The Residential Landlords Association has welcomed the Government’s decision to review the impact of paying housing benefits directly to tenants.
The RLA has been fighting moves to change the benefits system. The Government wants the housing element of the new universal credit to be paid directly to private tenants unless a tenant is deemed vulnerable.
However, the Government has now announced that there will be an official review of the six demonstration project areas that it chooses to test direct payments to tenants.
The review will be reviewed by a team led by Professor Paul Hickman from the Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research at Sheffield Hallam University.
The review was announced by welfare reform minister Lord Freud following a debate on an amendment tabled by crossbencher Lord Best calling for all tenants to be given a choice over who receives their housing benefit.
Alan Ward, RLA chairman, said: “It seems remarkable that the Government has so far denied tenants the ability to choose how their housing benefit is paid.
“While the RLA will continue, along with groups representing tenants, social housing providers and mortgage lenders, to champion the rights of tenants to choose, we welcome the minister’s decision to establish a review of direct payments.”
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Comments
Why on earth don't the government get it. This wishy-washy liberal nonsense of 'helping people to manage their own money".
The poor are much better money managers than most middle-class people. They know how much they have at all times, and probably how much they owe and are owed. Two simple reasons - a. they are motivated because catastrophe - no food, no heat, no home - is much closer than it is to us, and b. their finances are much simpler. But like all of us (except the odd anal retentive) they find money management a chore. And poor people get a lousy deal from the banks whose systems are designed for the middle classes.
All my tenant want direct payments. It's one less chore for them. But the council don't want to do it. And don't think for a minute the councils don't have discretion! My own LA, Bolton sent a landlord circular round when the LHA moved from median to 30%, saying if we would only charge LHA rate, ie no top up, then they would do DP.
This is the complete reverse of policy. Top-up is managing your own money. So they are trying to talk landlords out of that useful £10-20pw extra top-up you can usually get, to save their tenants the trouble of managing it.
Pure social engineering, and nothing to do with council finances. Which means you are going to get a landlord postcode lottery depending on the colour of your local council.
Needless to say, I complied immediately - to be honest the 30% figure works well. If you are an LHA landlord, buy cheap districts in a BRMA that has expensive city centre apartments. Those empty £100k apartments built in nice areas in the boom are a godsend to the percentile calculation.