Apparently you can’t voluntarily switch from legacy benefits to UC

According to Damian Hinds - http://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-question/Commons/2017-10-27/110119

Have I got this wrong now but I thought in a full service area anyone could choose to make a UC claim and legacy benefits would then stop? Or am I getting confused??

They can voluntarily claim though ...  There are no gateway conditions so the basic conditions of entitlement would apply?
The claim for UC would abolish the legacy benefits.
And we hear that claimants are being in some cases advised by DWP to make a claim.

Yep - I think the answer is simply wrong. Whether misinformed or deliberately wrong (to avoid answering the question), who knows. But we’ve all seen examples of JC+ advising people to claim UC when in fact they didn’t have to - they didn’t meet gateway conditions, or the change of circs was one that doesn’t necessitate a new claim for a legacy benefit.

Arguably you never HAVE to claim UC, but sometimes it is unavoidable because you need money & the conditions are such that it isn’t possible to claim a legacy benefit any more.

That’s exactly what I thought! Couldn’t believe his answer when I saw it and then started doubting myself!

How can they just make the up the answers to important questions?

Especially when it’s a written answer and they’ve got advisers there to help him - it’s not like it was said on the spur of a moment in a debate - it’s a considered answer! I despair!!

To be fair, that would be the correct answer in most cases in live service.  But Chi Onwurah is a Newcastle MP and the question is obviously inspired by issues arising as a result of that area having gone to full service a while back.

The art of being a politician: make sonorous, assured pronouncements as if you are the world’s greatest expert on something you have been briefed about five minutes ago, having never previously given it a second’s thought.  Adopt the same tone when indignantly denying doing whatever it is you have been caught doing.