There’s been a lot of publicity over the past week about the numbers of people who have fallen into arrears with their Council Tax and who are being taken to court by local authorities.   I’m very afraid that it will get much worse in the future. Up to 450,000 face court over council tax […]

(including ‘teaching me not to make assumptions – a lesson in fallibility’) “Shared ownership is an antidote to many of the problems in today’s housing market. It is a long-standing, affordable and sustainable option – and an ideal way of helping people realise their home ownership dreams. People can buy an initial share of between […]

“George Osborne is considering a further lowering of the amount households can receive in benefits as Tory MPs press him to reduce a newly-imposed cap by another £6,000. A limit of £26,000 a year was imposed on claimants yesterday, but the Chancellor is facing calls to take a harder line from backbenchers who want it […]

I’ve uploaded the first version of these tables. They cover all GB local authority areas and demonstrate the impact of the benefits cap on a range of family types using local housing costs. The tables quantify shortfalls in benefit, because of the cap, in both the HB capped scheme and the Universal Credit cap. They […]

The DWP have published their guidance for decision makers about deciding on Universal Credit, PIP and about the changes to ESA and JSA in the new benefits system. In order to be helpful they’ve put it out as lots of separate PDFs which are pretty unusable. I’ve pulled these into a consolidated version and put […]

The Big Lie is a propaganda technique. The expression was coined by Adolf Hitler, about the use of a lie so “colossal” that no one would believe that someone “could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously.” – Wikipedia Lie Number 1 – there will be a ‘New Simple Benefits System’ “Universal Credit […]

Rather late I’m afraid but I’ve just uploaded the latest update to Benefits After The Act. This now includes examples generated using the latest version of the Future Benefits Model (FFBM) which includes the real Universal Credit rates that will be in force from April as well as catching up with a lot of other […]

At the time of writing there is a great deal of concern about the impact of bedroom limits on social tenants. In April an under-occupancy penalty, the ‘bedroom tax’, will be imposed on about a third of all working age social tenants. This will reduce the amount of eligible rent used as the basis for […]

… for the delay in updating Benefits After The Act. I’ve finished the modelling but every time it seems about ready the government change something. I’m embedded in more detail on Council Tax interaction with Universal Credit and then I need to do a bit on the single-tier pensions. But it is underway.

Another quick advert to let people know that we’ll be criss-crossing Britain during February and March offering a number of courses courses on Welfare Reform. WELFARE REFORM AND MEANS TESTED BENEFITS This course looks at the core means-tested benefits system which will exist when the changes produced by the Welfare Reform Bill, and other announcements, […]