Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of suspending repayments on budgeting loans during the national covid-19 lockdown announced in January 2021.

Debt recovery, including the recovery of Social Fund Budgeting Loans, was paused for 3 months from April 2020 so that Debt Management staff could support processing in excess of three million new Universal Credit claims following the outbreak of COVID 19.

Those staff have subsequently been able to return to their roles in Debt Management and we have adopted a phased and controlled approach to re-instating debt recovery, allowing us to manage the demand on services.

There are no current plans to re-instate the suspension of debt recovery, but we will keep the situation under review.

We recognise that there will be some people who may be experiencing financial difficulty, and anyone unable to afford the rate of recovery is encouraged to contact DWP so an affordable rate of repayment can be negotiated.