Deputies approve final Income Support Scheme policy letter
A NEW Income Support Scheme that will eventually cost an extra £4m. a year was ushered in by the States yesterday.
The change will come about with the merging of housing support and supplementary benefit and it will also mark the end of the rent rebate scheme, which is currently available only to social housing tenants.
Income Support will operate according to a set of rules that will enable all households in Guernsey and Alderney to access financial support ‘sufficient to ensure an acceptable standard of living’.
By 2022, following transition, the new scheme will cost taxpayers £3,962,000 extra a year.
Employment & Social Security president Michelle Le Clerc said that it had been a long journey to get to this point, since the Social Welfare Benefit Investigation Committee had its proposals debated by the Assembly in March 2016.
The new social welfare system was due to go live on 6 July and this last policy letter was to establish uprated figures and provide further detail concerning the transitional arrangements ahead of this intended launch date.
‘It’s been acknowledged that some individuals and families suffer from levels of financial deprivation and social exclusion which are unacceptable in a generally prosperous society,’ she said.
‘The implementation of income support will go some way to righting this injustice.’
Three members had voted against income support the last time it was before the Assembly – deputies Lester Queripel, Barry Paint and David De Lisle.
However, Deputy Queripel said that he had now changed his mind and saw the proposals in a different light, due to the presence of figures and examples which had given him some comfort. He had also put 10 written questions to Deputy Le Clerc and said the answers he had received had gone a long way to allaying his concerns.
Deputy De Lisle said that the proposals were for a merger of two things, which would cost £4m. a year, involve taking on 4.5 staff and there would be no benefits to the taxpayer. And some people currently on the rent rebate scheme would lose out as a result.
Deputy Peter Roffey said that despite what Deputy De Lisle said, the two schemes were not working well and were discriminatory, between someone who lived in States housing and someone who was not particularly wealthy and living in the private sector.
Deputy Barry Paint said he had consistently voted against income support because of concerns over those who would be worse off as a result, what he described as people in the ‘middle ground’.
Concern over the financial impact of the transitional arrangements was raised by Deputy Rob Prow, who was worried that the report suggested it was not possible to quantify this impact.
The Benefit Limitation Rule was what worried Deputy Jennifer Merrett, since it limited the amount of benefit payable to £670 a week regardless of need and, in a case she cited, fell short of the amount that an assessment by Social Security itself had determined was needed.
She had asked how many this rule affected, but was told that ESS did not know.
The suggestion of gradually raising it had been made, but she said there was a fear that if it was abolished or raised too high too quickly, it might deter people from seeking work and they would ‘stay at home, watching daytime TV and living off the taxpayer’.
Deputy Le Clerc said that ESS would come back with RPIX increases in the years to come and that she thought the States would be nervous about abolishing it and would rather take small steps. Proposals on increasing it would be coming back later this year.
The proposals were approved by 35 votes to one, with only Deputy De Lisle voting against.
