Welfare Reform and Work Bill

Debate between Earl of Listowel and Lord Best

Monday 21st December 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 104B in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Cathcart, to which I have added my name. This would empower local authorities and the DWP to give landlords details of entitlement to housing benefit—in future to the housing element in universal credit—where a prospective tenant gives written consent for this information to be imparted. In parallel to efforts to come down heavily on so-called rogue landlords, the Government should try wherever possible to be supportive of good landlords, of which there are, thank goodness, plenty of examples. The nation needs a strong, responsible private rented sector. Legislation should surely be supportive of those willing to invest in decent rented housing, perhaps particularly in rural areas, where some large landowners often act in a similar way to a local housing association.

However, we know that many landlords are nervous of offering a tenancy to those on low incomes who could have difficulty paying the rent, particularly now that welfare reforms have diminished benefit support for these households. Landlords who want to do the right thing, who charge reasonable rents and who are keen to help those in their local communities should not be deterred; they can be reassured that prospective tenants have an entitlement to universal credit and can afford to take on a tenancy, so long as those responsible for administering benefits are willing to explain the position. If officials administering benefit do not feel able to discuss an individual case—even where, as in the amendment, the individual gave written consent for this—I commend the idea that they be required to share enough information with each landlord to enable them to make an informed decision.

Perhaps I could also stand in for my noble friend Lady Meacher and add support to Amendment 104BB, which is also in the names of the two noble Earls, Lord Listowel and Lord Cathcart. This also addresses a new barrier to private landlords accepting low-income tenants. It calls for the facility for payment of the housing element in universal credit to be made direct to landlords where the tenant requests it. I know the Minister was able to give some reassurance on this score to councils and housing associations by ruling that direct payments should be made easy where a tenant is eight weeks or more in arrears, and also by allowing direct payment of rent from day one for the most vulnerable tenants. However, a lot of private landlords will simply not let to anyone on benefits—that is, in receipt of the housing element of universal credit—if there is the prospect of an eight-week loss of rent before a tenant’s request for direct payment can be activated. For the private rented sector, direct payments seem sensible from the perspective of tenants as well as all those who want to encourage private landlords to be helpful and supportive to those in receipt of benefits. I support these amendments.

[The Earl of Listowel (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak briefly to my Amendment 104BB. I am grateful to the noble Earl and my noble friend Lady Meacher for adding their names to it, reflecting our earlier debates about the great concerns around increasing homelessness. Clearly these amendments are important because we wish to encourage landlords to take low-income tenants to address that homelessness. I declare my interests as noted in the register as a landlord.

I will not go into the details of this amendment because the noble Earl did that already. My concern is that paying HB directly to claimants may compound the homelessness issue we discussed earlier and contribute to a reduction in social housebuilding. Many of those receiving housing benefits may already be in debt, feel tempted to use their rent to pay off such debts and consequently become homeless. It may be that the eight-week limit that has been discussed will protect them from that. Social landlords are concerned that direct payment to tenants of HB may lead to tenants accruing arrears. Pursuing arrears is a costly business. Social landlords already face reduced incomes thanks to the reduced rents that this Bill introduces. Consequently, they may have less money to build more homes and we may see an impact on the building of social housing. I have two questions for the Minister on the effect of the move to direct payments of HB to claimants. What level of cost to social landlords does the Minister anticipate arising from that move to direct payments? What impact on homelessness, if any, does the Minister anticipate?

Welfare Reform and Work Bill

Debate between Earl of Listowel and Lord Best

Monday 14th December 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 62C, in the names of my noble friends Lord Low of Dalston and Lady Hollins. This is one of a number of amendments to the Bill addressing issues of special concern to charities seeking to help homeless—very often, young homeless—people.

