Welfare Reform Bill

Baroness Sherlock Excerpts

Wednesday 11th January 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sherlock]

My Lords, I have two specific questions for the Minister. Following on from my noble friend Lady Hollis, even if the money were to be spent on the same people, how can the Government guarantee that it is spent for the purposes for which the Social Fund was originally created?

Looking at the local authority fieldwork summary report mentioned by my noble friend Lady Lister, the fear is clearly out there in local authorities that the money will be sucked up by social care budgets. For example, even if it was spent on child protection, that would simply be displacing other money and there would not then be money available to enable local authorities to give cash to vulnerable families. How will the Minister ensure that it gets to the right people and for the right purpose?

My second question follows on from what the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, said about the Office of the Children’s Commissioner, which believes that the Government are in breach of Article 9 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. Has the Minister taken advice on this matter and, if so, will he share it with the House?

[Baroness Meacher]

My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendment 50ZC and I will try to speak extremely briefly in view of the hour. This amendment seeks to ensure that the Social Fund remains in place—

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Sherlock]

I asked specifically whether the Government had sought or received any legal advice about whether or not this proposal was compliant with the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. Can the Minister answer that question?

[Lord De Mauley]

Perhaps I may come to that in a moment.

[Baroness Sherlock]

I shall look forward to it.

[Lord De Mauley]

My noble friend Lord Kirkwood asked about the structure of what is being transferred. The current Social Fund AME allocation of £178 million will fund the new local provision. It will be distributed based on spend at the point of transfer nationally between England, Scotland and Wales. In England, the funding will be devolved to upper-tier local authorities. Again this will be based on Social Fund expenditure. The AME funding splits £141 million to replace community care grants and £36 million for emergency provision. The first year of the new system will be 2013-14 and the funding will be the same as the amounts in 2012-13.

My noble friend asked about the Social Fund Commissioner. The Independent Review Service changed 20,886 decisions in 2010-11. The number of crisis loans, budgeting loans and community care grant decisions made was 5,595,000. The IRS makes decisions on cases that can go one way or another depending on the discretion of the decision-maker. All decisions on the discretionary Social Fund are also first subject to an internal review in Jobcentre Plus.

My noble friend asked about the possible substitution for cash and white goods and indicated that he thought it might not meet the needs. There will of course still be national provision of advances of benefit through the new payments-on-account scheme that will replace budgeting loans and crisis loans for alignment.

The noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, asked how the mixture of AME and DEL will be managed. All the money is AME. There will be, of course, additional admin funding on top to cover the cost of the new burdens.