Royston Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Royston Smith on 2016-03-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the discretionary housing payments scheme in preventing households in exceptional circumstances having to pay the under-occupancy penalty.

Justin Tomlinson

For 2015/16 we have provided £60 million in Discretionary Housing Payment funding to help protect individuals affected by the removal of the spare room subsidy and we have protected this support at £60 million for 2016/17

Since 2013, £25 million of the Discretionary Housing Payment funding for the removal of the spare room subsidy has been allocated to support disabled people living in significantly adapted accommodation, including any adaptations made for disabled children. This funding support remains unchanged for 2016/17.

In the last financial year, the majority of local authorities spent less than or 100 per cent of their funding which indicates that they had sufficient funds to meet demand.

In the first six months of this financial year (2015/16) the majority of local authorities had spent less than 50 per cent of their Discretionary Housing Payment allocation.