§ Mr. Peter Bottomleyasked the Secretary of Slate for Social Services if he will make a statement on the proposed introduction of a postal claims procedure for unemployed people wishing to claim supplementary benefit.
§ Mr. Newton:Unemployed people who wish to claim supplementary benefit will no longer have to go to their local DHSS office from 6 December 1982. A new postal claim form will be issued by Unemployment Benefit Offices and it will not be necessary for unemployed claimants to have an interview unless they need help in completing the form. The decision to introduce this postal procedure followed encouraging results from a pilot exercise carried out earlier this year, with valuable help from the Open University Institute of Educational technology and the Research Institute for Consumer Affairs. The exercise showed that a large majority of claimants positively preferred to fill in a form rather than be interviewed. There was no sign of reduced takeup, or of unacceptable error rates. There were organisational advantages for our offices, giving scope for reducing some of the pressures on our staff. We expect to achieve a staff saving of about 1,000 posts, after allowing for 150 additional staff to visit claimants with children after 3 months.
I would emphasise that personal help will continue to be available at our offices for those who have difficulty with the form—for example, because English is not their main language. This is made clear on the form itself. As recommended by the research study, we shall also be introducing a special simplified form for school-leaver claimants.