§ Lord Morris of Manchesterasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether there are any plans to disregard war widows' pensions when calculating council tax relief and housing benefit. [HL5192]
§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Baroness Hollis of Heigham)A statutory disregard of £10 is applied to war disablement pensions and war widows' pensions when calculating entitlements to income-related benefits. There is also a full disregard of the war widow's supplementary pension.
In the case of housing benefit and council tax benefit, local authorities have the discretion to apply a further disregard up to the full amount of any war pension in payment.
At April 2003, 392 local authorities disregarded war pensions in full and two authorities, Middlesbrough and Bolton, applied a full disregard to war pensions but not war widows' pensions. A further 12 authorities applied a disregard in excess of the statutory £10. They are, as follows: Barrow; Chester-le-Street; Gateshead; Newcastle; North Tyneside; Preston; Salford; South Tyneside; Sunderland; Surrey Heath; Tynedale; and Weymouth and Portland. The remaining two authorities, Easington and Wear Valley, applied the statutory disregard only.