§ Mr. Meacherasked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will instruct special investigators and other officers of the Supplementary Benefits Commission to keep specifically to the criteria listed in the Supplementary Benefits Handbook in their determinations regarding the existence of cohabitation or otherwise, and not to use the presumption that an unsupported mother has slept with a man on three consecutive nights as tantamount to proof of cohabitation for supplementary benefit purposes.
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§ Sir K. JosephThe passage in the Supplementary Benefits Handbook dealing with cohabitation fully reflects the instructions already given to the commission's officers.
§ Mr. Meacherasked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will require that the officers of the Supplementary Benefits Commission shall not terminate the payment of supplementary benefit to unmarried mothers on grounds of alleged cohabitation without prior referral of each such case to a supplementary benefit appeal tribunal.
§ Sir K. JosephNo. The Ministry of Social Security Act provides that questions of entitlement to benefit are to be determined in the first instance by the Supplementary Benefits Commission.