Housing Benefit: Social Rented Housing – Parliamentary Written Answer

Mr Laurence Robertson: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions if he will consider excluding blind and partially-sighted people from the changes to housing benefit eligibility in respect of the spare room subsidy.

Steve Webb: We carefully considered whether it would be feasible to develop exemptions for specific groups. However, it was not possible to design exemptions that could be defined precisely enough in legislation to be simple and efficient to administer. Consequently, we have announced the addition of £25 million to the Discretionary Housing Payments (DHPs) budget from 2013-14. This is specifically intended to support disabled people living in significantly adapted accommodation, including people who are blind or partially-sighted. The measure will however be monitored and evaluated over a two-year period from April 2013. Initial findings will be available in 2014 and the final report will be released in late 2015.