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9 Jan 2006 : Column 53W—continued

National Pension Savings Scheme

16. John Penrose: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what assessment he has made of the effect of employer contributions to the national pension savings scheme, as proposed by the Turner Commission, on his Department's target of achieving an employment rate of 80 per cent. of the working-age population. [40173]

Mr. Timms: We are in the process of examining the recommendations made by the commission in detail. At this stage, nothing is ruled in and nothing is ruled out. One of the commission's recommendations, to which we will be giving careful consideration, is the introduction
 
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of mandatory employer contributions. In looking at this option we will of course take account of possible impacts on business and on the labour market.

Women's Pensions

17. Mr. Hollobone: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what proposals are being considered to improve the pension provision available for married women who choose to stay at home to bring up their children. [40174]

Mr. Timms: Women's pension provision is steadily improving through increased labour market participation, home responsibilities protection and the state second pension. The Government are considering how to extend pension coverage further and enable women with caring responsibilities to build up better pension entitlement. Our proposals for reform which we intend to publish in the spring, will be guided by the principle that the pension system should deliver fair outcomes for women and carers. A campaign to encourage carers to apply for home responsibility protection is being launched today.

Housing Benefit

18. Vera Baird: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what steps he is taking to improve the administration of housing benefit. [40175]

Mr. Plaskitt: In 2002, we put in place a comprehensive strategy for reform of housing benefit, with the first priority being to improve administration across the board.

We have already made significant progress. The average time taken by local authorities to process new claims has shortened by two weeks. We have introduced a number of simplification measures to reduce complexity in the housing benefit rules. We have provided investment, to help authorities make improvements in the administration of housing benefit. We have reduced the losses due to fraud and error. We are piloting the new Local Housing Allowance in 18 local authorities, with a view to national implementation.

22. Alison Seabeck: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what recent discussions his Department has had with the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister about the ending of the single room rent restriction for housing benefit. [40179]

Mr. Plaskitt: We have had no recent discussions with the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister specifically regarding the ending of the Single Room Rent restriction.

We are currently planning the way forward for HB reforms in the private sector and we will look at the Single Room Rent as a part of this process. Indeed we are piloting a more generous scheme in those areas running the new Local Housing Allowance.

However, the core rationale for the Single Room Rent, that of encouraging work, remains. Removing all Single Room Rent restrictions would in fact have the perverse effect of creating a situation where greater benefit dependency would be fostered at an early age.
 
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Danny Alexander: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions pursuant to his answer of 9 November 2005, Official Report, column 372W, on housing benefit, what estimate he has made of (a) the cost of limiting a 10 per cent. reduction in the housing benefit taper to earned income and (b) the cost of limiting a five per cent. reduction in the council tax benefit taper to earned income. [29779]

Mr. Plaskitt [holding answer 21 November 2005]: There would be no cost to local authorities for paying additional benefit as this would be met by the Department. The only impact to local authorities would be associated with the processing and maintenance of additional new claims; the numbers of which are in the table. The Department does not collect management information relating to the cost to authorities of processing and maintaining claims.

The available information is in the table.
Cost associated with reducing housing benefit (HB) and council tax benefit (CTB) tapers

	Number of new beneficiaries floating on	Number of existing beneficiaries gaining	Cost in annually managed expenditure (£ million per year)
Reducing the HB taper from 65% to 55% for earned income	105,000	305,000	150
Reducing the CTB taper from 20% to 15% for earned income	255,000	290,000	75

Notes:
1.All figures are for Great Britain.
2.Beneficiaries are rounded to the nearest 5,000 and costs are rounded to the nearest £5 million.
3.Each beneficiary represents a benefit unit, which can be a single claimant or a couple.
4.Earned income consists of income from earnings only, and excludes occupational pensions. For a couple, their earned income is their combined earnings.
5.The impact is estimated using the Department's Policy Simulation Model for 2005–06, using data from the 2003–04 Family Resources Survey up-rated to 2005–06 prices, benefit rates and earnings levels, and is calibrated to latest published forecasts and policies.
6.Results are subject to sampling and reporting errors and estimation assumptions, and are therefore indicative only. No behavioural changes are assumed.

