Draft Bereavement Benefits (Remedial) Order 2022

Debate between Tahir Ali and Mims Davies

Tuesday 24th January 2023 General Committees

[Mims Davies]

My hon. Friend has kindly reminded us of all surviving partners, dependent children and the access to support that is available irrespective of that partnership and sexuality. I hope that the Committee find that welcome. That provision is absolutely right, and it is helpful to put that on the record early in our proceedings.

The benefits can only be paid to survivors who were in a legal union—married or in a civil partnership—with the deceased on the day that they died. However, the McLaughlin judgment in the Supreme Court, handed down on 30 August 2018, and the Jackson case in the High Court, handed down on 7 February 2020, identified that legislation on widowed parent’s allowance and the higher rate of bereavement support payment respectively was incompatible with article 14 of the European convention on human rights. That article requires all rights and freedoms set out in legislation to be protected and applied without discrimination. In both cases, the courts found that by restricting eligibility to those in a legal union, current legislation discriminates between children on the grounds of the legal status of their parents’ relationship.

The order provides a remedy for Great Britain and Northern Ireland by amending the Social Security Contributions and Benefits Act 1992, the Social Security Contributions and Benefits (Northern Ireland) Act 1992 and the Pensions Act 2014. I am satisfied that the provisions of the draft Bereavement Benefits (Remedial) Order 2022 are compatible with the ECHR. The Joint Committee on Human Rights has reported on the draft order and recommended its approval.

For the Committee’s wider understanding, I will provide an overview of bereavement benefits as I take Members through the proposed changes. Widowed parent’s allowance was introduced in 2001 alongside the bereavement allowance and the bereavement payment. The WPA was intended to provide ongoing financial support following the death of a spouse to those with dependent children, and from 2005 that support was extended to cover the death of a civil partner. With the introduction of universal credit, a benefit designed to help with ongoing living costs, it was necessary to look again at the whole package of bereavement benefits. That applied particularly to WPA, which could be paid for the same purpose as universal credit, and which was complicated to claim and to administer.

We modernised financial support for the bereaved by introducing a new benefit from 6 April 2017. Bereavement support payment was intended to help with the more immediate costs of bereavement and to allow for a period of adjustment following the death of a partner. It consists of an initial lump sum, followed by 18 monthly instalments. A higher rate is paid to those with dependent children. Unlike its predecessors, it is tax- free and disregarded for the purposes of income-related benefits, helping those on the lowest incomes the most.

Bereavement benefits have only ever been payable to those who were in a legal union with their deceased partner. They are contributory benefits, with eligibility linked to the national insurance contributions of the deceased partner. Such inheritable benefits, derived from another person’s national insurance contributions, have historically been based on the concept of a legal union.

I will now outline what this draft order covers. Eligibility for widowed parent’s allowance and the higher rate of bereavement support payment will be extended to surviving partners who have dependent children and who were living with their deceased partner as if they were married or in a civil partnership at the date of their death. That includes partners who are or were pregnant on the date of their partner’s death, and there will be no qualifying period of cohabitation. This change will benefit thousands of families with dependent children.

[Tahir Ali (Birmingham, Hall Green) (Lab)]

Can the Minister tell us what the current level of take-up of this benefit is and what the take-up is expected to be after the change comes into force?

[Mims Davies]

I believe that we are doing that work at this point, so I am happy to give the hon. Gentleman further details as we go through the impacts and—[Interruption.]