Universal Credit and War Pension

UC claim for a War Pensioner
One of the supplementary allowances that can be included with a War Pension claim is Unemployability Supplement. To qualify for Unemployability Supplement the War Pension must be paid for a pensioned disablement of 60% rate or higher. The veteran must be under 65 when the claim was made, and the accepted condition(s) must be ‘so serious that they cannot work’.
Unemployability Supplement overlaps with ESA. This has never proved a problem for our Members as if they were paying rent they could access Housing Benefit.
However, now Universal Credit is here we may have a problem, which could be a potential unintended consequence that the government did not foresee.
One positive is the War Pension is ignored as income for Universal Credit. However, to claim UC they will still have to meet LCW and LCWRA criteria which is much harder than Unemployability Supplement. This may therefore mean they do not meet the criteria for UC and therefore cannot claim help with their rent. I can’t see anything in the legislation that would cover for this situation.
I just want people’s opinion as to whether I have this correct as a potential problem. If so we will take this up with DWP / ministerial level as this could be viewed as going against the Armed Forces Covenant – those who have served in the nations armed forces should face no disadvantage when accessing government support e.g. benefits and social care.
Grateful for anyone’s thoughts.
Best wishes
Liz

Not in the UK at the moment so I can’t check my library but, presumably, this will also apply to those still getting Unemployability Supplement as an add-on to IIDB, even though there have been no new claims since the 80s.

Like Gareth, I am away from any books (for the more boring reason that I’m waiting for a train in Blighty) so this is a bit off the cuff but why would a claimant in this situation need to have LCW to claim UC?

Surely it would just be a matter of signing a claimant commitment to get the standard allowance and housing costs element and then (assuming fit notes are supplied) a WCA would be carried out down the line. If they fail that, they just stay on UC with full conditionality.

Whilst the default claimant commitment may require the claimant to look for work, it doesn’t require them to be capable of it.