Universal Credit: Housing Chief Slams Direct Payments as 'Daft'

A housing association's chief executive has labelled the Government's plans for direct payments to tenants under Universal Credit as "daft". Matt Cooney, CEO of asra Housing Group, has written to MPs to urge them to pressure the Government into rethinking its plans, claiming that direct payments will be damaging to both social landlords and tenants.  Mr Cooney said: “There is a lot of discussion in the media about the forthcoming bedroom tax which will see asra’s customers lose about £1.2m collectively in housing benefit. Direct payment of benefits is an ideologically driven change to benefits and it will be extremely damaging to housing associations.”   Read more on the asra website.