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Forum Home  →  Discussion  →  Other benefit issues  →  Thread

Council Tax Reduction Schemes - UC housing costs

Liz W
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Welfare Benefits Unit, York

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Hi

If your local authority has adopted a ‘banding’ CTR scheme can you let me know if they take (or do not take) UC housing costs into account. I’m hoping to gather evidence to influence interpretation of Scheme guidance locally.

We cover North Yorkshire and York. Three local authorities are using a banded CTRS. Each uses a similar Scheme Document and all have the same wording relating to UC housing costs:

The authority may adjust the amount referred to in sub-paragraph (1) to take account of ... (d) an amount, which, in the opinion of the authority represents any award of housing costs.

[Sub-paragraph (1) - DWP’s UC figure]

Two authorities (Selby and Ryedale) are, as would be expected, ignoring any UC housing costs when assessing entitlement to CTR (just as they ignore HB). However, one authority (Hambleton) is including UC housing costs - pushing a lot of people out of entitlement or dramatically reducing their entitlement.

Just generally re CTRS banded schemes - is anyone taking any action locally or nationally in challenging the outcomes of these schemes? It seems clear that they impact more negatively on claimants with additional support in living costs benefits due to incapacity, disability or number of children.

Jon (CANY)
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Welfare benefits - Craven CAB, North Yorkshire

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Hi Liz
I had reason to look at this recently. Just from a web search on last year’s schemes, I saw that Barnsley MBC had a similar clause about the UC housing element.

Again, it was unclear (to me at least) as to whether they “take account” of it by disregarding it, or counting it as income.

Helen Rogers
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Welfare rights officer - Stockport MBC

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Don’t know if this helps, but thought it was worth flagging up that our local authority disregard the UC hsg element if the claimant has no earnings, but take it into account in full if the claimant has any amount of earnings that month.  This means that very few tenants in work and on UC qualify for CTS in this area.  But it also has the effect that claimants with a very small amount of earnings (eg £20 or £30 pcm) have their CT liability increased to a figure greater than the amount they have earned.

Our LA doesn’t have a banded system as such but restricts CTS to either a Band A or Band B level according to how many bedrooms the household needs using the LHA rules.

Liz W
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Welfare Benefits Unit, York

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Thanks for your replies.

Helen - that’s shocking. A real disincentive to working. And absolutely unexpected I’m sure for most people who find themselves with an increased bill.

Thanks Jon. I’ve contacted Barnsley to ask them how they use the criteria. Love that their strapline is “The Place of Possibilities” -  must be worth a visit at least!

We’re struggling to know how to best tackle issues with the CTRS inequities. I’m looking at Public Law arguments with appeals. It’s quite complex to try to explain to Councillors and highlight the impact in an accessible way.

Peter Turville
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Welfare rights worker - Oxford Community Work Agency

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Oxford city has introduced a banded scheme for all working age claimants for 21-22 and has had a banded scheme for UC recipients only for a couple of years. However, there have been issues with the 21-22 scheme - see https://www.rightsnet.org.uk/forums/viewthread/17201/

The UC only scheme disregarded housing costs as part of UC income (although there were issues with the definition of what else was included as ‘UC income’). Details of the City’s UC only scheme for 20-21 (Class F) are still on the council’s website. There is still only very limited info. about the 21-22 scheme and the full rules have yet to be published.

UPDATE

The 21-22 scheme has been published
https://www.oxford.gov.uk/downloads/file/7281/council_tax_reduction_scheme_working_age_april_21

[ Edited: 27 May 2021 at 03:40 pm by Peter Turville ]
Timothy Seaside
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Housing services - Arun District Council

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Liz W - 21 May 2021 12:35 PM

Just generally re CTRS banded schemes - is anyone taking any action locally or nationally in challenging the outcomes of these schemes? It seems clear that they impact more negatively on claimants with additional support in living costs benefits due to incapacity, disability or number of children.

We have a banded scheme which has exactly this impact on families and people with LCWRA.

I have a tenant on UC whose girlfriend (who was getting ESA) has just moved in with him. Their combined income is lower than it was before, but they have gone from a 90% CTR to a 50% CTR because of the LCWRA and Carer Element.

I’ve raised this (and other CTR issues) internally but I think the reality is that LAs will continue with this sort of thing until somebody raises a legal challenge. Frankly I can’t see how it can be lawful - it appears to be pretty clear-cut disability discrimination, and even if it’s indirect I can’t see any justification.

In answer to your main question (about housing costs); our scheme also has that wording, but it is consistently applied so that housing costs are disregarded as income. I think it’s a very poor template as it makes the disregard discretionary but without any indication of how that discretion is to be used. But to me this is just a reminder of what a bad idea CTR is as a replacement to CTB - apart from the obvious postcode lottery, there is the fact that LAs are not good at drawing up detailed benefit legislation. So they copy some from somewhere and possibly modify it a bit and then interpret it however they want with very little chance of challenge (and very little chance of a sensible decision from a VT if they are challenged).

Peter Turville
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Welfare rights worker - Oxford Community Work Agency

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Timothy (and others) - do your banded schemes operate without an applicable amount in the calculation and are based solely on some form of income calculation (including income disregards)?

Looking further at the 21-22 Oxford scheme for CTR claimants not on UC or ‘passported benefits’ (i.e. on WTC or only other income) the absence of an applicable amount and therefore the various premiums means they no longer benefit from the higher applicable amount that generates before applying the ‘excess income’ figure to calculate income for banding. I’m thinking therefore some claimants are worse off due to no longer getting the benefit of, for example, a carer, disability or severe disability premium (I need to undertake some worked examples).

Now that CTC has been disregarded as an income in the Oxford scheme that mitigates the loss of child additions & premiums but not the others?

Timothy Seaside
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Housing services - Arun District Council

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Yes, that’s exactly what is happening. The income doesn’t take any account of household circumstances. One of the effects of this is that any family that is benefit-capped will be asked to pay 100% Council Tax. It is terribly unfair (and actually unpopular with most of the benefit staff I’ve spoken to about it).