Rent Income Excellence Network Welfare Reform Policy Update 19

Rent Income Excellence Network Welfare Reform Policy update 19

Here is this week’s welfare reform update from HQN Associate Sue Beasor.

HB in the spotlight

In this BBC radio programme Paul Johnson, director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, asks why Britain spends so much on HB – see: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06bnbpx

But does it give an accurate picture? – see: https://speye.wordpress.com/2015/09/21/hb-truth-not-the-ids-bbc-and-ifs-porcine-faeces/

HB for private sector tenants

More than 300,000 low-income working families face a HB shortfall, as a result of government plans to freeze support. Research by Shelter predicts that 80% of working English households claiming support to help meet private-sector rents will be affected by the four-year HB freeze announced in July’s budget – see: http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/sep/10/low-income-families-private-housing- rent-benefit-freeze

Budget changes

The thinktank, the Resolution Foundation, has predicted that one-in-four workers will benefit from the national living wage, but that UK employers will see their total wage bill rise by only 0.6%. However the impact will be much bigger for a handful of industries, including retail and hospitality – see: http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/sep/15/national-living-wage-resolution- foundation-plays-down-fears-over-cost

The Institute for Fiscal Studies has warned the government it risks worsening inequality during workers’ lifetimes by cutting tax credits and reducing income tax rates for the richest – see: http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/sep/22/uk-tax-and-benefit-changes-worsening- inequality-ifs-warns

This article examines how the cut to tax credits will affect claimants after April 2016 – see: http://www.litrg.org.uk/News/2015/150917-How-will-tax-cuts-2016-affect-you

Welfare reform

Dundee City Council is to become the first local authority in Scotland to sign up to a campaign which aims to tackle the stigma encountered by many people living on low incomes – see: http://www.scottishhousingnews.com/5362/dundee-city-council-joins-campaign-against- welfare-stigma/

The Scottish government is to withdraw from one of the UK government’s leading welfare initiatives in protest at Iain Duncan Smith’s decision to abandon key targets for measuring child poverty. Scottish ministers have told the work and pensions secretary they plan to leave the social mobility and child poverty commission headed by former Labour cabinet minister Alan Milburn and that they want Scotland to be excluded from the legislation on child poverty passed by Westminster in 2010 – see: http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/sep/12/scotland-distinct-strategy-eliminating- child-poverty

Lucy Powell, the shadow education secretary, has warned that abolishing free school meals for all five to seven year olds could be damaging for children at the same time as tax credits are cut – see: http://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/sep/20/labour-warns-children-would-go- hungry-if-universal-free-meals-scrapped

Labour’s shadow work and pensions secretary, Owen Smith, has promised to abandon the language of ‘strivers and scroungers’ and signalled a change in tone from his predecessor, who had promised Labour would be tougher on welfare than the Conservatives – see: http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/sep/16/labour-vows-to-abandon-language-of- strivers-and-scroungers

Scottish parents whose children have to spend long periods in hospital will no longer lose their DLA and Carer’s Allowance payments after the child has been in hospital for more than 84 days. The current rule will be abolished as soon as new welfare powers are devolved from Westminster to Holyrood – see: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/scottish-parents-with-sick-children-to- regain-lost-benefits-under-new-changes-10511723.html

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Underoccupation

A new blog by Eileen Herden and colleagues at LSE Housing and Communities, My Spare Room, documents through photographs and first-hand accounts those affected by the ‘bedroom tax’ – see: http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/my-spare-room-the-real-cost-of-the-bedroom-tax/

Digital initiatives

In this article David Leach, director of operations, digital and customer services, Orbit Group, looks at the key steps in delivering digital evolution – see: http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/analysis-and-data/digital-evolution/7011782.article

Two social landlords explain how online systems will play a key part in their future – see: http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/analysis-and-data/analysis/era-of-online/7011785.article

DWP signals the end of DLA

The DWP has produced two factsheets for claimants about DLA ending – see: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/disability-living-allowance-is-ending-claimant- journey

And what happens next – see: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/disability-living-allowance-is-ending-claimant- factsheet

Benefit cap

Jeremy Corbyn has said that the benefit cap should be completely scrapped because of its damaging effects – see: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/the-tories-benefit-cap-should-be- completely-scrapped-jeremy-corbyn-says-10502073.html

But his some of his shadow cabinet ministers do not agree – see: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/jeremy-corbyns-frontbenchers-rebel-over- leaders-opposition-to-the-benefit-cap-10503098.html

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Universal Credit

Peter Marland, Director of Housing Services at Ashton Pioneer Homes, explains how the organisation learned valuable lessons as the first pathfinder for Universal Credit – see: http://www.housing.org.uk/blog/adapting-neighbourhood-management-for-universal-credit/

More than 100,000 households are now claiming Universal Credit, according to DWP statistics. Of the 112,180 claiming as of 13 August, just under a third (31%) were in work, with 69% unemployed – see: http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/policy/welfare-reform/more-than-110000-now-claiming- universal-credit/7011811.article

DWP announces the next phase of the Universal Credit national rollout. The aim is for Universal Credit to be in three-quarters of all jobcentres by Christmas – see: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/next-stage-of-universal-credit-rollout-begins

Fit for work?

A coroner has ‘demanded’ that the government takes action to prevent future deaths of disability benefit claimants, after concluding in an inquest verdict that a disabled man killed himself as a direct result of being found ‘fit for work’ – see: http://www.disabilitynewsservice.com/coroners-ground-breaking-verdict-suicide-was- triggered-by-fit-for-work-test/

The government’s Work Programme is making the lives of people with mental health problems worse and actually making them less able to work, research by Mind has found. It stated that scheme, which requires people to take unpaid work allocated by contractors or risk losing their benefits, has taking the wrong approach and is undermining work – see: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/mental-health-dwp-iain-duncan-smith-work- programme-worse-study-mind-charity-10505037.html

Financial abuse

Elderly people are robbed of cash and assets worth more than £78m each year, and in most cases the culprits are members of their own family, according to new research by Action on Elder Abuse – see: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/elderly-being-robbed-of-millions-each- year-by-their-own-families-says-new-research-10498387.html

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Troubled families

A new £100m government programme, based upon the existing Troubled Families initiative, would help to improve the lives of some of the most excluded people in society, support the integration of local services, and reform poorly targeted spending, according to a report published by the Institute for Public Policy Research – see: http://www.24dash.com/news/housing/2015-09-21-100m-government-programme-to-help- the-most-excluded

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