UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE ACT, 1925. An Act to amend subsection (3) of section one A.D. 1925. and subsection (2) of section three of the Unemployment Insurance (No. 2) Act, 1924, to amend the law with respect to the period on the expiration of which benefit under the Acts relating to unemployment insurance becomes payable and with respect to the rates of contribution under the said Acts, and to continue the saving contained in subsection (1) of section eleven of the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1923. [7th August 1925.] E it enacted by the King's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows: 1. Subsection (3) of section one of the Unemploy- Amendment ment Insurance (No. 2) Act, 1924 (which gives a right to of s. 1 (3) of receive benefit to persons who otherwise would not be Unemploy entitled thereto), shall have effect as if for the words ment In "he shall nevertheless be entitled to receive benefit "surance there were substituted the words "the Minister may, if, 1924. (No. 2) Act, having regard to all the circumstances of the case, he 14 & 15 considers it expedient in the public interest so to do, Geo. 5. c. 30. authorise that person to receive benefit." as to statutory conditions. 2. Subsection (2) of section three of the Unemployment Insurance (No. 2) Act, 1924 (which provides Amendment that during the period between the commencement of that Act and the first day of October, nineteen hundred and twenty-five, a person is to be entitled to receive benefit, if the Minister thinks fit so to direct, notwithstanding that the first statutory condition may not have been fulfilled in his case), shall have effect as though the thirtieth day of June, nineteen hundred and twentyseven, were therein substituted for the first day of October, nineteen hundred and twenty-five. Amendment as to waiting period. Rates of contribution. 11 & 12 Geo. 5. c. 15. 3. Paragraph 1 of Part I. of the First Schedule to the Unemployment Insurance (No. 2) Act, 1924 (which provides that benefit shall be payable in respect of each week after the first three days of a continuous period of unemployment), shall from the first day of October, nineteen hundred and twenty-five, have effect as if the words" the first week" were therein substituted for the words "the first three days." 4. (1) The following provisions shall have effect with respect to the contributions payable under the Unemployment Insurance Acts, 1920 to 1924, in respect of employed persons: (a) As from and after the fourth day of January, nineteen hundred and twenty-six, and thereafter during the remainder of the deficiency period as defined in section sixteen of the Unemployment Insurance (No. 2) Act, 1921, and during a further period thereafter ending on such date as the Minister may by order prescribe, not being a date later than the first day of the insurance year commencing next after the end of the aforesaid deficiency period (the aggregate of which two periods is in this section referred to as "the extended period"), the contributions payable as aforesaid by employed persons and their employers shall be at the respective rates set out in the First Schedule to this Act: (b) As from and after the fifth day of April, nineteen hundred and twenty-six, until the expiration of the extended period, the contribution payable as aforesaid out of moneys provided by Parliament shall be a contribu- (c) If at the end of the first quarter of the year in respect of that quarter, in the case of an employed person being a man by one penny, and in any other case by one halfpenny : (d) If at any time during the extended period the amount of the outstanding advances together with interest accrued thereon does not exceed the amount of the 1925 debt, and the Minister is of opinion, and the Treasury concur therein, that, having regard to all the circumstances of the case, the amount of the advances which will at any time during the next succeeding insurance year be outstanding together with interest accrued thereon is not likely to exceed the amount of the 1925 debt, the Minister may, in respect of contributions payable for that next succeeding insurance year, by regulations reduce the rate of the contribution payable by the employer by one penny in the case of the contribution payable in respect of a man or a woman and by one halfpenny in the case of the contribution payable in respect of any other person. Where it is necessary to ascertain any amount for the purposes of the foregoing paragraphs (c) and (d), that amount shall be ascertained by the Minister in consultation with the Treasury. An order made under paragraph (a) of this subsection shall be laid before both Houses of Parliament in the same manner as regulations made under the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1920, Geo. 5. c. 30. and subsection (3) of section thirty-five of that Act shall apply accordingly. 10 & 11 13 Geo. 5. c. 2. (2) After the end of the extended period the contribution to be made for the purposes of section five of the principal Act out of moneys provided by Parliament shall be at a rate equal to three-sevenths of the aggregate amount of the contributions paid in respect of the employed person by himself and his employer, or, in the case of an exempt person, paid by his employer, and subsections (3) and (7) of the said section five shall have effect accordingly, and the contributions payable by employed persons and their employers shall be at rates to be prescribed under subsection (2) of section four of the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1923, as if the date prescribed under this section were the date prescribed under that section. (3) Nothing in this section shall affect the provisions of sections fifteen and sixteen of the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1920 (which provide respectively for securing the solvency of the unemployment fund and for a periodical revision of the rates of contribution). short title and com. 5.-(1) Notwithstanding anything in any Act, it Saving, shall not be necessary for the Minister at any time repeal, before the first day of July, nineteen hundred and application, twenty-six, to require any association to make for the purposes of proviso (a) to subsection (1) of section mencement. seventeen of the principal Act, any greater provision for unemployment benefit than would have been required to be made for those purposes under that Act as originally enacted. (2) This Act does not apply to Northern Ireland. (3) The enactments set out in the Third Schedule to this Act are hereby repealed to the extent mentioned in the third column of that Schedule as from the dates on which the corresponding provisions of this Act respectively come into operation. (4) This Act may be cited as the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1925, and shall be construed as one with the Unemployment Insurance Acts, 1920 to 1924, and those Acts and this Act may be cited together as the Unemployment Insurance Acts, 1920 to 1925, and any reference in this Act to the Unemployment Insurance Acts, 1920 to 1924, or to any of those Acts, shall, unless the context otherwise requires, be construed as a reference to those Acts, that Act, or that provision, as amended by this Act. (5) This Act shall, except as therein otherwise expressly provided, come into operation on the second Thursday next after the passing thereof. |