Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Pensions on 21st March 1986.
Mr. Meacher Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will set out the average level of (a) the state earnings-
Mr. Major I shall let the hon. Member have a reply as soon as possible.
Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Goods and Services (Payment) on 21st March 1986.
Mr. Ottaway Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what is the average time it takes his Department to pay suppliers of goods and services to his Department.
Mr. Major Payments to suppliers are not centralised, but may be made from any of the local, regional or central offices of the Department. No figures are therefore available for an average time for payment across the Department as a whole.
Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Severe Weather Payments on 21st March 1986.
Mr. Michie Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what provision is being made by his Department for extra staff to be available to deal with exceptionally severe weather payments in order to avoid the long delays to routine claims.
Mr. Major The manpower provided for DHSS local offices contains a margin to deal with peaks of work such as that relating to exceptionally severe weather which, by their nature, cannot be planned in advance.
Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Housing Benefit on 21st March 1986.
Mr. Kirkwood Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what steps are taken by his Department before it seeks to recover certificated housing benefit overpaid so as to ensure that the claimant has first been notified by the relevant local authority (a) that a decision to recover has been made and (b) that the claimant may apply to the authority for a review of that decision.
Mr. Major Local authorities are under a statutory obligation to notify claimants of all determinations of benefit, including any given rise to an overpayment. The notification must inform the claimant of his right to seek a review of the determination. It is a matter for individual authorities to decide how best to inform claimants of actual amounts of any overpayments and the proposed method of recovery. The Department’s local offices become directly involved in recovering only certain categories of overpaid certificated benefit which are referred to them by the local authorities. In these cases the local office informs the claimant of the reason for the overpayment, the proposals for recovery, and that if the claimant disagrees with the calculation of the overpayment he should take this up with the relevant local authority.
Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Supplementary Benefit on 20th March 1986.
Mr. Sean Hughes Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services how many single payments were made from the Huyton office of his Department during each of the last five years and in 1986 to date.
Mr. Major [pursuant to his reply, 13 March 1986, c. 570]: The number of single payments made from the Huyton local office in the years since April 1982 are:
Year | Number
1982-
1983-
1984-
1985-
* up to 11 February 1986
Information is not available for a complete year prior to 1982-
Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on New Earnings Survey on 20th March 1986.
Mr. Frank Field Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will publish the data for the “New Earnings Survey” for 1983 on the numbers of poor persons and households.
Mr. Major I understand that the hon. Member is referring to this Department’s publication “Low Income Families”. I refer the hon. Member to the reply given by my hon. Friend the Minister for Social Security to my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington (Sir B. Rhys Williams) on 4 March at column 122.
Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Housing Benefit on 20th March 1986.
Mr. Corbyn Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will list the amount of housing benefit owed by his Department on 31 December 1985 to the local authorities of Islington, Camden, Hackney, Sheffield and Bristol; and if he will give comparable figures for the same dates in 1983 and 1984.
Mr. Major The Department pays subsidy to local authorities on their benefit and administration costs under the housing benefits scheme on the basis of final audited claims for each financial year. Payments on account of subsidy are made each month during the year on the basis of authorities’ estimates of expenditure. No payments of subsidy were owed by the Department to any of the authorities mentioned on 31 December 1983, 1984 or 1985. Payments on account had also been made in the normal way.
Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Local Office Staff on 20th March 1986.
Dr. Godman Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if, pursuant to his answer of 7 March, Official Report, column 322, he will published in the Official Report the number of additional social security local office staff to be allocated to (i) Greenock, (ii) Port Glasgow, (iii) Strathclyde and (iv) Scotland as a whole.
Mr. Major The method of distributing the extra local office staff has still to be decided, so it is not possible at this stage to say how many extra staff Scotland and individual local offices will receive.
Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Housing Benefit on 19th March 1986.
Mr. Park Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what proportion of the domestic ratepayers in Coventry receive housing benefit.
Mr. Major We estimate that the number of rate rebate recipients, based on the local authority’s subsidy claims as a proportion of the number of domestic ratepayers in Coventry is about 40 per cent.
Mr. Frank Field Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services (1) if he will list (a) the number of claimants eligible for housing benefit and (b) the number and percentage claiming benefit for each year since the scheme’s initiation; and if he will also present data on the number of dependants covered by these payments.
(2) if he will detail changes in the housing benefit scheme since its inception, together with planned future changes giving the numbers of claimants subject to changes to all or part of their entitlement, the average value of each of the changes and the net savings to public expenditure; and if he will express each of these changes to public expenditure as a percentage of the total cost of the scheme.
Mr. Major I shall let the hon. Member have replies as soon as possible.
Below is the text of Mr Major’s written Parliamentary Answer on Board and Lodging on 19th March 1986.
Mr. Kirkwood Asked the Secretary of State for Social Services when he expects the Chief Adjudication Officer to inform him of the date of a tribunal of commissioners to hear all the outstanding appeals involving the elderly and disabled in receipt of board and lodging assistance.
Mr. Major I understand that an oral hearing of a tribunal of commissioners has been arranged for Friday 11 April 1986 to consider a case relating to this issue.