Social Security (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1977

17 Other amendments relating to benefit

(1) In section 18(2) of the principal Act (under which a person who has exhausted his right to unemployment benefit requalifies for it when he has again been employed for 13 weeks in each of which he worked for 21 hours or more) for the words " 21 hours " there shall be substituted the words " 16 hours ".

(2) In section 80 of the principal Act (under which certain claims for benefit may be treated as claims in the alternative for other benefit) after the word " alternative " in both places there shall be inserted the words " or as a claim also ".

(3) It is hereby declared that in relation to any time before 6th April 1975 (which is the date on which the principal Act came into force) any reference to an employed earner or employed earner's employment in Chapters IV and V of Part II of that Act (which relate to benefit for industrial injuries and diseases), and in any other provisions of that Act so far as they relate to those Chapters, is to be construed as a reference respectively to an insured person or insurable employment within the meaning of the provisions relating to industrial injuries and diseases which were in force at that time.

(4) Where, after any benefit or increase of benefit under the principal Act (hereafter in this subsection referred to as a " relevant benefit or increase ") has been paid to a person for a period in respect of a child, child benefit for that period in respect of the child becomes payable at a rate which is such that, had the relevant benefit or increase been awarded after the child benefit became payable, the rate of the relevant benefit or increase would have been reduced, then, except so far as regulations provide otherwise, so much of the relevant benefit or increase as is equal to the difference between the amount of it which was paid for that period and the amount of it which would have been paid for that period if it had been paid at the reduced rate shall be treated as paid on account of child benefit for that period in respect of the child.

(5) Regulations under subsection (3) of section 119 of the principal Act as applied by section 8 of the [1975 c. 61.] Child Benefit Act 1975 may include provision as to the date from which child benefit is to be payable to a person in respect of a child in a case where, before the benefit was awarded to that person, child benefit in respect of the child was awarded to another person.

(6) For the purpose of calculating the rate of an invalidity pension under section 15 of the Pensions Act for a woman to whom that section applies by virtue of subsection (1)(c)(ii) of that section (which relates to a woman entitled to a widow's pension with a reduction under section 26(2) of the principal Act), subsections (3) and (4) of the said section 15 (which relate to that rate) shall have effect with such modifications as are prescribed.