Underoccupancy Charge: Carers Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Work and Pensions
Lord Christopher
Main Page: Lord Christopher (Labour - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Christopher's debates with the Department for Work and Pensions
(10 years, 1 month ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Freud
As I said, we have made sure that long-term discretionary housing payments can be made. We have also provided guidance to make it clear that where claimants are using their disability payments for needs caused by their disability, such as paying for care or Motability schemes, those would not be included in the calculation.
Lord Christopher (Lab)
My Lords, is it not the case that it is not just outrageous but downright cruel to require a partner—presumably a wife or a husband—whose day may be appalling anyway, to sleep in the same room as the disabled person? I find that statement utterly outrageous.
Lord Freud
About 40,000 couples in which one is looking after the other were covered by the spare room policy when it was introduced. That is about 6% of the total. The discretionary housing payment system was set up precisely to look at circumstances in which the couple could not share a room—because, of course, many of them could, even though there was a disability.