Charity Launches Legal Challenge to Benefit Cuts

Changes to the way housing benefit payments are calculated will be challenged in the High Court by a London-based charity today (19 December).  Zacchaeus 2000 Trust is bringing a case against the DWP, arguing that linking payments to the Consumer Prices Index measure of inflation is unlawful as it is ultra vires (outside of the power of the DWP) and it is in breach of the Equality Act 2012.  The CPI is a measure of inflation, which relates only to goods and services, and specifically discounts housing costs, meaning that the Government has severed the link between housing need and local rents irrevocably.  Read more on the Zacchaeus 2000 website.