I see the tension here between the objectives of the Department for Work and Pensions, which is so very concerned to see the huge housing benefit bill reduced, and the objectives of the Department for Communities and Local Government, which of course wants to see rising homelessness reduced. It is not going to be possible for the objectives of both departments to be met and a balance between these conflicting aims has to be achieved. It is utterly pointless for the DWP to win in cutting the benefit bill for housing costs if the homelessness position deteriorates further. The supposed savings will then look very paltry, not least when set against the costs to other government departments in physical and mental health, social care, criminal justice and more. This anxiety that cost-cutting measures will undermine homelessness charities is reflected in the list of 12 charities seeking to persuade your Lordships to accept this amendment, as set out by the noble Lord, Lord Low, with Crisis as the co-ordinator of their efforts. They are a roll-call of nationally important charities trying very hard to tackle the horrors of homelessness.

Amendment 62C addresses a key concern of the charities, which has been very well spelled out by my two colleagues: that the vulnerable 18 to 21 year-olds who come within the priority categories set out in the amendment will no longer be able to get enough financial help with their rent to obtain the accommodation and support which they need and which the charities and local authorities can organise or provide for them if the rental funds are forthcoming. If the charities have to turn away young people because they are denied access to sufficient support with their rent, then street homelessness—as the noble Baroness, Lady Hollins, has said, it has doubled in London since 2011—will get worse. That means more young people sleeping rough and facing the cold, the abuse, the violence and the illness that goes with that.

Later amendments in my name also address the same issue of the problems which will emerge if benefit payments for housing—in this case, the entitlement to the housing element in universal credit—are reduced for vulnerable young people. The other reductions, for us to discuss in detail later, which potentially affect housing costs for young homeless people are, first, the proposed 1% per annum cut to social housing rents, which could put some social housing charities out of business and, secondly, the new idea that rents in social housing should be capped at the local housing allowance levels set for private landlords, although the charities’ rents may include special support services that no private landlord would ever supply.

I am making the overarching point in respect of all these cuts that the DWP’s earnest desire to reduce the costs of housing benefit—in future, of universal credit—really must avoid crushing efforts to help those who are or will be homeless. To save time in our later deliberations, I simply flag up the common policy point which relates to all these amendments, since the Minister may want to respond in the round. I hope that he can provide reassurance that the DWP’s different ways of reducing benefits for housing will stop short of squeezing those people in the most acute difficulty and those bodies desperately trying to help them.

I think all of us, and every Government I have worked with over the last 45 years, have been clear that we must give special attention to trying to ensure that young people at risk of homelessness are supported. If we fail, and yet another young person ends up living on the streets, it is incredibly hard for that person to keep away from crime, alcohol, drugs, depression and ill-health and to get back on their feet, as we all know and as was so well illustrated by the example quoted by the noble Lord, Lord Low.

I feel sure the Minister gets this and has no desire for the Government’s welfare cuts to pull the rug out from under the charities that are trying so hard to address the evils of homelessness. This amendment would remove one of the new threats to these bodies continuing their vital work by ensuring a range of vulnerable young people are not going to be denied housing support just because they are aged 18 to 21 and will be in at least no worse a position to pay their rent than those who are older. Indeed, 18 to 21 year-olds may have a greater need for help simply because they are young. I commend the amendment to the Minister and hope he will be able to tell us that Government recognise the case being made and have no intention of harming the vital work of the charities that can offer a life-saving lifeline to very vulnerable young people.

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, I rise very briefly to support the amendment of my noble friends. On a visit to a Centrepoint hostel in Soho several years ago, I spoke with a very young girl—16 or 17 perhaps—and asked her why she was there. She said that her mother had a new boyfriend who did not want her around. The OECD said in its report on family formation that this country will overtake the United States in the 2030s in terms of the numbers of young people growing up without a father in the home. We have to think about the changes in families and about the Children’s Commissioner’s report on the sexual exploitation of children. Most sexual exploitation takes place within the family, from people within the family who the children know. Some 90% of lone parents are going to be women, and if different men are regularly coming into the household, this issue of girls in such households having worries about sexual exploitation or being sexually exploited also has to be considered. I commend the amendment to the Minister.

Local Government Finance Bill

Debate between Earl of Listowel and Lord Best

Tuesday 24th July 2012 Grand Committee

[Lord Best]

My Lords, sadly, I have to accept that there are cases where local authorities have acted in an insensitive and inept manner in using bailiffs to pursue the debts of vulnerable people who owe council tax. However, I fear that local authorities are the victims too. They have no desire to be sending bailiffs to hound poor people to pay their debts.

