Some pensioners will be affected by the 'bedroom tax'

princessdon

mazza111 wrote: »

It won't affect people like this. It will only be people of working age from my reading of it

The thing with PC is the "passported benefits" that arise from it.

for example a 61 year old woman can have a 40 year old (I know good on her for having a younger man, I'm using as an example only), partner.

Her parnter would either claim JSA (and all it entials) or she can claim him on PC - He gets double the money of JSA and doesn't have to seek work, despite being work age and able.

I don't see why someone who is work age has these kinds of exemptions purely because their partner claims PC.

I can fully see why UC is addressing this and I'd go further to say they shouldn't be able to put under retirement age on their claim if fit and able. All it does is allow many to retire early.

I know a few couples whose male partner is now retired 5 years early just purely because they can.

SandraScarlett

The "bedroom tax" scaremongering has caused so many elderly owner occupiers to think they will have to pay something for their spare bedrooms.

It isn't a bedroom tax. It is a reduction of benefits for those in Social Housing (council) who have more rooms than they occupy. This already applies for private rented accommodation.

The staff at my DH's centre have been inundated with queries from very worried people about this tax myth.

xx

mrs_motivated

It was dubbed 'bedroom tax' by politicians and the housing sector. This is why I referred to it thus.

The situation is as follows as many people have already said:


Welfarereform provides measures from April 2013 that mean that the way that HousingBenefit (and from October 2013 support for housing costs within UniversalCredit) claims from people living in social housing will be subject to a newsize criteria (under-occupation penalty or bedroom tax) threshold whichpresently only applies to those claiming from private rented properties.


Thismeasure will only apply to working age claimants. It will serve to restrictHousing benefit (housing costs within Universal Credit) so as to allow onebedroom for each person or couple, with the following exceptions:

§ children under 16 of the same genderare expected to share

§ children under 10 of the same ordifferent gender are expected to share

Wherethe tenants (or their partner) are disabled and require a non-residentovernight carer then they will be allowed an extra bedroom. However, FosterParents will not be afforded any concessions for a bedroom to accommodate afoster child. This means that Forster Parents who receive Housing Benefit willbe penalised.


Anyperson deemed to have more bedrooms than they require will lose a proportion oftheir Housing Benefit (housing costs within Universal Credit). The level ofreduction is a fixed percentage of the eligible rent/Housing Benefit. The levelof reduction is:

14% where there is one extra bedroom

25% where there are two or more extrabedrooms

Itis estimated that this measure will affect 670,000 (32%) nationally of socialtenants of working age who claim Housing Benefit. Of the 670,000 estimated tobe affected, 450,000 (66%) are estimated to be disabled (as defined by theDisability Discrimination Act).


I did not intend to debate the rights or wrongs of such a policy - only update that initially it was unclear in joint tenancys where one tenant was of pension credit age and one tenant was of working age (say a 64 year old married to a 57 year old) if they would be excempt and many landlords were assuming they would be and putting out information to tenants saying for example "These changes wont affect you if you are on pension / pension credit age".......

From April - they wont be affected where one of them is of state pension credit age and housing benefit will continue to be paid irrespective of underoccupation.. However when Universal Credit is rolled out although existing claimants will be protected...... When joint tenants currently under the pension credit age reach it , then BOTH tenants will need to reach it before they become exempt from paying for extra bedrooms.

McKneff

evenasus wrote: »

It's not a bedroom tax.

It's a reduction in benefits.

That's what I keep saying, you dont pay more money if you have a bedroom you don't use, you get less benefit paid to you from the taxpayer.

McKneff

margaretclare wrote: »

Thanks very much for the clear and unambiguous explanation.

So in fact it's not a 'tax' at all. I detest these kinds of emotive misrepresentations. Why not say - it's not a tax, it's a reduction in benefits. It's just rabble-rousing.

Exactly what I think MC, and I couldnt have put it better myself.

'Emotive misrepresentation' is really 'spot on'

Viberduo

Hmmm my mother is 60 next year and dad is already 62 and claiming pension and though they have my old empty room its a semi bungalow which is tiny so I dont think that should be the same as someone living in a massive house with many empty rooms, that and my parents live in middle of nowhere with only a few buses a day and teenagers hate living there so its bad for many.

evenasus

Viberduo wrote: »

Hmmm my mother is 60 next year and dad is already 62 and claiming pension and though they have my old empty room its a semi bungalow which is tiny so I dont think that should be the same as someone living in a massive house with many empty rooms, that and my parents live in middle of nowhere with only a few buses a day and teenagers hate living there so its bad for many.

Surely an spare bedroom is a spare bedroom.

margaretclare

evenasus wrote: »

Surely an spare bedroom is a spare bedroom.

I've seen many properties (in the past, while house-hunting) which were supposedly 3 bedrooms but the 3rd bedroom couldn't have accommodated even a single bed. You could only have got a cot in there, or maybe used it as an office. Same with a 2-bed property, the second 'bedroom' couldn't have accommodated a normal-sized single bed.

When my first husband and I were house-hunting more than 20 years ago, that was one of the reasons why we latched on to this property, where my second husband and I still live. It has 2 bedrooms of equal size. Speculative builder - I've never seen any other property the same. So, no, a spare bedroom is maybe not big enough to be used as a bedroom.

Viberduo

evenasus wrote: »

Surely an spare bedroom is a spare bedroom.

Maybe but it is a box room in fact all rooms in house are box rooms, if say you put a double bed side by side with a single bed that would take up about 90% of the room as you would have 2-3 feet space at bottom of bed if that and each bed would touch 2 walls

They have cheap rent anyway of about £55 a week so its not as if they are in a posh area with a massive empty house

Morlock

C_Mababejive wrote: »

There are plenty of under occupied "council" properties up and down the land where families have grown up and left home. I know of a single adult now of pensionable age who is occupying a three bedroomed home.

And that person will continue to live alone in a three bedroom property as pensioners are not affected, neither are tenants who do not claim housing benefit, so those properties will remain under-occupied.