Residential Care (Hansard, 29 October 1990)

§ Mr. Scott

The income support scheme contains special provisions related to the fees and other expenses paid by people in residential care and nursing homes. The income support limits established under these provisions, unlike other income support rates, take account of accommodation costs as well as other day-to-day living expenses. They are also set to take account of care costs. These arrangements will continue until the introduction of a new framework for funding community care, now planned for 1993.

Current regulations nevertheless also allow access to housing benefit in such cases. This was intended to assist those in residential care and nursing homes who are unable to claim the special rates of income support—principally disabled people who are in full-time work, or people living in a home run by a close relative. In recent months, however, a number of claims have come forward which go well beyond this limited purpose, and effectively establish housing benefit as an alternative to income support.

As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said in his uprating statement on 24 October at columns 348–66, this is neither sensible nor appropriate, and in the light of the substantial increases in the income support limits which we then announced, we therefore proposed to consult on amendments to re-establish the policy intention more clearly.

We will shortly be sending to the Social Security Advisory Committee and the local authority associations, and I am today placing in the Library, draft regulations to this end. They provide that those living in registered residential care and nursing homes should not generally have access to housing benefit, while preserving that 367W access for those who are excluded from the special rates of income support because they are in full-time work or living in a home run by a close relative. Underlying entitlement to housing benefit will, however, be preserved for all those at present living in a registered residential care or nursing home who have successfully claimed housing benefit, and for those who have, on or before today, submitted a claim which is subsequently determined in their favour. In these cases, housing benefit will continue in payment and will be increased as and when appropriate under the current rules, thus fully protecting their position.

Subject to the consultation with the Social Security Advisory Committee and the local authority associations, we intend to bring forward regulations later this year to give effect to these changes from January 1991.