Sponsored Immigrants – 29 January 1986

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Sponsored Immigrants on 29th January 1986.

    Mr. Thurnham Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services how many complaints he has made to magistrates’ courts under section 18 of the Supplementary Benefits Act 1976 against people liable to maintain sponsored immigrants in each of the last 10 years; how much money has been recovered as a result; and if he will make a statement.

    Mr. Major Departmental statistics do not show the types of cases in which complaints under section 18 of the Act are made but, as far as I am aware, no action has so far been taken in a case involving a sponsored immigrant. Proceedings would be brought only where it appeared that the sponsor was financially able to meet his responsibilities in whole or in part but satisfactory arrangements for him to do so could not be reached out of court. The statutory provision (which has existed only since the passing of the Social Security Act 1980) provides the necessary support for agreement to be reached with the sponsor out of court.

  • Mr Major’s Written Parliamentary Answer on Specialist Claims Control – 29 January 1986

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Specialist Claims Control on 29th January 1986.

    Mr. Cohen Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he has completed the consideration of the study of specialist claims control undertaken by his Department; what conclusions the study reached on the position of those whose benefits are stopped following an investigation and subsequently restored; if he will publish the study; and if he will make a statement.

    Mr. Major I refer the hon. Member to the reply given by my hon. Friend the Minister for Social Security to my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen, South (Mr. Malone) on 12 June 1985 at columns 482-483, and to the statement and copy report placed in the Library on that date.

  • Mr Major’s Written Parliamentary Answer on Statutory Sick Pay Scheme – 29 January 1986

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Statutory Sick Pay Scheme on 29th January 1986.

    Mrs. Currie Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will make a statement on the overall financial effects on employees of the operation over a complete financial year of the statutory sick pay scheme.

    Mr. Major In 1983-84, the first year of the scheme, £431 million was paid in statutory sick pay. It is estimated that this would have attracted some £130 million in tax and national insurance contributions from employees. Information is not available that would enable precise estimates to be made of the amounts of sickness benefit that would otherwise have been payable to SSP recipients in 1983-84; but on the basis of the financial estimates made when SSP was introduced, it is estimated that about £280 million in sickness benefit would have been payable to them in that year.

  • Mr Major’s Written Parliamentary Answer on Benefits (Uprating) – 28 January 1986

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Benefits (Uprating) on 28th January 1986.

    Mr. Andrew Bowden Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services when he expects to announce the next benefits uprating, and on which date in July it is proposed that this uprating will come into effect.

    Mr. Major The next main uprating of social security benefits will come into effect in the week beginning 28 July. The uprating will be based on the movement of the retail price index from May 1985 to January 1986. The January RPI will be published on 21 February and my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State, will make a statement shortly afterwards giving the details of the uprating.

  • Mr Major’s Parliamentary Answer on Maternity Benefit – 28 January 1986

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s Parliamentary Answer on Maternity Benefit on 28th January 1986.

    Mr. Nellist Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services how many women he estimates will be affected annually by the changes in the payment of maternity benefit proposed in his White Paper.

    Mr. Major Provisional estimates are that an additional 5,000 to 10,000 women will qualify for maternity allowance for the first time. About 75,000 to 85,000 women will no longer qualify because they were not working when their pregnancies began. However, many of those women will be eligible for some sickness benefit as a result of their previous national insurance contributions. As to maternity grant, the abolition of the £25 lump sum will affect an estimated 750,000 women, but this will be replaced by a payment of about £75 to low income families.

    Mr. Nellist Given that the Tories are the party of family, why is it that The Times estimated last year that 500,000 women would lose entitlement to maternity grant, and that the new payment, which will go to 220,000 785 women, is about £62.88 less than they would have received had the Government increased the grant to the equivalent of its 1969 level? How much does the Minister estimate is the cost of essentials for a new baby? Does he agree with the estimate made by The Mirror last year that the cost is about £450, not the miserable £75 which the Government propose?

    Mr. Major I rarely agree with The Mirror. In this instance, to restore the maternity grant to the 1969 level  – I am bound to say that it was not restored adequately by the Labour Government – would mean providing a grant of £125, at a cost of about £70 million to the Exchequer.

    Mr. Favell Far from the Tories not being the party of the family, would it not be far better, as the Minister for Health suggested earlier, for families to look after their own fathers and mothers, to look after their own children and to provide for their own maternity?