Mr. Paul Goodman: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions when he expects to publish details of his plans to pilot the local housing allowance in the social rented sector; and if he will make a statement. [29995]

Mr. Plaskitt: In order for housing benefit to keep pace with our wider welfare reforms we are considering options for reforming housing benefit for tenants in the social rented sector. However, we appreciate that conditions for social tenants are very different from those in the private sector, for example, social sector tenants don't always have the same degree of choice as
 
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those in the private sector. Such differences will need to be taken very seriously in developing proposals for reform, which we will do in discussion with experts on social housing.

Mr. Paul Goodman: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what assessment he has made of the impact of ending the direct payment of housing benefit to registered social landlords on their financial viability. [30011]

Mr. Plaskitt: While we want to create a situation where people become responsible for paying their own rent where they are able to do so, we recognise that this is a significant issue for social landlords and lenders. Departmental officials regularly meet with representatives of social landlords and will ensure that their concerns are taken very seriously when developing proposals for reforming housing benefit.

Lynne Jones: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many tenants in (a) England, (b) the West Midlands and (c) Birmingham received housing benefit in each of the past eight years; what percentage in each year rented from (i) a local authority, (ii) a registered social landlord, (iii) a private landlord and (iv) an employer; and what the average housing benefit payment was in each category. [33299]

Mr. Plaskitt: Information is not available for tenancies where the landlord is the tenant's employer. The available information is in the following tables.
Housing benefit caseload by tenure as percentage of total caseload: England

		Percentage of total
May	Total (000)	Local authority	Registered social landlord	Private (excluding RSL)
1997	3,870.8	57.9	17.6	24.4
1998	3,725.5	57.3	19.6	23.1
1999	3,585.4	56.0	21.8	22.2
2000	3,341.7	54.2	24.4	21.4
2001	3,207.4	52.5	27.3	20.2
2002	3,159.9	50.9	29.4	19.8
2003	3,161.3	47.2	33.1	19.7
2004	3,232.6	45.4	34.5	20.1
2005	3,314.9	43.9	35.2	20.9

Housing benefit caseload by tenure as percentage of total caseload: West Midlands

		Percentage of total
May	Total (000)	Local authority	Registered social landlord	Private (excluding RSL)
1997	413.4	65.6	18.5	16.0
1998	402.8	64.9	19.4	15.8
1999	388.6	62.1	22.4	15.5
2000	364.5	59.1	25.7	15.2
2001	351.7	53.9	31.4	14.7
2002	349.1	52.0	33.1	14.9
2003	349.9	47.0	37.9	15.1
2004	347.0	44.1	40.4	15.5
2005	352.2	43.1	40.1	16.8

 
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Housing benefit caseload by tenure as percentage of total caseload: Birmingham

		Percentage of total
May	Total (000)	Local authority	Registered social landlord	Private (excluding RSL)
1997	110.8	63.8	20.5	15.7
1998	109.5	63.0	21.2	15.9
1999	104.5	62.3	22.1	15.6
2000	91.7	61.2	24.0	14.8
2001	90.8	60.6	25.4	14.0
2002	92.4	58.9	26.7	14.3
2003	89.5	58.2	27.4	14.4
2004	88.7	56.8	27.7	15.5
2005	88.5	54.9	28.1	17.0

Housing benefit caseload and tenure by average amount in payment: England £ per week

May	Total	Local authority	Registered social landlord	Private (excluding RSL)
1997	44.82	37.15	50.31	59.07
1998	45.90	37.97	52.63	59.89
1999	47.90	40.04	54.64	61.11
2000	50.00	42.34	55.88	62.69
2001	52.97	45.38	58.18	65.65
2002	56.60	47.73	62.87	70.07
2003	57.99	49.90	60.41	73.32
2004	61.99	53.95	63.09	78.29
2005	65.79	56.98	65.92	84.11

