Minutes of CRF General Committee Meeting Tuesday 11 th September 2012 held at Hawthorn Mill

Transcription

1 PRESENT Eunice Clarkson, Committee Maureen Kershaw, Committee Ann Horne, Committee Sylvia Thacker, Committee Pat Dibb Ron Bowman, Committee Margaret Dyson, Committee Robert Dyson, Committee Winnie Riley Ivy Hendrickson Gwen Whithouse Joan Brooks, Committee Koyesh Miah M Shaw, Committee John Conroy Sheila Conroy Margaret Price J Howarth A Claremont O Hewson N Mann Christine Purdy B Brown Kath Dalby P Slubley PM Hardaker In attendance Barbara Kempf, Connect Lisa Longbottom, Connect Kim Long, Connect Jade Senior, Connect Sue Hendry, Connect 1. Welcome The meeting was chaired by Eunice Clarkson, CRF Chair 2. Apologies From the committee apologies were received from Malcolm Goodall and Terry Pratt. Other apologies were not read out due to their numbers, but were available for review by members of the committee. 3. Minutes and Matters Arising The minutes were proposed by Margaret Dyson and seconded by Robert Dyson 4. Speaker Kim Long, Money Advice Coordinator from Connect Welfare Reform The Welfare Reform Act was passed on 8 th March This is a major change to the benefits system aiming to simplify the system and provide a financial incentive to work. Most changes will begin to take place from April 2013 with a full transition by Most of the changes only apply if you are of working age and receive Housing Benefit. Working age is someone who is less than pension credit age, so when the first of the changes come into play in April 2013 this age will be someone under 61 years and 6 months. This will rise over time to 66 years by However you may still be indirectly affected. So the current benefits : Income related JSA, Income related ESA, Income Support

2 (including SMI), Working Tax Credits, Child Tax Credits and Housing Benefit will all fit into the new benefit called Universal Credit. Disability Living Allowance will change to Personal Independence Payment. Pension credit will also include support for housing and children. Child Benefit and Carer s Allowance will remain the same. The Government is still considering how Council Tax Benefit, Contributory JSA and ESA will work. In April 2013 Council Tax Benefit (CTB) will be replaced with localised Council Tax support scheme. Government funding for the schemes will be cut by 10% nationally. Working age claimants could receive 18% +, less support. In Leeds it is estimated that 34,299 working age claimants could be affected. In April Size criteria will apply to council and housing association properties. This means that people living in houses larger than they need will have their Housing Benefit reduced. This is widely known as the bedroom tax. It will affect working age tenants only (age less than 61 years 6 months old) who are claiming Housing Benefit. So under the new rules the size criteria will be: Members of the household Bedroom Entitlement Single Person One bedroom Adult Couple One bedroom Adult over the age of 16 One bedroom Two children of the same sex until One bedroom 16 One boy and one girl aged under 10 One bedroom years Single child One bedroom If you have more than two children the same rules apply depending on the age and the sex of the children for additional rooms. Even when tenants may have been getting full Housing Benefit, from April 2013, if they are living in a property with more bedrooms than they are entitled to, their housing benefit will be reduced. For one extra bedroom they will have their benefit reduced by 14%. So if the rent is 80 per week they will have to pay approx per week towards the rent themselves.

3 For two or more extra bedrooms they will have their benefit reduced by 25%. So if the rent is 80 per week they will have to pay approx 20 per week towards the rent themselves. At Connect we have calculated what the changes to Housing Benefit would potentially cost us. Average rent this year is % reduction to HB = per week (365 expected to under-occupy by 1 bed) Potential rent loss = per week / 219,000 per annum 25% reduction to HB = 22 per week (71 expected to under-occupy by 2 bedrooms) Potential rent loss = 1562 per week or 74,976 per annum Worst case total = loss of pw / 293,976 per annum. So from April 2013 there will also be A cap on the total amount a working age, out of work household can receive introduced. 500 weekly cap for families, 350 weekly cap for single people. Families with 4 or 5 children likely to be affected. Housing element of benefit will be reduced to meet cap. Funding for Crisis loans and Community Care grants will be transferred to Local Authorities. They will have the power to set up local welfare schemes but there will be no duty for a council to provide a local welfare scheme. Disability Living Allowance (DLA) scheme will be replaced by Personal Independence Payments (PIP). Affecting people age only. Involves the introduction of revised assessment criteria to decide eligibility. PIP will be for all new claimants and all existing DLA working age claimants. The Government want to reduce the amount they currently pay out for DLA. The introduction of Universal Credit will begin from October So instead of claiming IS, JSA, ESA, HB and Tax Credits claims will be for Universal Credit. This will affect the working age only although if you are a couple and youngest is working age you will claim Universal Credit. It will be Digital by default All claims to be made on line. There will be a Migration strategy: so by Oct 13

