¹ Titmuss, Richard M., Income Distribution and Social Change, London: Allen and Unwin, 1962.Google Scholar

² See Bell, Kathleen, Disequilibrium in Welfare, Inaugural Lecture, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, 1973.Google Scholar

³ Child Poverty Action Group, A Policy for Establishing the Legal Rights of Low Income Families, London: CPAG, 1969Google Scholar; see also LAG, the Bulletin of the Legal Action Group.

⁴ See de Smith, S. A., Judicial Review of Administrative Action, London: Stevens, 1959, p. 10.Google Scholar

⁵ Report of the Committee on Administrative Tribunals and Inquiries, London: HMSO, Cmnd. 218, 1957.Google Scholar

⁶ Throughout the research we benefited from expert advice and assistance. We had the full co-operation of D.H.S.S. and the tribunals. The University of Edinburgh was associated with the NILT project; the Council on Tribunals, the Lord Chancellor's Office and his Legal Aid Advisory Committee had an interest in it.

⁷ For discussion of growth of administrative tribunals, see Foulkes, David F., Introduction to Administrative Law, London: Butterworth, 1972 (3rd edn.)Google Scholar; Griffith, J. A. G. and Street, H., Principles of Administrative Law, Pitmans, 1965 (3rd edn.)Google Scholar; Street, Harry, Justice in the Welfare State, London: Stevens, 1968Google Scholar; Bell, Kathleen, Tribunals in the Social Services, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969.Google Scholar

⁸ Report of the Committee on Ministers' Powers, London: HMSO, Cmd. 4060, 1932.Google Scholar

⁹ Report of the Committee on Procedure and Evidence for the Determination of Claims for Unemployment Insurance Benefit, London: HMSO, Cmd. 3415, 1929.Google Scholar

¹⁰ Report of the Royal Commission on Unemployment Insurance, London: HMSO, Cmd. 4185, 1932.Google Scholar

¹¹ Social Insurance and Allied Services, London: HMSO, Cmd. 6404, 1942.Google Scholar

¹² There are, in fact, a Chief Commissioner and a number of Assistant Commissioners.

¹³ Reported Decisions of the Commissioner under the National Insurance, National Insurance (Industrial Injuries) and Family Allowances Acts, London: HMSO.Google Scholar

¹⁴ Statutorily, chairmen as well as wingmen are ‘members’; therefore throughout the article ‘other’ should appear before ‘members’ where reference is made to wingmen.

¹⁵ NILTs are constituted under the National Insurance Act 1965. The statutory rules governing their procedure are made under s. 73(1) of that Act.

¹⁶ See Annual Reports of the Council on Tribunals (1959–1973), London: HMSOGoogle Scholar, and Bell, Kathleen, ‘Administrative Tribunals since Franks’, Social and Economic Administration, Vol. 4, No. 4, 10. 1970, pp. 279–305.Google Scholar

¹⁷ Invalidity pension and allowance were not introduced until 1971 so they do not appear in our data.

¹⁸ Certain questions mainly concerned with whether contribution conditions are satisfied are determined by the Secretary of State with an appeal to the High Court on a point of law.

¹⁹ Unless otherwise stated these data are derived from a special analysis of D.H.S.S. records. We obtained from these records information for each final NILT hearing in which a case was allowed in whole or in part, disallowed, or withdrawn. The information is for Scotland and the Northern Region of England and for 1970. The information for the Northern Region of England was extracted and analysed first as something of an experiment to determine if an extension of the same exercise to the larger volume of Scottish data was justifiable. It was. Accordingly we analysed the Scottish data in a comparable way and gathered in addition further information for Scotland which we had not obtained for the Northern Region.

In 1972 when our work began the records for Scotland would have begun to be sent for destruction according to an established schedule which proceeds on a month by month basis after a lapse of two years. Local offices were instructed to suspend this schedule but owing to a misunderstanding some sets of the papers relating to the early part of 1970 for Scotland were in fact destroyed. We were able to obtain some of the lost data from other sources but there remains a number of cases representing 6.5 per cent of the final NILT hearings for which we have no information. We think, however, that the lost material is unlikely to differ in any systematic way from the remainder and for most of our purposes the cases we have can be regarded as a complete universe.

