Select committee: Scottish Affairs Committee
Recommendation 2
Second Report - Welfare policy in Scotland
Published 23 Jun 2021
Paragraph 23
Addressed to Scotland Office
Scottish Affairs Committee Welfare policy in Scotland All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
We recommend that DWP and Social Security Scotland work together to promote benefit up-take across all benefits in Scotland. Jobcentre staff in Scotland should be aware of the principles of both the DWP customer charter and the Scottish Social Security Charter to provide information, signposting and advice on how to apply for reserved benefits as well as Discretionary Housing Payments and the Scottish Welfare Fund. Similarly, Social Security Scotland should signpost clients towards UK Government benefits. The Committee recommends the DWP contribute to a review with the Scottish Government, Social Security Scotland and local stakeholders to determine how to do this in practice. This should be discussed at the next available opportunity in the Joint Ministerial Working Group between the governments.
From: Scottish Affairs Committee, Second Report - Welfare policy in Scotland (HC 55), paragraph 23, 23 June 2021
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 19 November 2021 (deadline 23 August 2021).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The UK Government "notes the Committee's recommendations" and responds to each in turn, accepting little of the report's welfare-policy proposals and referring several to the Scottish Government.
- On the £20 uplift and legacy benefits, it states "There was never any plan to extend the uplift to legacy benefits."
- On work allowances, it states it "has no plans to extend the work allowance to single adults".
- On Help to Claim funding, it "considers the existing resource to be sufficient", and says DWP agreed to fund Citizens Advice Scotland for another year, "up to 31 March 2022".
- On data sharing and Recommendations 2, 7 and 8, it says each data request "must be examined" by DWP as Data Controller, and treats several recommendations as "for the Scottish Government".