The Social Security (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2008

EXPLANATORY NOTE

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

These Regulations amend a number of different regulations relating to social security.

Regulations 2 and 4 to 7 amend the Income Support (General) Regulations 1987 (S.I. 1987/1967) (“the Income Support Regulations”), the Jobseeker’s Allowance Regulations 1996 (S.I. 1996/207) (“the Jobseeker’s Allowance Regulations”), the State Pension Credit Regulations 2002 (S.I. 2002/1792), the Housing Benefit Regulations 2006 (S.I. 2006/213) and the Council Tax Benefit Regulations 2006 (S.I. 2006/215) to remove references to an obsolete scheme called the Intensive Activity Period for 50 plus.

Regulations 2, 4, 6 and 7 amend the Income Support Regulations, the Jobseeker’s Allowance Regulations, the Housing Benefit Regulations 2006 and the Council Tax Benefit Regulations 2006 so as to:

• provide for the disregard of payments made by local authorities to a person (“A”) formerly in care which are passed on to the person who looked after him and with whom A continues to live;

• ensure that payments in respect of royalties, copyright and under the Public Lending Right Scheme are treated consistently in the benefits concerned;

• remove superfluous text and obsolete references to benefits no longer in payment.

Regulations 2 and 4 amend the Income Support Regulations and the Jobseeker’s Allowance Regulations so as to clarify:

• how monthly paid income is to be treated;

• references to the Secretary of State and “appropriate office”.

Regulation 2 amends the Income Support Regulations so as to:

• remove obsolete references to transitional categories of claimants which existed when Income Support was introduced;

• remove an anomaly so that qualifying young persons do not have to claim Jobseeker’s Allowance for a short period at the end of the child benefit extension period.

Regulation 3 amends the Social Security (Claims and Payments) Regulations 1987 (S.I. 1987/1968) to ensure that:

• community interest companies created under Part 2 of the Companies (Audit, Investigations and Community Enterprise) Act 2004 are added to the list of eligible lenders;

• direct payments for arrears of service charges for claimants living in a hostel can be made when the amount of arrears exceeds £100.

Regulation 4 amends the Jobseeker’s Allowance Regulations so as to:

• ensure that, following the introduction of additional adoption leave in April 2007, any person on adoption leave is treated as not available for work;

• amend references to Venture Trust programmes to reflect the fact they are now only funded through the Scottish Ministers;

• remove an inconsistency in the applicable amount payable for a couple where one member is aged over 18 and the other member is aged under 18 and treated as responsible for a child, to ensure that the couple receive the full adult couple rate.

A full impact assessment has not been published for this instrument as it has no impact on private and voluntary sectors.