Lord Laird – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Laird on 2015-12-03.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they record nationality and immigration status on social security benefit claimant records; and if so, whether that information is collated, and whether they will publish it broken down by nationality, status and country of origin.

Lord Freud

Nationality and immigration status are not recorded on social security benefit claimant records in a form that allows for collation.

For contributory benefits, nationality is not a qualifying factor, as eligibility is determined by the National Insurance contributions that the claimant has made. As such, this information is not available. For other income related benefits where residency conditions apply and the claimant must be lawfully resident in the UK, nationality is a factor. Once residency has been determined, nationality is not required for further processing and is therefore not routinely held on DWP computer systems in a form that allows for collation.

There are currently no plans to change how data is collected to allow for collation or publication.