Lord Turnberg – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Turnberg on 2016-02-03.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what proportion of total annual benefit payments are paid to EU immigrants.

Lord Freud

The information on benefit receipt by nationality is not available.

The Department has published statistics on working age benefit recipients claiming within 6 months of National Insurance Number (NINO) registration. This information is known as “Nationality at point of National Insurance number registration of DWP benefit claimants” and is included in the “Statistical Bulletin on National Insurance Number Allocations to Adult Overseas Nationals”.

The Government is looking at ways to reform the current administrative system under Universal Credit so that it will systematically record nationality and immigration status of migrants who make a claim.