The very worst aspect of this Bill is the expectation that councils will have to start collecting council tax from the very poorest households—the 20% or so of those of working age. They will be asked to find the money from their extremely low incomes, which have been provided mostly through benefit for other essential expenditure. The Bill means that councils are bound to face more arrears and more wasted expenditure in trying to extract small sums from poverty-struck people who simply do not have the money to pay. It is no fun for local authorities to be sending in the bailiffs when they feel that they must pursue these debts.

I support this amendment to protect vulnerable households from the heavy-handed action of unscrupulous bailiffs and I am grateful to the Zacchaeus 2000 Trust for bringing these matters to our attention today. However, the solution to the problem of these cases growing in number is to allow councils to avoid having to start taxing the poorest by giving councils the flexibility to raise the funds required by the Treasury in other ways—for example, as I suggested last week, through the painless reduction of the single person discount from 25% to 20%, on average. Councils are victims in this matter too.

[The Earl of Listowel]

I support the amendment and I raise a particular concern about care leavers and care-experienced adults who might be impacted by this. Of course, many care-experienced adults will be in this group of the very poor who have had poor educational experience and may have experienced long-term unemployment. The Committee has heard about parents and families struggling to survive and not functioning very well. Statistics show that if one has been brought up in care and becomes a mother, one is far more likely to have one’s own child taken into care. I am worried that this is an additional burden on particularly vulnerable families that is unwelcome.

I understand that care leavers will be assisted to the age of 22 with regard to council benefit—I may have that wrong and would be grateful for any correction in that area—but one has to keep in mind that while most young people leave home at the age of 24 nowadays, 20% of care leavers will have left care at the age of 16. The statistics for the mental health of young people in care highlights that 40% have mental disorders, which compares with what may be 10% of young people in the general population. That is what one would expect because of the history of trauma before they enter care, the experience of being taken from their families and often, unfortunately, their having an unsatisfactory experience in the care system. This is one group within the groups we are discussing to which we should pay particular attention.

I would be grateful for clarification about the experience of care leavers. In the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Looked After Children and Care Leavers, I have certainly heard of young care leavers describing their difficulties in trying to manage their finances on leaving care, with their homes eventually breaking down and all sorts of adverse consequences arising from that. I support the amendment and I am grateful to the Zacchaeus 2000 Trust for drawing my attention to this issue. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

Welfare Reform Bill

Debate between Earl of Listowel and Lord Best

Tuesday 18th October 2011 Grand Committee

[Lord Best]

I fear that that is exactly the position. Others may wish to come in on the amendment about foster parents.

Amendments 43 and 83 would not require an underoccupying tenant to move out where there was simply nowhere for them to downsize to—the fundamental point behind the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis. For example, the National Housing Federation has demonstrated that about 180,000 social housing tenants would be classified as underoccupying their two-bedroom homes and would need to move on, but that only about 68,000 one-bedroom social housing flats come available for letting in a year. Even if every one of the one-bedroom flats was allocated to those who are downsizing—which of course would be impossible as there are serious demands from tens of thousands of other such households—it would take years before they could be accommodated.

In the past, we built social housing between the world wars and afterwards. Mostly, we built three-bedroom housing. Now we have a lot of households that require something smaller, but we do not have enough houses to put them in. Here, again, the impossibility of people moving means that the exemption would kick in. If they were expected to downsize into less secure private rented properties, rents are likely to be much higher and therefore the benefit costs, the universal credit costs, would be much higher—about £66 per week more in south-east England. That is not a great saving. The housing benefit bill would be likely to rise dramatically although people were occupying less space.

Moving creates the familiar barrier to employment. Moving to somewhere with a higher rent itself intensifies demand on the private rented sector, which will push up rents more generally.

Of the amendments, my preferred option is to define underoccupying as exceeding the bedroom standard plus one—that is, having two “spare” bedrooms. That would cut the gains to the Government from the underoccupation penalty to 150,000 households from the 670,000 that the Government are expecting to be caught by the new penalty.

