Housing Benefit: Social Rented Housing – Parliamentary Written Answer

Alex Norris: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many households with a disabled family member are subject to the removal of the spare room subsidy.

Caroline Dinenage: As of May 2017, there were 414 thousand households in Great Britain who had a deduction made from their Housing Benefit due to the removal of the spare room subsidy. Of these, there were 278 thousand where the claimant or partner was receiving Disability Living Allowance (DLA) or Personal Independence Payment (PIP)or Employment and Support Allowance (ESA).

Housing Benefit: Supported Housing – Parliamentary Written Answer

Mr Roger Godsiff:To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether housing benefit recipients living in supported housing due to mental health problems will be subject to the benefit cap.

Caroline Nokes: People receiving a range of disability benefits including Disability Living Allowance, Personal Independence Payment or who receive the support component of Employment and Support Allowance, are exempt from the benefit cap. The benefit cap does apply to claimants living in specified accommodation if they do not meet the criteria for an exemption but any Housing Benefit they receive will not be taken into account when determining whether the cap should be applied

Disabled Couple Wins Watershed Case on Housing Payments

Councils may have to review their emergency housing payment policies after a High Court ruled that routinely considering disability benefit when calculating discretionary housing payments is unlawful. The High Court has quashed Sandwell Council’s decision to lower its discretionary housing payment (DHP) award to a bedroom-tax hit couple because they received disability living allowance (DLA). In September 2013, the council granted a lower DHP award to a disabled couple because it calculated their DLA as part of their income when they applied for help to cover the bedroom tax. The couple, who live in a three bedroomed specially adapted property, took a judicial review against the local authority in October 2013, arguing that its decision was discriminatory. Read more on Inside Housing.

Pensioners Hit Hardest By £9BILLION Welfare Spending Cuts

Savage spending cuts will soar to nearly £9billion a year, hitting pensioners hardest, a shock report reveals. The study shows PM David Cameron has broken his pre-election pledge to protect the elderly, with a quarter of welfare cuts falling on pensioner households. The Tory-led Government’s biggest cut is a £3.8billion-a-year reduction in pension credit, which tops up weekly income to a guaranteed minimum. Other cuts include a £138million-a-year reduction in the value of attendance allowances – paid to those who look after relatives – and £340million off disability living allowances for OAPs. A large chunk of the losses comes from switching the inflation measure used to set benefits each year from the Retail Prices Index to the lower Consumer Prices Index. Read more on the Sunday Mirror website.

DWP 'Leads the Way in Openness and Transparency'

The DWP is a pioneer of truthfulness regarding statistics, one of its spokespersons has said.  DWP ministers have continually stated that the majority of people on disability living allowance (DLA) were given benefits for life without any supporting medical evidence. The DWP's official press releases claimed that "more than 50% of decisions on entitlement are made on the basis of the claim form alone, without any additional corroborating medical evidence."  But an investigation by the UK Statistics Authority (UKSA) discovered that the real figure for claims passed without supporting medical evidence was actually 10%. The DWP also claimed that up to 71% of claimants get "indefinite awards without systematic reassessments" under the current system of DLA. However, the UKSA found that this claim was also untrue and that in the last two years of the DLA only 23% and 24% of claimants were given indefinite awards. Read more on 24dash.

'Bedroom Tax Victimising Mentally Ill Patients'

The government's controversial bedroom tax is victimising patients with mental health problems, a health campaigner has claimed.  Pam Jenkinson, president of Wokingham Mental Health Association in Berkshire, represented a woman suffering from depression, anxiety and anorexia at an unsuccessful appeal against the bedroom tax last week. The social housing tenant had fallen into arrears of £845 with Wokingham Borough Council after the local authority deemed she was under-occupying her two-bed flat.  Had she qualified for the higher rate of disability living allowance she would have been exempt for the bedroom tax. However, she only qualified for the middle rate of DLA and was consequently with hit with the tax, losing 14% of her weekly housing benefit. Read more on 24dash.

Housing Benefit: Disability – Parliamentary Written Answer

Mr Betts: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions for what reasons his Department's guidance to local authorities on assessing applications for discretionary housing payments, gave discretion to authorities to take account of applicants' entitlement to disability living allowance.

Steve Webb: The regulations covering discretionary housing payments (DHPs) are The Discretionary Financial Assistance Regulations 2001. These regulations allow local authorities to ask for information relating to a claimant's circumstances and income, including entitlement to DLA, as appropriate to enable them to make a decision on a DHP application. DWP guidance states that local authorities may wish to consider the purpose of the claimant's income, and where appropriate can decide to disregard income from disability related benefits as they are intended to be used to help pay for the extra costs of disability. In addition local authorities may like to bear in mind that such money might be committed to other liabilities for which the money was intended.  Local authorities have a duty to act fairly, reasonably and consistently. Each case must be decided on its own merits, and decisions should be consistent throughout the year. However, if a claimant is refused DHP, they could ask the local authority for the decision to be reviewed.

