Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate she has made of the number of new applicants for universal credit since the beginning of the covid-19 outbreak who are self-assessment taxpayers and have been (a) refused benefit or (b) had their benefit reduced as a result of having savings set aside to meet their tax bill for tax year 2019- 20 .
The information requested is not available as we do not record reasons as to what purpose an individual’s savings are used for.