If the Government cannot accept that, I hope that, alongside the exclusion for older people—the category most likely to be underoccupying at the moment— exemptions could be put in place for disabled people in adapted property, recipients of disability allowance, families classified as underoccupying because foster children are not counted, those unable to move because no suitable alternative exists, and those in supported or sheltered housing where a spouse or partner dies or leaves them and who are below pensionable age and would be compelled to move out. Added together, those exemptions would certainly reduce the hardship and extra costs implicit in the underoccupation penalty. I look forward to hearing comments from other noble Lords and the reaction of the Minister.

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, before I speak to my amendment in this group, perhaps I may follow the noble Lord, Lord Best, in his concerns about the impact of this move to an underoccupation penalty, particularly on families. It was encouraging to hear from the Minister the results of his survey and some positive outcomes to the changes whereby people will look for work, or think of getting a lodger. However, what concerned me about his comments were the large numbers who might go into arrears. I have observed from my experience of young people leaving care and of other families that people leading chaotic lives tend to think from day to day.

Therefore, given the example given by the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, if a family in bed and breakfast accommodation were offered a three-bedroom house that seems to suit them but may be too large, they may say, “We will take it and deal with the arrears when they come. We will not think of the future”. Then they end up in arrears and in serious difficulty because they are not able to cope with the worry of being in debt and they do not know what to do. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Best, for highlighting the fact that this issue needs close attention from the Government, and I look forward to learning more about it. He has a good point. This is a serious worry with the underoccupation penalty.

The noble Lord also raised the question of foster carers. Under the current absurd arrangement, foster caring and providing a room to a foster child would not count as a room and in this scenario would count against one. I am not expressing that very clearly, but I think your Lordships understand what I mean. I suppose it might be argued that this will be an incentive for some people to foster if they have a spare room. If the Bill is changed to be made sane, they would not be caught by this part of the legislation.

However, I have two further thoughts. First, there is a real question as to how far one should professionalise foster caring. People should go into foster caring because they love children and want to provide a good home to a child. I know that there is a debate about the professionalisation of foster care but, in principle at least, people should be motivated by caring for children, not making a bit of extra money or saving some money. Secondly, the harms that may arise from this proposal by far outweigh any potential benefits of that kind. If such families get into arrears there is perhaps the cost to the mental health service as the family breaks down under stress. There is the cost to the education system as their children fail. One needs to look at the bigger picture rather than just think about short-term savings.

Perhaps I may sum up. I apologise for using my laptop on this occasion; however, I cannot get internet access today and I was unable to download my notes and print them out. My Amendment 85 is modelled on the previous amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, and I apologise to the Committee because I drafted my amendment rather poorly. I should have referred to children looked after by local authorities rather than those cared for by them. My intention is to gain an assurance from the Minister that families who have their children looked after by a local authority may retain a room for that child to return to when he is ready. While a few children are adopted from care, most return home sooner or later, and it is right that they should have a room when that happens. It is important for the parents to retain a sense that their child remains their child and that they remain the parents. That is important because their children will normally still love their parents, however they have been treated, and will need to feel there is a place for them in their parents’ home. It is important also because the child will eventually return. Generally, we should strongly encourage these parents to retain their sense of responsibility for their own children. An experienced child and family social worker has reminded me that it will also be important for the child to know that his parents will be keeping a room for him. He will need to feel that he is still wanted and there is still a home for him with his parents.

In the year ending 31 March 2011, 3,050 children were adopted out of a population at that time of 65,520 children who were being looked after. Very few children, then, were adopted. Children who are subject to residence orders, or are being cared for informally by the Ryder family, are all the more likely to return to their families. Barnado’s has expressed concern about these children. This matter was also raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler of Enfield, at Second Reading. There is a separate amendment in this group, which I support, on those particular groups of children.

I would be most grateful if the Minister could reassure me that families whose children are looked after by a local authority would not normally be subject to the underoccupation penalty. I apologise if the problem with my drafting has made it more difficult for him to reply. I would certainly find a letter acceptable if that seemed more appropriate in the circumstances.

I will not speak to my Amendment 86 because my understanding is that the benefit arrangements for care leavers are such that the concern I had is not an issue. I look forward to the Minister’s response.