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The Committee notes that the Government's report has not been received. It hopes that a report will be supplied for examination by the Committee at its next session and that it will contain full information on the matters raised in its previous direct request, which read as follows:

1. Part V (Standards to be complied with by periodical payments). Articles 26 and 27 (Statistical information on the amount of the benefits in conjunction with Articles 10, 17 and 23), and Article 29 (Review of benefits) of the Convention. With reference to its previous comments, the Committee notes the statistical information provided by the Government on the number of beneficiaries and on the total benefits paid. It further notes that, according to the Government, it has not yet been possible on this occasion for the Ecuadorean Institute of Social Security to compile the statistical information requested in the report form adopted by the Governing Body under these Articles of the Convention. The Committee recalls that without such information it can neither ascertain whether the amount of the invalidity, old-age and survivors' benefits attains the percentage prescribed in the schedule appended to Part V of the Convention, nor assess the real impact of the pension increases in relation to changes in the general level of earnings or the cost-of-living index. It therefore once again expresses the hope that the Government will be able to furnish the information requested in its next report.

2. Part VI (Common provisions). Article 34, paragraph 2 (Right of appeal). In its previous comments, the Committee pointed to the absence in the social security legislation of provisions expressly establishing the right of insured persons to be represented or assisted by someone of their choice in an appeal against refusal of benefit or a complaint as to its quality or quantity. In reply, the Government refers to Article 19 of the Constitution guaranteeing the right to defence to every person, which is also applicable to all types of judicial or administrative complaints. The complainant could therefore be represented or assisted by any person in the resulting administrative procedure by simply writing down this wish in a form provided by the social security institution. The Committee notes this information with interest. It believes that, in view of such practices, it will be all the more easy for the Government to insert into the national social security legislation when it is next revised an express provision guaranteeing the right of an insured person to be represented by a person of his choice in an appeal or complaint procedure. In the meantime, the Committee would ask the Government to provide an example of the form handed out by the social security institution referred to by the Government.

3. In reply to the Committee's previous request concerning Article 4, paragraph 2, of the Convention, the Government states that the temporary exceptions of which Ecuador availed itself upon ratifying the Convention, concerned in particular employees in the agricultural sector who, by virtue of Decree No. 21 published in the Official Register No. 434 of 13 May 1986, were later on incorporated into the social security system under a special scheme for the protection of agricultural workers. The Committee would therefore ask the Government to provide a copy of this Decree with its next report. On the other hand, it hopes that the Government's next report will also include the statistical information requested by the report form under Articles 9, paragraph 2, 16, paragraph 2, and 22, paragraph 2, as well as information on any new measures concerning rehabilitation and placement services provided to disabled persons, which might help to improve in practice the application of Article 13 of the Convention.