HC Deb 03 May 2000 vol 349 cc122-3W
Mr. Viggers

To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security when residents of Gosport will receive their winter fuel payments. [119840]

Angela Eagle

The administration of benefits is a matter for Alexis Cleveland, the Chief Executive of the Benefits Agency to answer. She will write to the hon. Member.

Letter from Alexis Cleveland to Mr. Peter Viggers, dated 2 May 2000: The Secretary of State has asked me to reply to your recent Parliamentary Question asking when residents in Gosport will receive their winter fuel payments (WFP). Our records show that 10.2 million WFPs were issued in November 1999. Of these, around 5 million were issued directly to Post Offices, the remainder were issued to customers home address or direct to their bank accounts. For security reasons, Post Offices were advised to return any uncollected girocheques to the Benefits Agency by 21st December 1999. Approximately 85,000 were returned by the Post Office. My staff have been contacting customers whose payments were returned to ascertain the reason for non-collection and re-issue payments where possible. All payments were made before the end of March with the exception of those where the customer has still not responded to our enquiries. Following the ruling in the case of Taylor, the age at which Winter Fuel Payments can be made was to be equalised at 60, and the need to be in receipt of a qualifying benefit is removed. As before, these payments are intended for people who are ordinarily resident in Great Britain. In order to meet the requirements of the European Court of Justice ruling it was necessary to identify the new beneficiaries from people aged 60 and over and build processes to ensure that this year's payments, and payments for past winters, could be made as soon as possible. The Secretary of State for Social Security wrote to all MPs on 11 April setting out the planned delivery arrangements to make these payments. As he indicated, the current plan is to begin making payments for past winters from the end of June onwards and to make this coming winter's payments before Christmas. I hope this is helpful.