Altogether 7,528 cases were included in our study. They constitute 21 per cent of all appeals and references to NILTs in Great Britain in 1970. 5,007 of our cases were from Scotland and 2,521 from the Northern Region. In the text figures frequently relate to smaller totals. This is because not every item of information was recorded in every case record. Differences between the total number of cases given above and the appropriate total in the text indicate in each case the number of cases for which the particular item of information was not available.

²⁰ D.H.S.S. Annual Report 1970, London: HMSO, Cmnd. 4714, 1971, p. 365Google Scholar. Comparable totals for the two adjacent years are: 1969, 34,812; 1971, 29, 331.

²¹ See footnote 19 above.

²² The form is in course of amendment.

²³ For the Northern Region 96 per cent.

²⁴ In Scotland a small number (8) had been granted a partial allowance.

²⁵ There were in addition a further 75 cases for Scotland which we have excluded from the table because all the necessary information is not available.

²⁶ See Table 1, line 3, above.

²⁷ For the Northern Region the range is from 378 hearings to 34.

²⁸ Dixon, Robert G. Jr., ‘The Welfare State and Mass Justice: A Warning from the Social Security Disability Program’, Duke Law Journal, Vol. 1972, No. 4, 09 1972, pp. 681–741CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The SSA disability insurance scheme is not to be equated with British industrial disability benefits. It is concerned essentially with total incapacity for gainful employment. Dixon's study shows that efforts to introduce standardization, objectivity and uniformity in proceedings in borderline disability claims have largely failed.

²⁹ The title ‘hearing examiner’ was changed in 1972 to ‘administrative law judge’. Claimants who are refused a disability allowance have a right to a hearing which is in many respects similar to, although not identical with, an appeal to a tribunal in this country.

³⁰ Dixon, Robert G., op. cit., p. 717.Google Scholar

³¹ A postal questionnaire was sent to all (71) NILT chairmen in Scotland and the Northern Region in 1970. Completed questionnaires were obtained from 60 (84.5 per cent).

A postal questionnaire was also sent to one in two NILT members serving at December 1970 in Scotland and the Northern Region. The population of members was stratified by region (Scotland and Northern Region), by type of panel (employers' and employees') and by sex. Completed returns were obtained from 483 (67.3 per cent).

For the survey of appellants we attempted personal interviews with every appellant receiving a decision at eight NILTs in and around Tyneside from mid-May to the end of July in 1972. We completed interviews with 244 out of a total of 272. The eight tribunals together deal with a little more than half the cases coming to NILTs in the Northern Region. They provide considerable variety in characteristics and as a group we think they are reasonably representative of NILTs in the Northern Region.

Our data analysis (see footnote 18 above) provides information which in some matters is comparable to that available to us from the survey of appellants. It should in fact be superior to the interview survey since it represents a census of appellants in Scotland and the Northern Region and not merely a sample. But the information available to us from the data analysis suffers in some instances because not all the items were recorded in the original documents. The comparisons that can be made, however, reveal patterns which are sufficiently similar to encourage us to believe that material we present from the appellants' survey can be taken broadly as being representative of appellants in both areas with which we are concerned.

The numbers on which the percentages in the text are based are in each case the numbers of returned questionnaires or of completed interviews. These numbers are: chairmen 60; members 483 (employers' representatives 257, employees' representatives 226); appellants 244.

³² Information of a similar nature about chairmen and members (but not appellants) is to to be found in Cavenagh, W. E. and Newton, D., ‘The Membership of Administrative Tribunals’, Public Administration, Vol. 48, Winter 1970, pp. 449–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³³ This figure of 80 per cent comes from the data analysis. The comparable figure from the survey is 81 per cent. In this case material from the data analysis is virtually complete.

³⁴ Percentages do not always sum to 100 because of rounding.

³⁵ The remainder were widowed, divorced or separated, although in some cases we failed to obtain the necessary information. The interviews of appellants showed a larger proportion for divorced or separated and a smaller proportion for ‘no reply’ than either the postal questionnaires or the data analysis. It seems likely that informants are more willing to give this information in a personal and private interview than in other contexts.

³⁶ Including G.C.E. ‘0’ level, ‘A’ level and equivalents.

³⁷ All the chairmen are now legally qualified.

³⁸ E.g. Justice of the Peace, Coroner.

³⁹ The ‘reverse’ could of course apply, although this seems implausible.