Citizens Advice welcomes more support for low income households to cope with the recession
Commenting on the tax credits and benefits measures in today’s budget Citizens Advice Director of Policy Teresa Perchard said:
“We appreciate that the Chancellor has faced an enormous challenge in creating this budget as there is a continued increase in demand for support for those affected by the recession. Citizens Advice Bureaux across England and Wales have helped over 20,000 additional people since extending their opening hours in February this year, after a much needed £10m boost from the Government in November.
“While we would have liked to see the Chancellor go much further, we welcome the announcements today on tax credits, for pensioners and the social fund.
“For people of working age who unexpectedly have lost their jobs, or had to significantly reduce their working hours due to the recession, extending entitlement to tax credits to cover childcare costs for four weeks is particularly welcome and will broaden support for the families affected. However Citizens Advice believes that this should be provided for six months in order that working parents who have lost their jobs have adequate and realistic opportunity to find alternative employment, therefore we hope that this can be kept under review.
“We also welcome the commitments in the Budget to improve take up of tax credits and benefits - and the announcement that HMRC has set a target for increasing take-up of working tax credit - currently estimated to be as low as 22% for entitled households without dependent children. This is a good start, but we would like to see ambitious targets to improve take-up and get more money into people’s pockets in the coming year. Too many people are currently missing out on crucial benefits - the DWP estimates the figure is worth up to £9.9bn – and this could make a huge difference to their wellbeing in these difficult times.
“We are pleased to see the Chancellor give a further guarantee to pensioners that the State Retirement Pension will increase by at least 2.5% next year and that the Winter Fuel Payments in 2009 will continue to be paid at the increased amount. Increasing the amount of savings that pensioners can have before they begin to lose entitlement to means tested benefits, to £10,000 from £6,000, will also help many pensioners with income from small amounts of savings.
“We are also pleased to see an extra £270m allocated for the Social Fund, which we hope will mean extra money in people’s pockets for those most in need of loans to cover emergencies or help with buying big household items.”
Talking about additional funding for job seekers Teresa continued:
“We welcome the Chancellors announcement of extra investment and support for job seekers. The additional £1.7bn for Jobcentre Plus should better help them face the extraordinary pressures they are currently under. Citizen Advice Bureaux in England and Wales saw daily enquiries about redundancy increase by 153% between April 2008 and January 2009 and enquiries about JSA increase 138% for the same period.
“The £3bn support package for job seekers, particularly younger people is welcome though we are concerned about the fact this extra support will only be made available after they have been out of work for 12 months. We also hope these measures are long term and that young people in this situation are offered sustainable jobs with career progression opportunities.”
Commenting on support for homeowners, Teresa concluded:
“Citizens Advice appreciates the continuation of measures for those with mortgage arrears, including the extension of the Support for Mortgage Interest scheme (SMI) which will continue to maintain a higher level of support for homeowners for a further 6 months.”
Notes to editors:
- The Citizens Advice service is a network of independent charities that helps people resolve their money, legal and other problems by providing information and advice and by influencing policymakers.
For more information in England and Wales www.citizensadvice.org.uk
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