§ Miss Richardsonasked the Secretary of State for Social Services how many invalidity beneficiaries are currently disqualified from long-term supplementary benefit because they have not been able to claim ordinary supplementary benefit for the required time; and what is his estimate of the number that will be in this position after November 1980.
§ Mrs. ChalkerI regret that the information is not available in the form requested. However, the number of invalidity beneficiaries who would be eligible for supplementary benefit after November 1980, if a spell of one year in receipt of incapacity benefits were to qualify them for the long-term scale rate, would probably be of the order of 100,000.