Universal Credit

Baroness Sherlock Excerpts

Wednesday 5th September 2018 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Sherlock]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact on claimants of the timing of Universal Credit assessments and payments.

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

One of the main building blocks of universal credit is the monthly payment cycle. It is important because we are trying to replicate the world of work where people receive their salary on a monthly basis. There are no issues for the majority of claimants. Universal credit has been designed to take earnings into account in a fair and transparent way. We do not want to prejudice the ongoing legal case, but I assure the House that we take any feedback very seriously. We welcome it. We care about our clients, and we want our system to work for them.

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

I thank the Minister and I am happy to give her some feedback right now. The Child Poverty Action Group has done some work on real cases and has found low-paid workers who are losing hundreds of pounds a year because their payday clashes with the monthly assessment period for universal credit. If someone is paid fortnightly or every four weeks, they can end up being paid twice in one universal credit month and not at all in the next. The result is that they lose a lot of money in work allowances. In the double month they can lose things such as free prescriptions because they seem to earn too much and in the lean month they can be hit by the benefit cap because they look like they earn too little. CPAG has made some really obvious recommendations, such as flexing assessments dates and averaging income figures. Are the Government going to look at this and, if so, when? It surely cannot be right that some people lose out just because of when they get paid.

[Baroness Stedman-Scott]

I am always happy to rely on the noble Baroness to keep us on our toes and I am grateful to her for it. She raised valid points which are in the report. We are listening to stakeholders. We understand the concerns raised in the report, and we are going to come back and say what can or cannot be done, but we cannot prejudice the legal case and, annoying as it is, I ask the noble Baroness to be patient. We are doing our very best to consider the report.