Terms & Conditions

[david farrar]

Good afternoon

Sorry if this has been asked before. We went full service in our area last December.

Under Reg 5(2) of Schedule 3 to the Consequential Provisions Regulations, certain classes of claimant are eligible for greater protection from rent restriction (e.g. pensioners, incapable of work, limited capability for work or a child in the household).

If a claimant is in receipt of UC and occupying supported exempt accommodation, then how do you determine whether the claimant has limited capability for work? Especially with the abolition of the additional WRAG component from April 2017.

Thanks

[David]

Which of the consequential provisions  regulations is this – there have been a number(eg SI 630 and 1788 of 2013)? If you could give me the SI please, that would be helpful.

[david farrar]

Consequential provisions regs 2006

(4) If any person to whom paragraph (10) applies?  

(a) is aged 60 or over; or

(b) is incapable of work for the purposes of one or more of the provisions of the Social Security Act, or Part 2 of the Act; or

(c) is treated as capable of work in accordance with regulations made under section 171E of the Act; or

(d) is a member of the same household as a child or young person for whom he or his partner is responsible,  

no deduction shall be made under paragraph (3) unless suitable cheaper alternative accommodation is available and the authority considers that, taking into account the relevant factors, it is reasonable to expect the claimant to move from his present accommodation.

My concern is with headers 2 and 3

[david farrar]

Can anybody advise how they deal with Universal Credit recipients in this situation?

[David]

You refer to Reg 5(2) of Schedule 3 to the HB Consequential Provisions Regulations but reg 5 just has sub paras a-c?

[david farrar]

Sorry, paragraphs 4(5) has sub-paragraphs a-c

Where as sub-paragraph (4) of 5(2) states:

 
If any person to whom paragraph (10) applies
(a)is aged 60 or over; or
(b)is incapable of work for the purposes of one or more of the provisions of the Social Security Act, or Part 2 of the Act; or
(c)is treated as capable of work in accordance with regulations made under section 171E of the Act; or
(d)is a member of the same household as a child or young person for whom he or his partner is responsible,
no deduction shall be made under paragraph (3) unless suitable cheaper alternative accommodation is available and the authority considers that, taking into account the relevant factors, it is reasonable to expect the claimant to move from his present accommodation.

[ggilley]

Hello

 

We raised this with the DWP and received the following response:

 

Universal Credit is an in and out of work benefit, and claimants who submit a certificate from their GP or consultant advising that they are unfit for work retain full work conditionality until such time that a Work Capability Assessment confirms if they have capability for work. This is therefore a completely different approach than existed with Employment and Support Allowance, where a claimant had no work conditionality during their initial assessment period.

 

As UC claimants who wait for a Work Capability Assessment are not treated as incapable of work and retain full work conditionality, the Secretary of State is therefore not making a decision that they are vulnerable until such time that the Work Capability Assessment identifies that there is limited capability for work.

 

Once limited capability of work is established, indicators exist in the UC record on CIS to confirm this, so Local Authorities will be able to identify such cases.

 

From what I understand, you will only be allowed to treat someone as incapable from the work capability assessment decision and therefore, we are all going to take a hit on subsidy as WCAs take about 3 months.

 

Hope that helps!

Gemma

[cfowkes]

I did try and take this up with the DWP because we have a lot of supported accommodation schemes.  I didnt get very far.  I wonder if anyone else has approached the DWP regarding the subsidy hit?

[Julian Hobson]

I'm not sure i understand this.

The Reg "4" referred to here is the retained HB reg 13(4) for cases where a person occupies "exempt" accommodation under para 4(1) of schedule 3 to the Consequential provision regulations.

Reg 13(4) identifies the vulnerable folk that need to be occupying the "exempt" accomodation in order for the rent restriction not to apply.

As far as i understand this if a person is receiving UC and are yet to be determined as having limited capability for work then their rent will be restricted to the RO maximum notwithstanding that they occupy Exempt accommodation because reg 13(3) will apply to them.

Where someone has limited capability for work you can only restrict to the RO maximum if there is suitable alternative cheaper accommodation, in all other cases reg(3) will not apply to them.

It is only the cases that are not restricted where the subsidy loss occures.

I'm rehearsing this now because we are looking again at all of ours and its so long since I been through it with a fine tooth comb – please dont take what ive said above as gospel – just setting out my reading

 

 

  

[cfowkes]

You could be right Julian.   We have looked at the kind of accommodation first and the need for support etc.  Where the accomodation is supported exempt we have not restricted HB  and have then used the defininition of vulnerable as a guide for subsidy only.

 

 

 

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