Housing benefit caseload and tenure by average amount in payment: West Midlands £ per week

May	Total	Local authority	Registered social landlord	Private (excluding RSL)
1997	39.30	34.81	45.46	50.61
1998	40.40	35.34	47.50	52.46
1999	42.38	36.99	49.15	54.21
2000	44.08	38.89	48.98	55.92
2001	46.52	41.33	49.72	58.73
2002	49.43	43.44	52.77	62.97
2003	50.08	44.35	52.02	63.10
2004	52.99	47.23	54.12	66.41
2005	55.67	48.99	56.65	70.44

Housing benefit caseload and tenure by average amount in payment: Birmingham £ per week

May	Total	Local authority	Registered social landlord	Private (excluding RSL)
1997	42.95	37.75	49.55	55.49
1998	43.86	37.71	52.03	57.40
1999	46.16	39.98	53.89	59.87
2000	47.05	40.82	54.59	60.56
2001	48.13	41.97	55.55	61.36
2002	51.87	44.90	60.02	65.31
2003	51.47	45.09	58.27	64.32
2004	54.91	48.18	61.08	68.56
2005	58.60	51.55	63.49	73.26

Notes:
1.Caseloads are rounded to the nearest hundred and shown in thousands.
2.Totals may not sum due to rounding.
3.Figures for any non-responding authorities have been estimated.
4.Housing benefit figures exclude any extended payment cases.
5.Average amounts are rounded to the nearest penny.
Source:
Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit Management Information System Quarterly 100 per cent. caseload stock-count taken between May 1997 and May 2005.




 
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Mr. Iain Wright: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions whether he plans to restrict the direct payment of housing benefit to landlords whose tenants commit antisocial behaviour. [35180]

Mr. Plaskitt: As with the wider community, landlords have a responsibility to ensure that, in carrying out their business, they minimise the scope for antisocial behaviour by their tenants.Most landlords take this responsibility seriously and the Government have in the past considered what action can be taken against those few landlords who do not.

We have looked at the option of removing entitlement to direct payments from recalcitrant landlords, but have concluded that this would not be an effective measure.

Danny Alexander: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions pursuant to the answer of 16 November 2005, Official Report, column 1256W, on housing benefit, when he expects to make a decision on the recommendation in his Department's research report No. 243 that all disabled claimants and all care leavers should be made exempt from the single room rent restriction. [38105]

Mr. Plaskitt: We will continue to review the single room rent and local housing allowance shared room rate as we move forward with wider welfare reform, to ensure that young people can access appropriate accommodation. However, the core rationale for the single room rent, that of encouraging work, remains.

Danny Alexander: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions pursuant to the oral statement of 7 December 2005, Official Report, column 271WH, on housing benefit pathfinders, what the source was for the figure he gave of 60 per cent. of those who rent in the private sector who are not in receipt of housing benefit rent sharing accommodation. [38106]

Mr. Plaskitt: The source of this figure is the Department's analysis of the 2002–03 Family Resources Survey.

Mrs. Moon: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (1) if he will assess the merits of removing the 16-hour housing benefit rule to enable young adults in housing need to study full-time for qualifications at level 3 or below without loss of housing benefit; [38285]

(2) what research he has carried out on the impact of the 16-hour housing benefit rule on those in housing need who are unable to claim housing benefit if they are studying for more than 16 hours per week. [38286]

Mr. Plaskitt: I refer the hon. Member to the written answer I gave on 12 December 2005, Official Report, columns 1762–63W to the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Laws).
 
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Mr. McGovern: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions whether the Government are planning to remove the single room rent upper limit on housing benefit provisions for those under 25 years. [40170]

Mr. Plaskitt: We have no such plans, although we will continue to look at the single room rent as part of the process of wider housing benefit reform.

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