The government have started drawing up plans to move 1.7million benefit claimants onto Universal Credit.
The changes are set to start in a matter of weeks. The transfer was put on hold due to Covid - but it is understood that ministers plan to restart it this spring, reported The Mirror.
The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) will start with a small number, with a cap of up to 10,000 households, of Tax Credit claimants. They will then remove the cap and move onto disability and other benefit claimants.
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The government plan to have everyone on the new six-in-one benefit by the end of 2024. Charities and the government’s welfare watchdog have raised fears over plans to restart the “managed migration” of old-style benefit claimants.
The Social Security Advisory Committee (SSAC) warned the change “creates a significant risk” for benefit claimants, many of whom have “complex lives”. It also creates risks for the DWP in delivering its plan, the committee warned.
Chair Dr Stephen Brien warned there must be “independent oversight and scrutiny”. He announced he would be seeking further advice from experts over plans to lift the 10,000-household cap.
Ministers insist Universal Credit is often more generous than old-style benefits, after they were repeatedly forced to reform it amid public anger and poor Brits turning to food banks. The six-week wait was cut to five, allowances for people in work were raised, and the amount given to debt repayments was cut.
But campaigners point out some people could still be worse off. Anela Anwar, chief executive of anti-poverty charity Z2K, said lifting the 10,000 cap must get fresh approval in Parliament. She added: “It ensures DWP avoids a repeat of the shambolic early stages of Universal Credit, when many people were left without anything to live on for weeks or sometimes even months on end. That resulted in MPs getting hundreds of complaints from desperate and angry constituents.”
Dr Brien was one of the original brains behind Universal Credit, and faced questions over his impartiality in 2020 when he became SSAC chairman. He hit back at this at the time, insisting his work would be “evidence-based”.
He told ministers on the latest change: “I can provide assurance that we do not wish to unduly delay the process. We will not be undertaking a large-scale public consultation on this occasion but intend to seek the advice of a small number of experts, including those with significant experience or expertise of agile processes and their governance.”
But he added: “For the public to have confidence in this process and to minimise risk further consideration needs to be given to establishing appropriate independent oversight and scrutiny of the programme as it moves forward.”
DWP Permanent Secretary Peter Schofield said in November that he was “determined” to see Universal Credit fully rolled out by December 2024. He told MPs: “We got the funding in the spending review to finish this on time.” The benefit’s director general Neil Couling suggested the transfer would be a “slow, slow, slow experience”, adding: “You need to develop your processes and do that with small volumes.”
A DWP spokesperson said: “Universal Credit is a modern dynamic benefit which supports people in and out of work. We have always been clear about our ambition to move people over from the legacy systems, which are complex, inefficient and based on aging, inflexible IT. The Department will continue its regular engagement with the committee and our ambition remains to see the rollout of Universal Credit delivered safely and on time by 2024.”
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