§ Mr. Andrew SmithTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Services if all claimants who have made applications for items such as non-essential furniture since August 1986 will be identified by his Department so that decisions on such claims can be reviewed in the light of CSB 241/87.
§ Mr. Portillo[holding reply 29 January 1988]: We have considered carefully the commissioners' decision in CSB 241/1987 and its possible impact on past claims for furniture and household equipment. The effect of the commissioners' decision is to give some claimants access 206W to a discretionary payment for an exceptional need under regulation 30 of the Single Payments Regulations. However, we believe that, under the stringent conditions which apply for a payment under that regulation, relatively few claimants who had previously been denied a payment would now be entitled to one. To identify those claimants would be a major task, costly to mount, disruptive to local offices, and disproportionate to the amount of extra benefit likely to be payable. We have decided, therefore, that it would not be appropriate to conduct a search for such cases, although individual requests for review will be dealt with in the normal way.