HC Deb 26 June 1984 vol 62 cc411-2W
Mr. Beith

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services whether, in view of the assumption for social security purposes that striking miners are in receipt of £15 strike pay, he will disregard gifts in kind up to this level when calculating supplementary benefit.

Dr. Boyson

The effect of section 6(1)(a) of the Social Security (No. 2) Act 1980 and of regulation 12 of the Supplementary Benefit (Trade Disputes and Recovery from Earnings) Regulations 1980 together is that any resources which the striker himself receives as a result of being on strike are deducted in full from any supplementary benefit otherwise payable for his dependants. The only exception to this rule is that the first £15 of payments to the striker from his union are disregarded.

Resources to which the above provisions do not apply fall to be considered under the Supplementary Benefit (Resources) Regulations. These regulations apply to all supplementary benefit claimants and provide for an occasional gift to be disregarded up to £100; periodic gifts would be treated as income and normally subject to a disregard of £4 per week. Guidance on the treatment of income in kind is contained in paragraph 6820 of the S manual, a copy of which is in the Library.

The Government have no proposals to change this legislation. The application of the law to the facts of individual cases is for the independent adjudication authorities.

Mr. Gordon Brown

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will give the latest figures available for (a) the numbers claiming supplementary benefit, (b) the total number dependent on supplementary benefit and (c) how many of the latter were children.

Dr. Boyson

The estimated figures for December 1983 are(a) 4.3 million, (b) 7.2 million and (c) 1.8 million.

Mr. Gordon Brown

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services why no figures from the 1983 annual statistical inquiry of supplementary benefit cases are yet available; when such figures will be available; and for what reasons it is taking longer to produce the figures from the 1983 survey than the corresponding analysis took based on data from the 1982 statistical inquiry.

Dr. Boyson

Production of final tables from the 1983 supplementary benefit annual statistical inquiry is presently being delayed by the strike by a small number of staff at the Department's computer centre in Newcastle.

Provisional data from the 1983 inquiry have been processed and are currently being validated. Unfortunately, the validation process is itself being hampered by the strike and is therefore taking longer than is customary. A limited number of statistics concerning overall numbers of recipients has been cleared and can be released.