§ Mr. MeacherTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will list, for each means-tested benefit, each of those other benefits which are taken into account in assessing its value.
Benefits to be taken into account Benefit being assessed Income support Family credit Housing benefit Community Charge benefit Income support — Yes No No Family credit No — No No Housing benefit No Yes — No Community charge benefit No Yes No — Generally attendance allowance—other than for those in residential care or nursing homes—and mobility allowance are fully disregarded in all the income related benefits, as is the first £10 of war widows pension, war disablement pension and other analogous payments. Child benefit, including one-parent benefit, is disregarded in the assessment of family credit. Most other social security benefits are taken fully into account in calculating entitlement to the income-related benefits.
Full lists of items which are disregarded in whole or in part are contained in regulation 40(2) of, and schedule 9 534W income—before housing costs—fell from 3.8 million in 1979 to 2.5 million in 1987 and remained at 2.5 million in 1988.
Sources are the Central Statistical Office's annual redistribution of income articles and the published family expenditure survey reports; the estimates listed in the table are made from the most appropriate published source for each year. All the pre-HBAI analyses are in terms of numbers of households rather than population, and none of them used equivalisation to adjust for differing household sizes and compositions. This makes a considerable difference to the percentage shown as having below half average income. The pre-HBAI household income distributions show many households with relatively low incomes merely because there are few people—perhaps only one person—living in these households. The HBAI figures in the first column use equivalisation to adjust for this, and thus give a meaningful indication of the income distribution and of relative living standards.
Various different definitions of income have been used, and the one from the FES reports in 1960–61 and 1965–66 is a pre-tax gross income measure.
All the figures are derived from the family expenditure survey and thus cover only the household population.
§ Mr. JackThere are four income-related benefits. These are income support, family credit, housing benefit and community charge benefit. The treatment of these benefits in assessing entitlement to each of the others is set out in the table.
to, the Income Support (General) Regulations 1987; regulation 24(2) of, and schedule 2 to the Family Credit (General) Regulations 1987; 29(2), 31(2), 33(2), 36(3) and 38(2) of, and schedules 3, 4 and 5 to, the Housing Benefit (General) Regulations 1987 and regulations 23(2) of, and schedule 3 to, the Community Charge Benefits (General) Regulations 1989.
Family credit is paid at the same rate for a fixed period of 26 weeks. If a claim for income support is made within 535W this period, family credit is taken into account in the calculation of the income support for the remainder of the 26-week period.