    Mr. Major My hon. Friend makes a valuable point. It might be worth drawing to the attention of the House the fact that our changes in maternity benefits have several important features that will benefit mothers. For the first time, pregnant widows will receive the statutory maternity allowance as well as the widow’s allowance.

    Ms. Richardson Does the Minister realise from the figures that he read out that many women will lose altogether? Does he know that more than 1 million families live on or below the poverty line and that an increasing number of children are born into low-income families? With the changes that the Government propose in the Social Security Bill, more pregnant women will suffer stress and will have to go, with a begging bowl in their hands, to the social fund, but will get nothing. That, together with the cut in child benefit, will lead to a worsening of family support.

    Mr. Major I cannot agree with the hon. Lady. The reality is that most of the families of whom she speaks, and for whom she cares a great deal, will be entitled to the £75 maternity grant from the social fund, which is triple the sum presently paid.

  • Mr Major’s Parliamentary Answer on Private Residential Care (Elderly People) – 28 January 1986

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s Parliamentary Answer on Private Residential Care (Elderly People) on 28th January 1986.

    Mrs. Clwyd Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services when he last visited a private residential care home for the elderly.

    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Security (Mr. John Major) Such visits are made from time to time by Ministers. Most recently I visited such a home in Southampton on 15 January 1986.

    Mrs. Clwyd I am sure that the Minister will agree about not only the physical but the emotional needs of elderly patients. Therefore, what plans does he have to improve social work training for careers in those homes, given the present abysmal level, where less than 10 per cent. have any social training qualification at all?

    Mr. Major The hon. Lady makes an interesting and useful point. She will know that the registration of homes is the responsibility of social service departments. They must satisfy themselves about the level, adequacy and nature of staffing provided in those homes. They are fully aware of the hon. Lady’s point.

    Mrs. Currie May I invite my hon. Friend to visit a private residential care establishment for the elderly in my constituency, where he will find that the standards are first-class? They could be copied throughout the rest of the country. Does he agree that, sooner or later, we will need some form of assessment system for people entering private residential care, to ensure that the large sums of public money being spent are being allocated appropriately?

    Mr. Major My hon. Friend has extended an enticing invitation, which I shall bear in mind. I entirely agree with her observation.

    Mr. Meadowcroft Is the Minister aware that the inflexible restrictions on supplementary benefit payments for residential care are causing great distress and tend to hit the nursing element of care? If the Social Security Commissioner upholds the decision of the local tribunal in Leicester of 3 December, which declared that the restrictions were unlawful, will the Minister undertake immediately to withdraw those restrictions?

    Mr. Major I cannot anticipate that result. We have considered the levels in the Ernst and Whinney report, which we expect shortly. We are committed to a review of residential and nursing home limits within 12 months of their implementation. That is not far away now.

    Mr. Meacher Is the Minister aware that tens of thousands of elderly and disabled people risk acute anxiety as a result of the decision not to cover the rising costs of residential care due to inflation, as a result of which they run a real risk of eviction? Is he further aware that elderly and disabled people whose capital has been depleted below the supplementary benefit level since April last year still have no guarantee of security of tenure? Will he give an absolute and unequivocal guarantee that no elderly person will be evicted from residential care because of the DHSS’s failure to cover the full cost of residential charges?

    Mr. Major Even under the Government of which the hon. General was a distinguished luminary, that happy circumstance did not not apply. Handicapped people and those who have been in homes for some time might be entitled to special hardship provision, for which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has discretion.

    Mr. Meacher That is not a guarantee.

  • Mr Major’s Written Parliamentary Answer on Fraud Investigators – 27 January 1986

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Fraud Investigators on 27th January 1986.

    Mr. Cohen Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services how many fraud investigators his Department employs; and what is his estimate of the amount of public money they saved in 1985.

    Mr. Major I shall let the hon. Member have a reply as soon as possible.

  • Mr Major’s Written Parliamentary Answer on Mr. Salah Abdessalem Ben Rabha – 27 January 1986

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Mr. Salah Abdessalem Ben Rabha on 27th January 1986.

    Mr. Peter Bruinvels Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services whether Mr. Salah Abdessalem Ben Rabha, a Libyan national resident in Wiltshire, is in receipt of any social security benefits.

    Mr. Major It is the Department’s policy not to give information about any individual without their permission.