Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how people who are responsible for funeral costs and in receipt of a qualifying benefit have an application for a Social Fund Funeral Expenses Payment refused because of the family tests in the eligibility criteria in each of the last five years.

Table 1 shows the number of applicants responsible for funeral cost who were receipt of qualifying benefits but were refused a Funeral Expenses Payment due to the family test reasons below:

• There is a surviving partner
• There is a closer relative
• They are not a partner, friend or relative

Table 1: Funeral Expense Payments- Refusals linked to the Family Test

Notes:

- These figures have been estimated using unaudited internal DWP Management Information which is not quality assured to the same extent as Official / National statistics.

- These applicants are assumed to have been responsible for funeral costs and to have been in receipt of a qualifying benefit.

- Figures have been rounded to the nearest 100.