Clause 16
Welfare Reform Bill
4:45 pm
Danny Alexander (Shadow Minister and Disability Spokesperson, Work & Pensions; Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey, Liberal Democrat)
I beg to move amendmentNo. 198, in clause 16, page 14, line 21, leave out paragraph (a).
The purpose of the amendment is to probe the Government’s intentions for the rules on notional income and notional capital and the way in which those will be applied in the context of the employment and support allowance. As the Committee will no doubt know, the notional earnings rule—as it applies to income support—can be applied in certain cases in which people are not undertaking paid employment, such as voluntary or other work, and Jobcentre Plus does not think that it is reasonable to provide their services free of charge. That means that someone is treated as if they were in a paid job. For example, if someone works 10 hours a week on a voluntary basis, that can be regarded as 10 hours a week of actual employment.
The notional earnings rule means that the notional amount of money that someone is deemed to be earning can be taken into account and removed from income support on a pound-for-pound basis. In other words, people’s benefit can be reduced by an amount, even though they have not received it, because theyare doing an activity in the community, for example, which Jobcentre Plus deems, for whatever reason, appropriate. Likewise, earnings disregard rules—which are pretty ungenerous anyway—would also apply. In some cases, expenses when undertaking voluntary work can be counted as earnings. Therefore, someone who has had their travel expenses reimbursed could have those treated as earnings and therefore they would count towards the £20 earnings disregard limit.
Will the Under-Secretary clarify the Government’s intentions for provisions on the employment and support allowance? The notional earnings rule was invented to tackle the situation in which people may have forgone earnings to maximise their benefit situation. However, in the context of a Bill that deals with work-related activity and people undertaking activities that can help them get back into the labour market—this point has been made on both sides of the Committee during the course of our proceedings—activities such as voluntary work can and should be regarded as work-related activity as part of pathways to work or whatever.
How will those rules apply to employment and support allowance? If necessary, will the Under-Secretary consider a form of limited amendment to the notional earnings rules specifically in relation to the employment and support allowance so that people engaged in voluntary work, as part of the process of getting closer to the labour market, can do so without being penalised. I look forward to her response.