Second Special Report - Cost of living support payments: Government Response to the Committee's First Report of Session 2023-24

This is the government's response, published 25 January 2024.

Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.

The Government's response sets out the case for the one-off, automated Cost of Living Payments and the Household Support Fund, and does not change eligibility rules or payment timing in the ways the Committee recommended.

• On the UC nil-award recommendation, the Department "recognises the frustration" but says substantial changes "would introduce complexity, risking delays to payments or introducing unacceptable levels of fraud or error".
• On bringing forward the evaluation, it says fieldwork is due to begin in early 2024 with full findings "later in the year", that earlier publication would be "detrimental to the robustness of the evaluation", but that "any early relevant findings" will feed into policy decisions.
• On Housing Benefit as a qualifying benefit, it says payments to those receiving only Housing Benefit "could not therefore be delivered in a quick, accurate and straightforward manner", and points to Household Support Fund guidance on prioritising such households.
• On Household Support Fund guidance for people with no recourse to public funds, it says it "would not be appropriate to provide a definitive list of powers" because cases "must be judged on an individual basis".

Read the government's response ↗ Report an error