Pension Credit and EU nationals

I currently have a 66 year old Polish gentleman who is homeless, he has been in this country since 2014 and has done Agency work up until December 2017.
The reason he became homeless, was due to a fire in the property he was renting. His paperwork was destroyed and his English is very limited, and he has been sleeping rough.

We arranged for DWP to do a claim with him, its turned down on the grounds of Directive 2004/58/EC.

1 My client does hold a valid Polish Passport which we helped him to acquire for means of an ID and he has correspondence from Inland revenue, but apparently the DWP does not accept letters from the Inland Revenue as evidence.

Can anyone suggest a way forward that my client can claim P/Credit as he is not allowed to claim any of the other benefits due to his age.

I am new to this so any help would be appreciated.
Thanks

Well question one is - has this client presented as homeless to the local authority? If not, he has to do so right away. If he has and they have refused to help him, then he needs advice from a solicitor immediately.

To access most benefits (and homelessness assistance from the council for that matter), he will need to have a “right to reside”  - i.e. he will need to have some basis under domestic or EU law to live in the UK.

Most commonly for an EEA national, that means being a “worker” however various other statuses can apply. One instance is where an EEA national has (a) lived in the UK for at least three years (b) worked in the UK for at least 1 year and (c) reached retirement age. In that scenario, the individual becomes a “permanent resident” in the UK and no longer needs to meet any conditions in order to continue to have a right of residence. On the face of it, that would probably apply to your client (there could be other possibilities too).

I don’t see why your client can’t request his employment records from the agency or agencies he has worked for under GDPR.

I think though, the priority is dealing with the housing situation - today ideally - because someone in this position probably doesn’t need to be sleeping rough.

In the first instance, he needs to present to the local authority and insist on a homelessness application being taken. If they refuse to help, then he needs a lawyer.

If you can’t find a lawyer, try Civil Legal Advice on 0345 345 4 345 or our emergency helpline - https://england.shelter.org.uk/get_help/helpline

What Eliot said but I’d also add the following.

You state that he is unable to “claim” Pension Credit (PC), which concerns me slightly as we’ve been hearing more and more tales about people calling the PC helpline and being told they’re not eligible and so they refuse to accept a PC claim. This isn’t lawful - anyone and everyone has a right to make a claim for any benefit.

It’s then for the DWP to decide whether they are eligble for that benefit and issue a decision. Once you have a decision, you can challenge any refusal byway of mandatory reconsideration and then appeal and in doing so, you can request that the DWP look at his NI contributions record, which in turn will help establish whether he (1) was a worker for right to reside purposes and (2) therefore potentially meets the criteria Eliot notes in terms of having reached retirement age and has a permanent right of residence.

One other thing in relation to the homelessness application, we’ve recently updated our factsheet on Homelessness to take account of the changes introduced by the Homelessness Reduction Act 2017.

It’s quite long as a result but sections 4 and 5 are probably most relevant to your client at this stage.

Thank you for the updates its been most useful. I had also requested that the EU team at the DWP contact me, shock they came back straight away. But did give me some guidance with regards getting the claim looked at again and using The Inland Revenue information that I have.

I will also look at the mandatory reconsideration route.

RosieB - 17 August 2018 04:56 PM

Thank you for the updates its been most useful. I had also requested that the EU team at the DWP contact me, shock they came back straight away. But did give me some guidance with regards getting the claim looked at again and using The Inland Revenue information that I have.

I will also look at the mandatory reconsideration route.

Has anything been done about the housing issue?

As far as benefits go, this is a pretty bog standard “DWP says he doesn’t have a right to reside, we say he does” sort of case which will probably get resolved on MR or appeal in a couple of months if you can get some decent evidence together.

What concerns me is that this man is highly likely to be entitled to at least emergency accommodation from the Council and that really needs to be pushed as a priority.

Yes Booked appointment with a housing officer for Monday.

RosieB - 17 August 2018 05:30 PM

Yes Booked appointment with a housing officer for Monday.

Are you still at work - if so, can you put him in touch with our emergency line? He’s likely entitled to temporary accommodation for the weekend - an appointment on Monday isn’t really good enough.