HC Deb 24 March 1958 vol 585 cc17-9
29. Mr. Dodds

asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance what is the latest available information of the number of weekly assistance grants that have been increased to provide for rent increases under the Rent Act; what further consideration has been given to the possibility of assessing the amount of money involved in these payments; and what information is available in this respect.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

I am informed by the National Assistance Board that up to 8th March about 272,000 weekly assistance grants had been increased by an average of 5s. 3d., to provide for rent increases under the Rent Act. As I have previously explained to the hon. Member, large numbers of grants cease for various reasons every week, and it is not possible to say how many of these 272,000 grants are still in payment. It is not therefore possible to provide any precise estimate of the cost involved.

Mr. Dodds

Does not the right hon. Gentleman appreciate that this is a very serious matter involving the payment of public money? It is not a fact that each week there must be details of the amount of money that is paid as a consequence of increases under the Rent Act? Why does the right hon. Gentleman not try to get the information? Are the Government really ashamed of the amount that has to be paid out in consequence of their legislation?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

I explained at much greater length during the debate on the National Assistance Board's Supplementary Estimate the problem of obtaining the figures which the hon. Gentleman wants. I should not be called upon to inflict a repetition of that quite lengthy discussion upon the House at this stage. I would only point out to the hon. Gentleman that payments made by the National Assistance Board very often stop for one reason or another because the person is no longer in need. Therefore, the sort of simple calculation which the hon. Gentleman asks for is quite impossible.

Mr. Peyton

Is my right hon. Friend aware that he has the support of the Goveernment side of the House in resisting the suggestion that he should collect a quite unnecessary mass of information and that it is far better to save the administrative costs and give to the beneficiaries the increases that this Government have awarded? Does my right hon. Friend realise that on this side of the House we are very proud of our record?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

I am obliged to my hon. Friend. I would only add that, as I made clear on an earlier occasion, these payments are very properly made to help people in need. I am a little surprised that the hon. Member for Erith and Crayford (Mr. Dodds) should wish to challenge that.

Mr. Marquand

The right hon. Gentleman says that the payments are properly made. Can he assure the House that not one of these increased payments made by the Board is made to landlords who are illegally requiring increases of rent?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

These payments are not made to landlords but to the recipients of National Assistance, so the somewhat prejudicial supplementary question of the right hon. Gentleman does not even begin to arise.

Mr. Marquand

The right hon. Gentleman has not begun to answer my supplementary question. Is he satisfied that the money which is going to landlords through the intermediation of persons drawing National Assistance is absolutely according to the law?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

I have absolutely nothing to add to the very full and considered statement I made on this point in debate a few weeks ago and which, I suggest, the right hon. Gentleman now reads.

Mr. J. Griffiths

May I ask the right hon. Gentleman a further question which may help the House on this matter? The National Assistance Board will have submitted its Estimates for next year. In estimating the amount it will want for next year the Board must surely have taken into account an estimate, based on experience, of the extra it will need to pay in increased rents because of the operation of the Rent Act.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

There is, of course, no separate figure in respect of rent increases made under the Rent Act as distinct from rent increases made, for example, by local authorities or outside the Rent Act; nor is there a precise total figure for rent as distinct from other payments. As the right hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well from his own personal experience, Estimates of this kind are made on the considered judgment of the total amount required, and no attempt is made to break them down.

Mr. Griffiths

Is it not a fact that when the Estimates are presented we can arrive at the figure, as the Minister can, by comparing the previous years' accounts, which will show the extra amount for which the National Assistance Board has to budget.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

High as is my regard for the intellectual capacity of the right hon. Gentleman, I doubt very much whether he will be able to disentangle elements from accounts which must be judged as a whole.