Judicial Review Sought Over Council's 'Unfair' Housing Policy

A Black Country council is facing a judicial review over its handling of a housing benefits claim. A disabled couple is challenging Sandwell Council's decision to offer a lower discretionary payment after including disability payments in their income. Lawyers representing them said it amounted to "disability discrimination". The local authority said it believed it was interpreting guidance "correctly". The couple were now forced to use part of their Disability Living Allowance (DLA) to cover the shortfall in rent. Read more on the BBC website.

Benefit Cuts Hit Thousands of City Residents

Hard-Up residents are calling Nottingham City Council at a rate of more than one a minute over worries about benefits changes that came into force last month.  The Post can reveal that between April 2 and 16, the council answered 5,300 calls and had 2,854 face-to-face enquiries, meaning it dealt with nearly 750 queries a day.  Compared with the same period last year, the service has received 71 per cent more phone calls.  The council has taken on an extra 14 benefits advisers to its team of 58, for the next 11 weeks, to help cope with the demand. Staff have also been working overtime and have cancelled holidays.  Research shows that Government welfare changes, which include changes to Disability Living Allowance, Child Benefit and the Spare Room Subsidy, or Bedroom Tax, will take £120 million out of Nottingham’s economy.  Read more on the Nottingham Post website.

Conservative Claims about Benefits Are Not Just Spin, They're Making It Up

Government ministers like Iain Duncan Smith and Grant Shapps are misrepresenting official statistics for political gain.  In the past few weeks, readers of UK newspapers have learned a number of things about the UK social security system and those who rely on it. They have learned that 878,000 claimants have left employment and support allowance (ESA) to avoid a tough new medical assessment; that thousands have rushed to make claims for disability living allowance (DLA) before a new, more rigorous, assessment is put in place; and that one in four of those set to be affected by the government's benefit cap have moved into work in response to the policy. These stories have a number of things in common. Each is based on an official statistic. Each tells us about how claimants have responded to welfare policy changes. Each includes a statement from a member of the government. And each is demonstrably inaccurate.  Read more on the Guardian website.

Benefit Cap 'Will Encourage People to Work'

Imposing a nationwide cap on benefits will "encourage people into work", the government has said, as the plan is rolled out in four London boroughs.

Couples and lone parents in Haringey, Enfield, Croydon and Bromley will not receive more than £500 a week while a £350 limit applies to single people.

But critics said the cap failed to tackle underlying issues, like the cost of housing and regional differences. The cap will be imposed across England, Scotland and Wales from July. Jobseeker's allowance, income support, child and housing benefit count towards it, but not Disability Living Allowance. Read more on the BBC website.

Housing Benefit: Social Rented Housing – Parliamentary Written Answer

Mr Byrne: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what estimate he has made of the number of disability living allowance recipients affected by the social rated sector under occupancy penalty.

Steve Webb: It is estimated that around 180,000 claimants, where either the claimant or partner are in receipt of disability living allowance will be affected by the social sector under occupation charge.

Government Failing Most Vulnerable Victims of Bedroom Tax

The Government's efforts to help vulnerable people who will be hit by the bedroom tax are falling far short of what is needed. The fund for Discretionary Housing Payments (DHP) has been given a £30m boost this year as the prime minister announced that the extra money would specifically ensure that the most vulnerable people are protected from the bedroom tax cuts.  But the mismatch between what the Government is taking away in housing benefit and what the DHP can help offset has left a gap of over £100m in benefits being taken away from disabled people.  If the £30m of DHP funding was distributed equally among every claimant of Disability Living Allowance (DLA) hit by the tax, they would each receive just £2.51 per week – compared to the average £14 a week loss in housing benefit from the bedroom tax.  Read more on the NHF website.

Disabled Vent Anger at 'Sham' Welfare Consultation

A report, based on consultation responses to the Government's Disability Living Allowance (DLA) reforms, has claimed the Government "misled" MPs and peers over the "hostility" to disability benefit reforms. The damning report - written by disabled people themselves - has labeled the DLA reforms as "disastrous" for sick and disabled people. It will be presented to Parliament today (10 January) amid anger that the views of disabled people have been ignored. Only seven per cent of organisations that took part in the consultation were fully in support of plans to replace DLA with a Personal Independence Payment (PIP), the report claims. Read more and download a copy of the report from the Ekklesia website.