Forum Home → Discussion → Other benefit issues → Thread
Welfare Reform Bill
forum member
Torbay Disability Information Service, Torbay NHS Care Trust
Total Posts: 342
Joined: 29 June 2010
And as they say: a year is a long time in politics.
If anybody’s interested, I’ve just started a blog looking at the Welfare Reform Bill. The idea is to comment on it as it goes through and to mutter about the implications etc.
http://blog.cix.co.uk/gmorgan/
A very good piece by Polly Toynbee appeared in the Guardian over the weekend.
You can’t cut £18bn from the poorest without pain
Was there a serious problem of a ballooning welfare bill? Mike Brewer of the IFS says unequivocally no. “Labour deliberately increased spending on specific things, such as pension credit and child tax credits.” These had precisely the planned effect, taking a million pensioners and 600,000 children out of poverty. The Department for Work and Pensions bill didn’t rise until the crash.
Long-term unemployment hasn’t risen – it has fallen tenfold over the last decade. In 2000 47,700 had claimed jobseeker’s allowance for five years or more. By this year there are only 4,220 long termers. Research by LSE Professor John Hills shows low earners in the bottom 20% move in and out of insecure work in temporary jobs, never getting their foot on a ladder. The growth of agency work consigns willing workers to a life revolving through the jobcentre door.
Most of the rise in disability living allowance claimants is due to disabled children and young adults who used not to survive, together with the increase in old people – and campaigners encouraging more people to claim. It’s a myth that incapacity benefit rose: it plateaued for a decade.
As for the work programme, to help people into jobs, only two of its 35 prime contractors are from the “big society” voluntary sector: the rest are big firms who will subcontract the real work to specialist charities, skimming 21% off the top: watch out for this unfolding story.
The housing benefit bubble was another convenient myth. The bill did rise 30% in a decade, but that’s surprisingly little when house prices and rents rose 50%.
forum member
welfare rights service, Lancs County Council, Preston
Total Posts: 2
Joined: 23 June 2010
Re Household benefit cap
I’m looking at the impact assessment (http://www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/household-benefit-cap-wr2011-ia.pdf) and , if I’ve got this right, it is going to cost as much to administer as it will save?
hi -
i think the cost of policy as set out in impact assessment (£400m over 2 years) is to indvidual claimants, whereas the savings (same amount) are to government.
rightsnet news story to follow.
cheers ros
forum member
Social policy coordinator, CAB, Basingstoke
Total Posts: 504
Joined: 16 June 2010
Have you looked at clause 102 on recovery of overpayments?
UC, JSA, ESA and the housing element of SPC all to be removed from the scope of s 71 of the Admin Act and to be recoverable full stop, no matter what the reason for the OP.
In fact the new civil penalties, for people who “negligently” make false statements (ie mistakes) will now mop up a lot of the old s 71 overpayments. So you don’t just have to pay the money back, you pay a penalty on top.
Attached is the briefing from Disability Benefits Consortium for MP’s for the second reading debate of Welfare Reform Bill.
File Attachments
- Briefing from the Disability Benefits Consortium 7-3-11 (2).doc (File Size: 107KB - Downloads: 2991)
forum member
Welfare Rights Adviser, Bristol City Council, Bristol
Total Posts: 49
Joined: 21 June 2010
Gareth - where do I find the rules that you may only get PC once both members of a couple are QASPC?
forum member
Welfare Rights Adviser, Bristol City Council, Bristol
Total Posts: 49
Joined: 21 June 2010
thanks for info - it is worrying!
I’m assuming that they will put in some sort of pensioner premium but I’ll be surprised if it’s equivalent to the couple rate difference.
Here’s the Citizens Advice briefing, with scenarios as well.
File Attachments
- CAB briefing on welfare reform.pdf (File Size: 245KB - Downloads: 2653)
forum member
Social policy coordinator, CAB, Basingstoke
Total Posts: 504
Joined: 16 June 2010
I don’t read clauses 3 and 4 of the Bill as saying that you have to claim UC if only one member of a couple is of pension credit age: in fact, the reverse.
Clause 3(2) says that “joint claiamnts are jointly entitled to universal credit if EACH of them meets the basic conditions…” (my emphasis).
Claus 4 (1) sets out the basic conditons which includes “(b) has not reached the qulaifying age for state pension credit”.
So by my reading, if only one of them is under SPC age, they can’t claim UC. They must both be.
Para 64 of Schedule 2
State Pension Credit Act 2002 (c. 16)
64 In section 4 of the State Pension Credit Act 2002 (exclusions), after subsection (1) there is inserted—
“(1A) A claimant is not entitled to state pension credit if he is a member of a couple the other member of which has not attained the qualifying age.”
The explanatory note for which says:
145. Paragraph 64 amends the State Pension Credit Act 2002 so that a member of
a couple who has attained the qualifying age for state pension credit may not receive
state pension credit if the other member of the couple has not attained that qualifying
age. This is to ensure that all claimants who have not attained the qualifying age for
state pension credit are required to claim universal credit and, if appropriate, be
subject to work-related conditions of entitlement.
I suspect that the effect of Ariadne’s clause is to ensure that only the younger person can claim UC and it won’t be a joint claim.
[ Edited: 10 Mar 2011 at 11:11 pm by Gareth Morgan ]The WR Bill has now been sent to a Public Bill Committee for scrutiny and there is a call for written evidence.
Do you have relevant expertise and experience or a special interest in the Welfare Reform Bill? If so, you can submit your views in writing to the House of Commons Public Bill Committee which is going to consider this Bill.
Deadline for submissions - The Committee is able to receive written evidence from Wednesday 9 March, when the Bill passed the Second Reading Stage; and will stop receiving written evidence at the end of the Committee stage on Thursday 10 May.
The sooner you send in your submission, the more time the Committee will have to take it into consideration. The Public Bill Committee is expected to meet for the first time on Tuesday 22 March.
Guidance on submitting evidence to a Public Bill Committee
Second reading of Welfare Reform Bill, now have your say