1 S.I.
2011/2954: Reported for defective drafting
Local Government (Discretionary Payments) (Injury
Allowances) Regulations 2011 (S.I. 2011/2954)
1.1 The Committee draws the special attention
of both Houses to these Regulations on the ground that they are
defectively drafted in one respect.
1.2 These Regulations set out a scheme for the payment
of discretionary awards to employees of local government pension
scheme employers who sustain an injury or contract a disease in
the course of their work.
1.3 Regulation 9 provides for questions as to the
rights or eligibility of a person to be considered for an award
to be decided initially by the employer. Regulation 11 applies
where a person in relation to whom a decision is made under regulation
9 disagrees with the employer's decision. It allows that person
("the claimant") to apply to a specified person to give
a decision on the disagreement. By virtue of regulation 13, an
application under regulation 11 may be made or continued on behalf
of the claimant by specified persons.
1.4 Paragraph (3) of regulation 11 imposes four requirements
with which an application must comply including "(a) [the
application must] set out the claimant's full name, address and
date of birth; national insurance number (if any) and the name
and address of his or her relevant employer, or, where the claimant
is a person listed in regulation 7(1)(b), that of the deceased's
relevant employer". Paragraph (4) provides that an application
by any other person must also set out (a) his or her relationship
to the claimant, and (b) the claimant's full name, address, date
of birth and national insurance number (if any) and the name of
his or her relevant employer, or, where the claimant is a person
listed in regulation 7(1)(b), that of the deceased's relevant
employer".
1.5 In a memorandum printed at Appendix 1, the Department
for Communities and Local Government accepts that regulation 11(4)(b)
imposes no obligation in addition to that imposed by regulation
11(3)(a). It considers that the Regulations will operate appropriately
notwithstanding the otiose provision and has no immediate plans
to amend them. The Committee does not doubt that applicants are
unlikely to consider themselves obliged to set out the same information
twice in a single application, but does expect the Department
to correct this error when the Regulations are next amended.
1.6 The Committee accordingly reports regulation
11(4)(b) for defective drafting, acknowledged by the Department.
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