HC Deb 07 November 1988 vol 140 cc94-5W
Mr. Nicholas Bennett

To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many applications for transitional payments in respect of housing benefit have been made; and how many have been approved at the latest available date.

Ms. Ruddock

To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security (1) what percentage of people eligible for transitional payments in(a) the United Kingdom, (b) London and (c) Lewisham have applied to date;

(2) how many people have applied for transitional protection payments in (a) the United Kingdom, (b) London and (c) Lewisham; and how many people have been paid so far in each category.

Mr. Robin Cook

To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many applications have now been received by his Department's unit in Glasgow regarding housing benefit transitional payments; how many have been duly processed; and how many actual payments have been made.

Mr. Peter Lloyd

The transitional payments unit has received 364,643 applications up to 1 November. Of this total 238,858, or 51 per cent., have been assessed and 108,146 cases have now received their first payments, including arrears from the beginning of April. It is necessary in every case to issue an inquiry form to the applicants local authority to obtain details of the housing benefit position. There are currently just over 95,000 forms with local authorities which have not been returned. The backlog of work which accumulated at the unit before it became operational has now been cleared and as the forms are returned from authorities assessments are made and notifications sent out without delay. I regret that the information is not yet available for either London or Lewisham. It is not possible to quantify the numbers of people with potential eligibility to housing benefit transitional payments.

Mr. Clay

To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how much he expects to save as a result of(a) not uprating the lone parent premium under housing benefit and (b) raising the non-dependant deduction over and above the retail prices index less housing.

Mr. Peter Lloyd

No change to the basis for uprating these amounts has been made and we have made no calculations of the costs involved. The housing benefit lone parent premium was introduced in April at a higher level than for income support as a transitional measure to reduce losses for lone parents. The aim is alignment in the two schemes. Since housing benefit was introduced it has been normal practice to uprate the non-dependant deductions in line with the housing element of the retail prices index, rather than any other index, to reflect changes in levels of actual housing costs.