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UC and free school meals
According to SI 2013 No. 650, The Free School Lunches and Milk (Universal Credit) (England) Order 2013- http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2013/650/made - any family receiving UC will be brought under s.512ZB(4) of the Education Act 1996, meaning they’re entitled to free school meals and milk. This position is confirmed in the leaflet ‘Universal Credit and your family’ at https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/192654/universal-credit-toolkit-quick-guide-your-family.pdf which states ‘If your family is receiving Universal Credit between April 2013 and March 2014 you will be entitled to free school meals for your children.’ I’m assuming this means, for this year at least, that everyone on UC will qualify - it seems pretty unambiguous.
However, this seems an uncharacteristically generous expansion of the scheme. Is anyone aware of any amendments to the above that I might have missed, or of definite/imminent plans to introduce some sort of further income test, which is what I’d expect? I’ve heard rumblings about this but can’t seem to find anything concrete - for example, that renowned source of social policy information The Mirror has recently stated - http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/cruel-dinners-hundreds-thousands-children-1941142 - that ‘Households with earnings of more than £135 a week are likely to lose out under the PM’s plans to replace most benefits with Universal Credit’, but unfortunately doesn’t go on to show its workings out.
So does anyone know where we actually stand on this?
TIA for any advice received.
hi - i think the position is that all the passporting stuff applies only to the universal credit pathfinder under which everyone’s on jsa anyway.
government has said that it is reviewing the whole thing and no decisions yet made for when universal credit rolled out to working people etc.
£135 is the approximate weekly net earnings of a single person (before the work allowance disregard is deducted) which would extinguish a single person’s max UC of £71.70 a week. That might be where the Mirror got it from?
See also this post
http://www.rightsnet.org.uk/forums/viewthread/4681/#19732
End of March 2014 marks the end of the ‘short-term solution’ (expected UC claimant count under 100,000).
If (or when?) UC rollout is further delayed then I guess it’s possible that the short-term solution could be extended beyond April 2014.
If (or when?) UC rollout is further delayed ...
Cynic!
Thanks for the info all. I figured the current regs were only a short-term thing, but a few wobbles - including that Mirror article (you’re probably right about its shaky foundations, HB Anorak) - made me wonder if there wasn’t something more imminent on the cards. I suppose it’s fairly obvious they won’t let everyone on UC into FSMs indefinitely, but as we’re currently preparing publicity materials for FSM takeup for the coming year we need to be fairly assured - as if anyone can be at the moment - that they won’t be out of date within a few months. (Of course, since we’ve no idea when UC will reach us up here, the point is moot today but may not be tomorrow. Or, more likely, in early 2014.)
I guess we have to put UC as a passporting benefit for now and amend later. If the regs aren’t amended before rollout up here it’ll be a bit of a swine if/when they later do, and families who’ve freshly qualified for FSMs get bumped right back off. But it’s par for the course these days, I suppose.
At CPAG conferernce last week DWP said it was something still being looked at by them, so they are well aware.
The whole issue of passporting is under consideration. There was a SSAC report about it last year.
The possibility is that passported elements may be ‘monetised’ and people will get extra money in their benefits, with a note saying “£14.60 of this is for school meals, £1.30 for prescriptions and 17p for a wig”.
entitlement to remission of NHS costs and travel costs for universal credit now extended to 5 April 2014 -