Ninety-three families in social housing in the Marlborough area face cuts to their housing benefit when the ‘under occupation’ rules come into force in April 2013. For some this will mean a cut of between ten and twenty pounds a week, for others a cut of over twenty pounds.
Working age households will lose fourteen per cent of their housing benefit per week if they have one unused bedroom – unused, that is, as a bedroom. Those with two or more such bedrooms will lose at least a quarter of their housing benefit per week.
In the Marlborough area seventy-three households will lose £10-20 and a further twenty-one will lose £20 or more per week.
Across the county 2,893 households will have their housing benefit reduced due to this new ‘size criteria’.
Under the coalition government’s rules same gender children under sixteen are deemed to be able to share a bedroom; children under ten must share a bedroom regardless of gender. Disabled tenants who need overnight care can have a separate bedroom for their carer.
These statistics were given by Wiltshire Council to the recent meeting of the Marlborough Area Board.
[See our What’s On calendar for Friday, 7 December for details of a Question Time in Devizes Town Hall on the government’s welfare reform programme with a panel including Claire Perry MP, a solicitor and representatives of Wiltshire Citizens Advice Bureau, the Department of Work and Pensions and the Carers Trust.]
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