Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether the review of Universal Credit will consider the process of how social security rates are (a) set and (b) uprated.

The Secretary of State already has an annual Statutory duty to conduct a review of benefits and State pension rates, including Universal Credit, to determine whether they have retained their value in relation to the general level of prices and/or earnings. This is a well-established process that applies more widely than just Universal Credit and is therefore outside the scope of the review.

This Government uprated benefit rates for 2025/26 in line with inflation, with 5.7 million Universal Credit households forecast to gain by an average of £150 annually. We will also improve the adequacy of the Universal Credit standard allowance with the first sustained above inflation rise in the basic rate of Universal Credit since it was introduced, subject to parliamentary approval as part of our welfare reform.