4 New claims only with migration to be completed for all claimants by So if you currently claim any benefits that will fit into the Universal Credit benefit you will be automatically transferred over within this time period. Universal Credit will be administered by DWP and will be paid as a single household payment, Monthly in arrears, Direct payment of housing costs to the claimant in most cases. The Safeguard policy for direct payments is still to be decided. October 2014 will see the Pension Service take over assessing Housing Benefit for people of pension credit age and Housing Benefit will become part of Pension Credit. Existing Housing Benefit claims to be migrated across from April 2015 March The full strategy and role of councils is still to be decided. Connect will keep tenants informed as and when we know more. So the impact of the changes will mean that many will face more than one deduction from their benefits. People will need to manage their money on a monthly basis. Benefits will be paid monthly in Arrear, which will mean they have a period without any money. Any overpayments and breaks in claim are likely to impact more than they do now. It is highly likely they will struggle to make priority payments or make them and have no money remaining for living costs. There may be a need for people to move home. The impacts that Connect face are increased transaction costs, increased arrears, increased legal action court apps, evictions, increased legal costs, void cost and relet costs, slower payment times, increased staff time to recover arrears. As well as increased costs to income collection we will also need to provide our tenants with help. Tenants will need more help and support managing money, help to access on line and access to bank accounts. We ll need to review our Arrears and Lettings Policies, Our size criteria is more generous than the government standard if we kept to the same we risk rent and void loss. By changing these polices we risk increased Anti Social Behaviour on our estates. We are currently trying to find out who is going to be affected. Make sure they get and understand information about the changes. We re currently visiting 436 tenants that are likely to be under-occupying. Have plans to contact further 1200 where we receive Housing Benefit direct. We are also promoting our Help services, such as - Money Advice, Fuel Efficiency and Getting back to work.

5 5. Break 6. Welfare Reform continued. Q, How much will the rents go up then? A, Rent increase will be calculated the same as it is every year. We are not anticipating that rent increases will cover the shortfalls that aren t paid, but we can t say what happens in the future. Q, You say it has to be done online, what if they don t have access? A, We are trying our best to try refer people to get help and training for getting online. Q, Why don t Connect have a computer in their reception? A, We do have one in our reception. You can also get access at your local library. Q, Will Pension Credit go directly? A, We don t know, it is still undecided. Q, Do you have to claim every month? A, Not that we know of, only if there is a change in circumstances. Q, You re saying that people won t pay their rent, but what about the responsible people? A, We know that their will be a lot of people who will pay their rent. But we still need to think about the risk and be proactive in setting systems in place to help people now. Q, Sharing a bedroom until what age, 15 or 16? A, When the first child reaches 16, then they will be entitled to a bedroom each. Q, I work fulltime and pay my own rent, will this affect me? A, No, these changes only affect people who claim benefits. There followed a small session of members in attendance looking at various case studies to encourage them to discuss the impact of the Welfare Reform on those

6 people in the case studies using the information they just heard in their table groups. 7. Action sheets Completed action sheets Green Pasture Close, need new signage was fitted to the individual cul-de-sacs as initially raised by the Tenant Inspectors. Ancion Court, hot water issues and low temperatures on heating system resolved. Specialist contractor attended and change the settings for the individual properties affected. Ancion Court, communal lounge cleaning not done for 6 months. The service charge for this period was refunded to the tenants and a contract was set with the cleaners following consultation with the tenants. Carr Street, outside painting programme not done after Connect said it would be. Painting of the scheme completed April Incomplete action sheets Nunthorpe Rd, remedy unsightly duck taping and damage to meter boxes. Connect have added the replacement of these meter boxes to the planned maintenance programme for 12/13. Will update action sheet once the work has been completed. Ancion Court, Connect agreed to install at outside tap at Residents meeting 28/03/12 still not done. John Pears to raise at next patch team meeting in September 2012 for approval. Eunice asked for the long awaited Gutter cleaning programme and the Painting programme be added to the action sheets on behalf of all CRF members as there is continuous talk of these 2 planned programmes from Connect, but still no firm dates have been provided for the commencement. Lisa to add action sheet 8. A.O.B Margaret Price thanked the CRF for the notice boards fit throughout the scheme where she lives which was an approved application to the CRF Community Priority Fund. Date of the next meeting: 6 th November pm 3pm, Huddersfield