Welfare Reform Bill

Let me continue now with Amendments 119 and 120, which would postpone the inclusion of support for housing costs in universal credit and pension credit until right at the end of the process in October 2017, four years after the introduction. Amendment 48B would effectively provide for the housing costs element to be implemented at a later date than the other parts of universal credit. We are committed to ensuring a smooth transition from housing benefit, guided by principles of protecting claimants and ensuring business efficiency. Amendment 119 would mean that any claimants moving on to universal credit in the first few years after it is introduced would then need to go through a second migration process when their housing support transferred in October 2017. Furthermore, to avoid significant complexity we would have to amend the housing benefit legislation to align housing benefit with universal credit; for example, by aligning the treatment of income. I cannot accept the noble Lord’s amendment. As we do not believe that it is desirable to delay the incorporation of housing support into universal credit, we certainly would not want to introduce such a delay for pension credit. Our plans will ensure continuity of support for pensioners. Amendment 53B would specify that housing benefit, currently delivered by local authorities, would be abolished from October 2017. We have no intention of specifying in primary legislation the dates on which particular benefits will be abolished. We are currently developing our strategy for migrating claimants to universal credit. This involves more than 18 million existing awards of benefits and tax credits. We need to ensure that we have the flexibility to implement these changes properly, with due regard to staff and claimants alike. Housing benefit will only be abolished once all claimants have successfully been migrated to universal credit or pension credit. Amendments 55A, 55B, 71A and 71B relate to the role of local authorities. We have already agreed that although universal credit will be delivered by the Department for Work and Pensions, it will draw on the expertise of colleagues in local authorities as well as HMRC. We will build on the best of what we do currently to deliver the new service, taking the opportunity to modernise and improve, to deliver better efficiency for the taxpayer and better service for claimants. On the question of the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, about HMT’s risk register, as was discussed earlier today in Questions in the Chamber, there is no specific HMT risk register which tracks projects. HMT works closely with colleagues in the Cabinet Office’s Major Projects Authority to monitor the progress of all major projects. Clearly, universal credit is on the Government’s major projects portfolio, which is essentially a compilation of the high-risk and high-value projects, covering 200 major projects with a total value in excess of £300 billion. The Major Projects Authority has been involved with universal credit right from the start of the process in 2010. As well as providing challenge through assurance reviews, it is in involved in various levels of governance and is indeed represented on the programme board. As we develop the detailed design, we will continue to work collaboratively with local authorities to develop their role, particularly in relation to local and face-to-face delivery. Although, as I said earlier, many claimants will handle their universal credit claim online, we will continue to provide a face-to-face service. We are looking at these issues as part of the end-to-end delivery service rather than in isolation. We are also working with local authorities in Scotland and CoSLA is represented on our senior stakeholder group—in response to the question of the noble Baroness, Lady Donaghy.