Select committee: Work and Pensions Committee
Recommendation 10
Seventh Report - Children in poverty: No recourse to public funds
Published 14 Apr 2022
Paragraph 35
Addressed to Department for Work and Pensions
Work and Pensions Committee Children in poverty: No recourse to public funds All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
Most of those who gave evidence were keen to see an end to the no recourse to public funds condition. But we think the Government is unlikely to change this policy and such a change could result in fewer people bring granted visas to the UK. As an alternative, we have concluded that it is both affordable and appropriate for the Government to extend Child Benefit to all British children irrespective of their parents’ immigration status. We recommend it does so as soon as possible.
From: Work and Pensions Committee, Seventh Report - Children in poverty: No recourse to public funds (HC 603), paragraph 35, 14 April 2022
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 13 June 2022 (deadline 14 June 2022).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government responds to each recommendation, taking forward some reviews, data work and funding while stating "there are no plans to shorten the maximum period of time spent subject to NRPF for families with children" and declining several others.
- On domestic abuse, it will provide £1.4 million in 2022–23 to continue funding support for migrant victims, with the independent evaluation of the pilot due to report in Summer 2022.
- The Department for Work and Pensions "will review its guidance and communications" for people with an NRPF condition and will write to the Committee within three months on the outcome.
- The Home Office does not plan to carry out a cost-benefit analysis on NRPF, saying it "would not be feasible to do so meaningfully", and does not plan to publish the NRPF Forum minutes.
- On data, the Home Office is "committed to further explore data availability" on NRPF and migrant poverty, while recognising the challenges of identifying and gathering the relevant data.