§ Mr. Chris Smithasked the Prime Minister, further to the answer to the hon. Member for Islington, South and Finsbury on 30 April, Official Report, column 48 by the Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Security, for what reason information was available to the Welsh Office and the Department of Employment but unavailable to the Department of Health and Social Security as to the numbers of young people whose benefits were reduced prior to December 1983 for refusal to take up a youth training scheme place, or because they have come off a youth training scheme prematurely; and if she will make a statement.
§ The Prime MinisterIn his reply on 30 April, my hon. Friend the Minister for Social Security made it clear that the figures given related to reductions in supplementary benefit resulting from premature terminations of youth training scheme placements or refusals to take up suitable places. The figures given from time to time by the Department of Employment and the Welsh Office are the number of decisions made by insurance officers (now adjudication officers) at the Department of Employment that a young person had without good cause prematurely left a placement or refused to take up a suitable place. Some of these decisions will have led to reductions in supplementary benefit but others will have led to other penalties such as non-award of national insurance credits, or possibly in a few cases non-payment of unemployment benefit.
The Department of Employment has recorded decisions on YTS refusals or premature leaving since 1 September 1983. The DHSS has kept records of supplementary benefit reductions for this reason only since December 1983.