§ Mr. Don FosterTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions, pursuant to his answer of 10 April 2001,Official Report, column 504W, on housing costs, how many of the responses (a) supporting the exclusion of some or all housing costs in the calculation of households' income, (b) supporting the inclusion of housing costs in the calculation of income, (c) which offered other suggestions and (d) making no comment were submitted on behalf of more than one organisation or individual; and if he will list the total number of organisations or individuals who expressed support for each of the four categories listed above. [159038]
§ Mr. Meacher[holding answer 26 April 2001]: A total of 252 responses to the consultation document were received. The breakdown of responses is as shown:
- (i) 50 responses supported the exclusion of some or all housing costs in the calculation of household income;
- (ii) 86 responses supported the inclusion of housing costs in the calculation of household income;
- (iii) 15 responses offered other suggestions;
- (iv) 101 responses made no comment.
A copy of the full analysis of the consultation responses was placed in the Libraries of the House in November 1999.
Some organisations submitted an individual response as well as appending their names to a response from an umbrella organisation in the area. No separate record is available of how many were submitted on this basis.
The consultation draft of the UK Fuel Poverty Strategy sets out the Government's approach of displaying the number of fuel poor according to the two main definitions:
on the basis of making no allowance for housing costs in the calculation of household income: andby excluding any Housing Benefit or Income Support for Mortgage Interest (ISMI) payments.This consultation provides a further opportunity to comment on this aspect of the fuel poverty definition.