Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment his Department has made of the potential effect of the loss of local authorities' access to housing benefit claim data on their ability to target services and support tenants effectively; and if he will make a statement.

Local authorities are the data owners of Housing Benefit data. DWP shares customer data with local authorities in order for them to assess claims more effectively and quickly and to help them to keep claims right. We have contingency arrangements in place, should those interfaces fail.