Unemployment Act 1934
| Jurisdiction | UK Non-devolved |
| Citation | 1934 c. 29 |
| Year | 1934 |
Unemployment Act, 1934.
(24 & 25 Geo. 5.) CHAPTER 29.
An Act to amend the Unemployment Insurance Acts, 1920 to 1933, and to make further provision for the training and assistance of persons who are capable of, and available for, work but have no work or only part-time or intermittent work; and for purposes connected with the matters aforesaid.
[28th June 1934]
B 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:—
Part I.
Amendment of Unemployment Insurance Acts.
Insured Persons.
1 Age for entry into insurance and contributions in respect of persons under sixteen.
(1) The minimum age for entry into insurance under the principal Act shall, instead of being the age of sixteen years, be the age (not being less than fourteen years) when a person attains the age at which under the law for the time being in force his parents cease to be under an obligation to cause him to attend school unless there is some reasonable excuse.
(2) The rates of contribution applicable under the Unemployment Insurance Acts, 1920 to 1933, in the case persons under the age of eighteen years shall apply only as respects persons who are between the ages of sixteen and eighteen years, and the contributions payable under the Unemployment Insurance Acts by employed persons and their employers shall, in the case of persons who have not attained the age of sixteen years be at the following rates, that is to say, from the employed person for each week twopence, and from the employer for each week twopence.
(3) Subject to, and in accordance with, the provisions of Part I of the First Schedule to this Act, the Minister shall, after consultation with the Board of Education and the Scottish Education Department, and with the approval of the Treasury, provide by regulations for crediting with contributions any persons who, after attaining the age at which the period of compulsory elementary instruction ends, have continued to receive whole-time education, and the provisions of Part II of that Schedule shall have effect as to the reckoning of contributions so credited.
Regulations made under this subsection shall not come into force until the expiration of twelve months after the coming into operation of this section, but as from the date on which they come into force shall apply to persons who, having previously (whether before or after the commencement of this Part of this Act) attained the age aforesaid, have continued and are then continuing to receive whole time education.
(4) This section shall come into operation on the third day of September, nineteen hundred and thirty-four, or on such earlier date as the Minister may by order direct.
2 Power to enlarge or restrict excepted employments.
(1) Where it appears to the Minister that the terms and conditions of service of, and the nature of the work performed by any class of persons employed in an excepted employment are so similar to the terms and conditions of service of, and the nature of the work performed by, a class of persons employed in an insurable employment as to result in anomalies in the operation of the Unemployment Insurance Acts, the Minister may, by regulations made with the consent of the Treasury, either unconditionally or subject to such conditions as may be specified in the regulations, either—
(a ) provide for including the class of persons employed in insurable employment among the classes of persons employed in excepted employment; or
(b ) provide for including the class of persons employed in excepted employment among the classes of persons employed in insurable employment.
(2) Section four of the principal Act shall cease to have effect but any order or special order made under that section shall continue in force and have effect as if the provisions thereof had been made by regulations.
(3) The Minister may by regulations provide, subject to such exceptions and conditions as he thinks fit, for adding any class of employment to the excepted employments only as respects persons who are in any week employed in that class of employment to such extent (being in the opinion of the Minister inconsiderable) as may be specified in the regulations.
Benefit.
3 Right to, and duration of, benefit.
(1) An insured contributor who is between the ages of sixteen and sixty-five years and is unemployed shall, if he proves that the statutory conditions are fulfilled in his case, and if he is not disqualified under the Unemployment Insurance Acts for the receipt of benefit, be entitled, subject to the provisions of those Acts, to receive in a benefit year, benefit—
(a ) in respect of periods not exceeding in the aggregate one hundred and fifty-six days; and
(b ) if qualified for additional days under the provisions of the next following subsection, in respect of additional days of which the maximum number shall be computed in manner provided by that subsection.
(2) The following provisions shall have effect with respect to additional days—
(a ) an insured contributor shall be qualified for additional days if at the beginning of the benefit year five insurance years have elapsed since the beginning of the insurance year in which he first became such a contributor, so, however, that a person shall cease to be so qualified if at the beginning of any benefit year five consecutive insurance years have elapsed without contributions being paid in respect of him as an insured contributor, but upon contributions being again so paid shall be treated for the purposes of this paragraph as if he had then first become an insured contributor;
(b ) the maximum number of additional days in any benefit year shall be computed, in the case of an insured contributor qualified for such days, by allowing to him days at the rate of three for every five contributions paid in respect of him as an insured contributor in respect of the last five years, less one day for every five days in respect of which benefit has been paid to him in respect of the benefit years which ended in the last five years.
For the purposes of this paragraph—
(i) the expression ‘the last five years’ means the period of five complete insurance years last preceding the beginning of the benefit year in respect of which the computation of additional days is made;
(ii) every two contributions paid in respect of a person as an insured contributor under the age of eighteen years shall be reckoned as one contribution;
(iii) fractions of a day shall be disregarded.
(3) An insured contributor who has in any benefit year exhausted his benefit rights shall not thereafter be entitled to benefit in respect of any day in that benefit year, nor shall be become entitled to benefit in his next benefit year before the Monday next after the end of the calendar week for which there is paid the last of the ten contributions mentioned in paragraph (b ) of the next following section.
(4) In calculating contributions for the purposes of the last two foregoing subsections, paragraph (i) of subsection (2) of section five of the Unemployment Insurance Act 1927 (which provides that no account shall be taken of any contributions paid in respect of any person in respect of any period during which he was not bona fide employed) shall apply in like manner as it applies in calculating the thirty contributions required by the first statutory condition.
(5) The Minister may by regulations make provision as to the circumstances in which and the extent to which contributions paid in error and sums paid to a person by way of benefit while he was not entitled thereto are to be taken into account for the purposes of this and the next following section.
(6) After an insured contributor has at the beginning of his benefit year proved that the first statutory condition is fulfilled in his case, then, subject to and in accordance with regulations made by the Minister, he shall be treated throughout the remainder of that benefit year as if that condition continued to be so fulfilled.
4 Definition of benefit year.
(1) For all the purposes of the Unemployment Insurance Acts, the expression ‘benefit year’ shall mean, in relation to an insured contributor, the period of twelve months beginning on the date on which, on a claim for benefit, he proves for the first time after the commencement of this Part of this Act—
(a ) that the first statutory condition is fulfilled in his case; and
(b ) in the case only of an insured contributor who has exhausted his benefit rights in his last preceding benefit year, also that contributions have been paid in respect of him for ten weeks since the Sunday last before the last day in that benefit year in respect of which he received benefit;
and every subsequent period of twelve months commencing on the date on which that contributor on a claim for benefit proves the matters aforesaid for the first time after the termination of his last preceding benefit year.
(2) If, in the case of any insured contributor, it is found that he has been treated in error as having begun his benefit year on any date by reason of his having been wrongly treated as having proved any of the matters aforesaid on that date, his benefit year shall nevertheless be deemed to have begun on that date, but he shall not be entitled to benefit during the remainder of that year until he proves those matters.
5 Provisions as to rates of benefit.
(1) As from the first day of July, nineteen...
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