Single parents on maternity leave claiming Statutory Maternity Pay or Maternity Allowance who were working at least 16 hours a week before starting maternity leave, are treated as in work for tax credit purposes and so can continue claiming Working Tax Credit to top up their SMP or MA and from the birth will also get Child Benefit and Child Tax Credit.

As they are not actually working, they are eligible to claim Income Support but their income will be above the applicable amount of £64.30 so they will not qualify for IS until their SMP/MA and WTC comes to an end.

For people with high mortgage interest payments, their applicable amount can be much higher than their income if the housing costs are included in the calculation. If they apply for Income Support at the start of their maternity leave but are turned down as their income is too high without housing costs, we had hoped that the waiting period would now be 13 weeks and the mortgage limit £200,000.

However, we have been advised that because they are not in receipt of income support at the start of the waiting period, they would instead have to wait 39 weeks, as prior to the 5.1.01 changes and also be limited to a mortgage of £100,000. Does anyone else have experience of this situation and whether this interpretation is correct - it seems very unfair if this is the case.

Any thoughts would be gratefully received, thanks.