WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION. Statistics of Compensation AND OF Proceedings UNDER The Workmen's Compensation Acts, 1906 and 1923, and The Employers' Liability Act, 1880, DURING THE YEAR 1924. Presented to both Houses of Parliament by Command of His Majesty. pense LONDON: PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY HIS MAJESTY'S STATIONERY OFFICE To be purchased directly from H.M. STATIONERY OFFICE at the following addresses: Adastral House, Kingsway, London, W.C.2; 28, Abingdon Street, London, S.W.1; York Street, Manchester; 1, St. Andrew's Crescent, Cardiff; INTRODUCTORY LETTER CONTENTS. .. TABLE 1.-Summary of Payments for Compensation TABLE 7.-Number and Nature of Legal Proceedings under the Workmen's Compensation Acts and Employers' TABLE 8.-Applications for Arbitration and Amounts of Compensation Awarded under the Workmen's TABLE 9.-Memoranda Registered and Amounts of Compen- sation Agreed under the Workmen's Compensation TABLE 11.—Appeals under the Workmen's Compensation Acts TABLE 12.-Appeals under the Employers' Liability Act TABLE 13.-Certificates of Disablement, &c., given by Certifying TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE SIR WILLIAM JOYNSON-HICKS, BART., M.P., HIS MAJESTY'S PRINCIPAL SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT. Sir, I have the honour to present herewith Statistics of Compensation and of Proceedings during the year 1924 under the Workmen's Compensation Acts, 1906 and 1923, and the Employers' Liability Act, 1880, which have been collected and tabulated in the Statistical Branch of the Home Office. Annual statistics have been published from 1908 onwards, excepting the four years 1915 to 1918, during which they had to be suspended on account of the war. The present statistics follow the abbreviated form. adopted in 1914 and subsequent years. The volume contains : I. Statistics as to compensation paid during 1924 under the Workmen's Compensation Acts, 1906 and 1923, in the seven great groups of industries in which returns are called for from employers under Section 12 of the Act of 1906, viz. :-mines, quarries, railways, factories, docks, constructional work and shipping. These groups embrace a large proportion of the chief industries, but it has to be borne in mind that they do not by any means cover the whole field. Besides the various commercial, clerical and domestic employments to which the Act applies, there are several important industries which are not covered by the returns, for example, building, road transport, and agriculture. II. General statistics for 1924 in regard to the administration of the Workmen's Compensation Acts, 1906 and 1923, together with particulars relating to the Employers' Liability Act, 1880. Important changes in the law came into operation at the beginning of 1924 as a result of the passing of the amending Workmen's Compensation Act of 1923, and of the lapse of the Workmen's Compensation (War Addition) Acts, 1917 and 1919. (19213) Wt. 9657 C339 1,500 1/26 Harrow G.79/35. A 2 The main changes affecting the Statistics may be summarised as follows: (1) Injuries resulting in death.--An additional allowance is payable in cases where the dependants include children under the age of 15 years (the amount of the allowance varying according to the number and age of the children), and in these cases the total maximum compensation payable to the dependants is raised from £300 to £600. Further, the minimum compensation payable in any case of death where the workman leaves any persons wholly dependent on his earnings, is raised from £150 to £200 (2) Injuries resulting in disablement.-Under the Act of 1906, compensation was to be a weekly payment not exceeding 50 per cent. of the earnings of the disabled workman up to a maximum of £1. Under the War Addition Acts this was increased in the case of totally disabled workmen by an additional weekly allowance equal to 75 per cent. of the weekly compensation, but these Acts were temporary measures and (subject to a saving for existing cases) expired on the 31st December, 1923. By the Act of 1923, the maximum is raised to 30/- and the lower paid workers (with wages under 50/- a week) are allowed a higher rate ranging up to 75 per cent. of their weekly earnings. An important alteration was also introduced by the Act of 1923 in regard to the waiting period. Under the Act of 1906, compensation was payable only for disablement lasting more than a week but was dated back if the disablement lasted two weeks or more. Under the Act of 1923 compensation is payable for disablement lasting more than three days, and is dated back if the disablement lasts four weeks or upwards. These and other less important changes are reflected in the present Statistics, and their effects are noticed in the appropriate paragraphs. It should be noted that cases arising in Ireland, which were included in the statistics for 1921 and previous years, are not included in the statistics for 1922 to 1924, the power to collect statistics of such cases being now vested in the Governments of Northern Ireland and the Irish Free State. In the comparative tables, which are given below in connection with Part I of the Statistics, it has not been possible to separate and exclude the Irish cases from the figures for the years previous to 1922, and this must of course affect, though not, it is considered, to any serious extent, the comparison of the figures for 1922 to 1924 with those of previous years. Part I. Statistics of Compensation in Certain Industries. The information in Tables 1 to 6 relating to the seven. groups of industries was obtained from returns received from individual employers, and from collective returns supplied by Employers' Mutual Indemnity Associations and Insurance Companies who are under an arrangement with the Home Office to make returns on behalf of the employers belonging to or insured by them. The collective returns made by these Associations and Companies covered 120,244 employers and accounted for 75.1 per cent. of the fatal cases, and 73 per cent. of the compensation in such cases, and 74.5 per cent. of the disablement cases, and 77.6 per cent. of the compensation in such cases in the seven industries. The Of the total amount of compensation paid, £3,604,763, or 54 per cent., was paid by Mutual Indemnity Associations; £1,542,175, or 23.1 per cent., by Insurance Companies, and £1,528,100, or 22.9 per cent., by uninsured employers. practice as regards insurance appears to differ widely in different industries. For example, in the case of the mining industry 73.9 per cent. of the compensation was paid by Mutual Indemnity Associations, 8.5 per cent. by Insurance Companies, and 17.6 per cent. by uninsured employers. In the case of the cotton industry the proportions were, Mutual Indemnity Associations 79.7 per cent., Insurance Companies 17.9 per cent., and uninsured employers 2.4 per cent., and in the case of the woollen industry, Mutual Indemnity Associations 23-8 per cent., Insurance Companies 66.5 per cent., and uninsured employers 9.7 per cent. In the case of constructional work the proportions were Mutual Indemnity Associations 10.7 per cent., Insurance Companies 69.9 per cent., and uninsured employers 19.4 per cent. 18,307 returns were received from uninsured employers, of which 2,541 gave particulars of payments of compensation under the Act, while 15,766 were "Nil" returns, i.e., to the effect that there had been no cases of compensation. The aggregate number of persons coming within the provisions of the Act who were employed in the seven industries was 7,512,359. The corresponding figures for the years 1915 to 1918 are not available. The figures for preceding and subsequent years were: (It should be noted that the figure which the employer is asked to give is the average number employed throughout the year.) (19213) A 3 |