MAJORITY REPORT. 
3 
—E 
EE 
We have no indication that employers have objected to the 
arrangement under which they pay the contribution, and 
although we do not think there is very much substance in the 
argument that an employer would give preference to persons 
with private incomes if he had not to pay a contribution, the 
system provides a useful answer to such a criticism. We do 
not think that exempt persons should be deprived of medical 
benefit which they have enjoyed for 11 years. To do 
so would be deliberately to go back on the provisions of 
the 1913 Act, and we share the view of the Ministry of Health 
that any removal of medical benefit from those who have enjoyed 
it would be a retrograde step. 
533. We suggest one small amendment in the system. Aft 
present, where the total income of an exempt person, from all 
sources, exceeds £160 a year, he is required to make his own 
arrangements for receiving medical treatment and attendance. 
This was the income limit in the 1918 Act, and it was not 
raised in 1918 to meet the depreciation in the purchasing power 
of money when all the other figures were raised by, approxi- 
mately, 50 per cent. We understand that this was due to the 
feeling of the medical profession at the time that there should 
be as little extension of contract practice as possible. We think, 
however, that in view of the limits otherwise provided in the 
system, this limit should now be raised to £250 per annum. 
MEN SERVING IN THE FORCES OF THE CROWN. 
534. Men serving in the Armed Forces of the Crown are 
required to be insured under the National Health Insurance 
Act, but, inasmuch as their service pay continues during illness 
and full medical attendance is provided by the Service Authori- 
ties, the only insurance benefit to which they are entitled is 
maternity benefit. The contribution payable is 34d. a week, 
the whole of which is paid by the Service Departments. This 
contribution, in addition to covering the cost of maternity 
benefit, provides the funds required to enable the men on dis- 
charge from the Forces to continue in full insurance as civilians. 
No contribution cards are used during service, but the contribu- 
tions are paid in bulk by the Service Departments to the National 
Health Insurance Fund and are credited to the appropriate 
Approved Societies on the basis of a record, obtained from each 
man on his enlistment, of the Approved Society of which he is 
a member. 
535. Tt was stated in evidence given on behalf of the Ministry 
of Health that this system gives rise to some administrative 
inconvenience, owing to the difficulty of obtaining from a man 
on his enlistment correct particulars of his Approved Society 
(Kinnear, Q. 373). Many men are found on discharge to have 
been members of Societies, although on enlistment they stated