Housing Benefit (Under-occupancy Penalty)

Simon Hughes Excerpts

Wednesday 27th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Steve Webb]

Our impact assessment is our best estimate based on what we expect the impact of the policy to be. That is all any Department ever produces. We believe that it is a robust best estimate.

[Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)]

My hon. Friend knows that his Liberal Democrat colleagues expressed concern about this measure when it went through this House and the other House, and that it was changed as a result of some of those concerns, but does he accept that there is still concern that the message about the facts is not getting through and that pensioners in particular are worried? Will he also accept the need to address other categories of people who need separate rooms—for example, those with disabilities or those with teenage, university or service children—but whose needs are not being adequately met at the moment?

[Steve Webb]

My right hon. Friend has some credibility on the issue of welfare reform, because he has been prepared to vote for difficult decisions on public spending. Neither the Labour party nor the nationalist parties have taken any difficult decisions on anything—they simply oppose everything—whereas he has, quite fairly, been willing to take some difficult decisions and support them and, again quite properly, raise concerns about the detail of policy. He is entirely right. The principle of the policy must be seen in the context of deficit reduction. Given that we have to reduce the deficit, we want to do so in a way that potentially has upsides as well as downsides, such as by making better use of the social housing stock, but it has always been our intention to protect the most vulnerable. The additional £30 million on top of the core £20 million for discretionary housing payments is the key way we want to do that, and I will say more later about how we want to ensure that that system works.

--- Later in debate ---

[Steve Webb]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady. The point of the policy is not for people to be evicted, which would raise costs for the Exchequer and for the individual, but to ensure that existing housing stock is fully occupied.

Let me try directly to address the issue of the shortfall. There were two ways in which we could have approached the matter, one of which was blanket exemptions, which is what we did for pensioners. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan for making it absolutely clear in opening the debate that pensioners are not covered by this change.

It is clear that we wanted to protect another set of people. Let me deal with the example of foster children, whom my right hon. Friend the Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) mentioned. The position on foster families is, I think, shared across the House. If people need a spare bedroom for a foster child, we want to make sure that they have one, and we want to support fosterers. The question is whether that is done better by some blanket exemption or by what we have done in costing what it would take to meet the shortfall for those families and giving the money to local authorities so that a foster family for which this was an issue—it might not be an issue for all of them—can approach the authority and have the shortfall made up.

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and I are entirely open to discussing whether that is the most effective way of delivering that support. Our judgment was that discretionary housing payments gave local authorities the discretion we would want them to have. If for any reason that message is not getting through and is causing anxieties to foster families who do not know about DHPs, for example, or if local authorities have not communicated well enough, we would be happy to look at whether this is the most effective way of supporting families. Where there is a shortfall, discretionary housing payments for this and other measures are available. We want to make sure that people use them when they are in genuine need. Eviction is clearly not something that we are seeking to achieve.

[Simon Hughes]

That was really helpful. I want to pursue the issue raised by the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg). The Minister has said that he is willing to look at whether the discretionary funds will meet certain problems. May I take it that he and the Secretary of State would be willing to look at the categories defining which people need a bedroom, as I think some categories that are not currently counted as falling within the definition should be included in it?

[Steve Webb]

I can see the attraction of that approach, and I think there is a balance to be struck. The attraction of the approach for foster families would be that the size criteria could be defined and then categories of people such as a couple, teenage children and so forth could be added to the list. We could say that a bedroom used for a foster child is a bedroom, so no deduction applies, people do not need to go to the council for the DHPs and the Department for Work and Pensions rather than the local authority would meet the bill. That is one way of doing things.

The challenge for us in that approach is defining in Whitehall all the categories of people who ought to have a room. There could be difficulties even within a category, as there might be foster carers, for example, for whom this is more or less of an issue. It could vary from case to case. We have to make the judgment: where do we need to make a blanket exemption or a blanket entitlement to a room, and where do we say that we will give the local authorities money and discretion? Each side of the argument has its attractions. We have to ensure that the money we have given to local authorities is well spent and that people know it is coming.

I have been interviewed on various television programmes, which have featured case studies of people who were obviously distressed—and I do not doubt that some people are distressed by this change. Obviously, however, if they approached their local authority, they would not be affected by it. That is the issue. They would go to their local authority, which has been given money to help them; the authority would help them, so they would not be affected. My right hon. Friend the Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark and the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg) are right that we must ensure that people are not unduly alarmed, as in many cases money is available to help the most vulnerable.