The BBC reports:
Millions of people who currently claim housing benefit are to be given more time before cuts are introduced.
Ministers had planned to introduce a cap from next April on how much housing benefit could be claimed.
But the BBC understands that existing claimants will now have until January 2012 to adjust their circumstances if needed before the caps are brought in.
The Department for Work and Pensions would not confirm the move, which it said was “speculation”.
Simon Hughes’s response has been:
If the reports about changes to the housing benefit proposals are true, then this will be very welcome. Many of us have pressed very hard since the budget in June for a more gradual and sensitive change in the benefit system. We must await further details, but the signals sound good – the Government is listening.
Follow @LibDemVoice on Twitter
Like us on Facebook
Subscribe to our feed
Sign-up for our daily email digest
On the (micro)farm
How the Lib Dems are choosing their targets for the next election
Our six great Party Award winners from Bournemouth Conference
Lib Dem democracy versus Labour control-freakery
Event at the Botanic Garden this Friday! #dundeewestend
Whittling away at Democracy
Home again
Roland
Tristan
Joe Bourke
Simon R
14 Comments
OK – what’s the quid pro quo for those outside London/SE who subsidise these international rents with their taxes – can we have the difference in monetary terms (in the delay) to assist in our private sector development even more? Let’s be clear – it’s to help out the Hughes/Davey gang – they have too much power in our party.
btw I was talking only about the cap – the forcing of under 35year olds to share outside London/SE is a `one size fits all` idiocy that should also be addressed.
A welcome development, these housing benefit reforms are a disaster for London. It does seem as though the government has not done a proper impact analysis of what it is doing and relies far too much on market forces providing the safety net without any safeguards at all. I really hope the 10% cut will be dropped, that will be devastating if that gets implemented.
@Geoffrey Payne “I really hope the 10% cut will be dropped, that will be devastating if that gets implemented.”
I find it hard to believe that it won’t be dropped.
The arguments in favour of it are that, (a) it will reduce the rise in rents, and (b) it’s an incentive for people to find work.
Both are specious. The 10% cut was arbitrary, and it’s unnecessary. There are other measures to tackle both issues that are less arbitrary.
The measures to cap rents are controversial, but they can be adjusted to particular situations. The measures IDS is planning for jobseekers who refuse to engage in getting work are discretionary, and would take into account individual circumstance.
The 10% cut is the worst policy the coalition has advanced. My hope is the only reason it’s survived is because they don’t to set an early precedent, and as this isn’t planned for a while, they can put off the u-turn till later.
So Geoffrey why should a taxpayer in Stockport subsidise a 2k rent in London – I’m all ears.
Sorry it’s 1,600 a month
I suppose the correct riposte to you, John, using the same kind of reasoning, would be: Why should children sleep on the streets in London when they can sleep in beds in Stockport?
Jane – good point they could move up to Stockport, although it is a rather pricey part of Cheshire
Why don’t they just get a job?
@ John,
“So Geoffrey why should a taxpayer in Stockport subsidise a 2k rent in London – I’m all ears.”
Your question is one that is comonly asked, and with some justification. The pernicious element of this debate is that, in condeming the government’s proposals, opponents are assumed to be content with the status quo and are asked to defend it. I am not content with it, and it is hard to defend. The asnwer, however, isn’t what has been proposed, and now may be delayed. The root cause of teh problem is a lack of affordable housing. If there were enough of this then HB wouldn’t be so expensive. The answer has to involve a commitment to more social housing – although we also need private housing.
So, you’re right, the costs of housing in london are eyewatering. But the solution proposed by the Tories is only dealing with the effect, not the cause, of the problem.
I might slightly cheekily also note that the wealth that London creates and sends to skipton and most other parts of the country keeps many people better policed, educated and priovided for than might otherwise be the case, so it’s actually us who are subsiding you.
why on earth did i write skipton and not stockport? must be some horrific metropolitan laziness. apologies. but it is all the same after watford, isn’t it? (joke!)
As far as the LHA cap is concerned, it only affects 2% of the people who are going to see their housing benefit cut – and accounts for 3% of the reduction in spending. It may be the basis that the coalition has used to justify their whole package of cuts, but it’s not where the saving is coming from.
The amount of tax per capita that this costs us all, per year, is £65 million for the whole of the UK. Or, to put it another way, £1.05 a year for every man, woman and child in the UK. I personally don’t support the extremes of LHA that we’ve seen in a tiny number of cases in central London, but the extreme cases shouldn’t be seen as justifying the package as a whole (http://www.parliament.uk/briefingpapers/commons/lib/research/briefings/snsp-05638.pdf).
The other changes (all of which will affect people in Stockport and Skipton) are:
1. Changing the basis for setting Local Housing Allowance rates from the median to the 30th percentile of local market rents from October 2011. Saving £425m by 2014/15.
2. LHA rates to be uprated by the Consumer Price Index (rather than the Retail Price Index) from April 2013 – saving £390m by 2014/15
3. Uprating non-dependent deductions to reflect increases in rent since 2001/02, in April 2011 and annually on the same basis. Saving £340m by 2014/15.
4. Restricting Housing Benefit to 90 per cent of the full award after 12 months for claimants who are in receipt of Jobseekers Allowance, from April 2013. Saving £110m by 2014/15).
5. Restricting Housing Benefit for working age social tenants who occupy a larger property than their family size warrants to a standard regional rate for a property of the appropriate size, from April 2013. Saving £490m by 2014/15.
As part of the Spending Review two further Housing Benefit measures were announced:
6. Raising the age at which the Shared (formerly Single) Room Rate applies from 25 to 35 from 2012 saving £215m a year by 2014/15 (this change can be achieved through regulations); and
7. Capping household benefits at £500 per week from 2013. This measure is wider than HB as it may affect other benefit payments.
All pretty technical. And all (except possibly the last one) measures which will badly affect the poorest people in Skipton and Stockport.
If you think the capping of Central London LHA justifies the overall housing benefits package, you’ve been had.
@ martin Todd
What a brilliant post these housing benafit cuts have been used as a smokescreen for the much nastier stuff. Nice to know there are still some good analysis from those in my former party .
@Martin Tod – Excellent post. This gives the debate some much needed perspective, and exposes these changes for what they are – spiteful.