Oral Answers to Questions

Helen Hayes Excerpts

Thursday 20th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I wonder why I did not know that. I am as near to speechless as I have ever been.

[Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)]

T7. . Mr Speaker, may I, too, wish you, all the staff and Members of this House a very happy Christmas? However, over this Christmas season women survivors of domestic abuse in households receiving universal credit will find it harder to leave than they should if their universal credit payment is paid to their abuser. Only yesterday, the director of Women’s Aid said of the Government’s ongoing refusal to introduce automatic split payments for universal credit:“We know from our research into the impact of universal credit that it risks exacerbating financial abuse for survivors and poses an additional barrier to survivors’ ability to escape the abuse.”What representations is the Minister for Women and Equalities making to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions to urge her to address this outrageous inequality now?

[Justin Tomlinson]

I have met Women’s Aid three times in the past month, as well as Refuge and ManKind, as we are looking to improve the support available through universal credit, based on the three key principles. The first is identifying people, whereby those organisations are helping directly to sort out training and guidance for all our frontline staff so that people can be identified as quickly as possible. Secondly, we are building on the principle of referring, so that all local and national partnerships are then made available. Finally, we are supporting people, to make sure they are fast-tracked to get a single status universal credit claim, advance payments and, where appropriate, split payments.