Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how much was spent on short-term benefit advances in the last 12 months; how much was spent by each jobcentre last year; and how much was spent in the last year of the crisis loan scheme.
Data is not held by individual Jobcentres.
Regional data which is the lowest level data available is provided in the table below for the value of awards paid for Short Term Benefit Advances (STBAs) from April 15 to February 16.
National | £5,368,526 |
Central England | £835,137 |
London & the Home Counties | £1,353,691 |
North East England | £777,410 |
North West England | £863,664 |
Northern Ireland | £2,917 |
Scotland | £784,848 |
Southern England | £413,869 |
Wales | £336,989 |
National data for the final year of the Crisis Loans scheme can be found in Annex 1 of the Social Fund Annual Report 2012/13 here:
As Crisis Loans were administered via a national telephone based service this information is not held at Jobcentre level.
Notes:
The reporting period provided for STBAs is the current financial year.
Only Working Age Benefits (i.e. ESA, IB, JSA and IS) are included in the above information for benefit advance applications as the number of applications received for State Pension Credit and Carer’s Allowance is not available.
STBA data is not routinely published but the Department has agreed that this information can be used in PQ and FOI responses.
Source:
Benefit Expenditure Business Information (BexBI).The information in BexBI is sourced from the combined payment and accounting tool, Central Payment System (CPS).