Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that disability related expenditure assessments are being undertaken by local authorities.

Where local authorities decide to charge for the provision of care and support, they must follow the Care and Support Statutory Guidance, which is available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/care-act-statutory-guidance/care-and-support-statutory-guidance#Chapter8

This guidance sets out that, where disability-related benefits are taken into account during a financial assessment, the local authority should make an assessment and allow the person to keep enough of their benefit payments to pay for necessary disability-related expenditure, to meet any needs which are not being met by the local authority.