Financial advice: lump sum inheritance whilst on Universal Credit

Yamor

I have seen it suggested that that would still be treated as deprivation.

See the last post in this thread:

https://www.rightsnet.org.uk/forums/viewthread/19614

HillStreetBlues

Yamor said:

I have seen it suggested that that would still be treated as deprivation.

See the last post in this thread:

https://www.rightsnet.org.uk/forums/viewthread/19614

Interesting post.
A point I would raise, is it possible to deprive yourself of something you haven't got? 

EDIT
As on legacy benefits, if a loan was taken out on the car and had monthly payment, then  it couldn't simply be paid off as had to be went due, so would have to keep to the monthly payments.
Now it's changed with UC I expect this point will reach the upper chamber in the future.

Yamor

Yes it's a strong point that (which was also made in that rightsnet thread...).

HillStreetBlues

Yamor said:

Yes it's a strong point that (which was also made in that rightsnet thread...).

I only read last post, but just had a read of the whole thread

ElwoodBlues

Yamor said: 

As HillStreetBlues says, case law is quite clear that converting capital from a type taken into account for benefits to a type not taken into account (e.g., property or a pension pot) can still be deprivation.

I also think it would be difficult to argue that the getout for buying "goods or services" reasonable in their case helps them, as both property and a pension pot would not seem to be included in " goods or services".

Interesting. Do you have any links to the case law regarding this in respect of UC please?

Could it be argued that the legislation specifies "goods and services" because they are intentionally separating those from capital? Suggesting that the legislation isn't intending transfer from one form of capital to another isn't relevant to DoC?

Yamor

ElwoodBlues said:

Yamor said: 

As HillStreetBlues says, case law is quite clear that converting capital from a type taken into account for benefits to a type not taken into account (e.g., property or a pension pot) can still be deprivation.

I also think it would be difficult to argue that the getout for buying "goods or services" reasonable in their case helps them, as both property and a pension pot would not seem to be included in " goods or services".

Interesting. Do you have any links to the case law regarding this in respect of UC please?

Could it be argued that the legislation specifies "goods and services" because they are intentionally separating those from capital? Suggesting that the legislation isn't intending transfer from one form of capital to another isn't relevant to DoC?

There are a number of cases on this topic, but not specifically about UC. They are mostly about Income Support or Supplementary Benefit. See below for links to a couple of the cases.

However, there is no reason the old case law should not apply to UC, and in fact the Sweet and Maxwell 'Social Security Legislation' books, with commentary by Upper Tribunal judges, takes it as given that the case law would apply to UC.

I'm not clear what you are suggesting in your second paragraph, and perhaps this is what you mean, but the inclusion of the "goods" getout does suggest that conversion to a form of capital which is disregarded could still be deprivation (goods would generally be disregarded as capital due to being 'personal possessions').

https://www.rightsnet.org.uk/pdfs/cis/112_94.pdf

https://administrativeappeals.decisions.tribunals.gov.uk/Aspx/view.aspx?id=536

ElwoodBlues

Yamor said:

I'm not clear what you are suggesting in your second paragraph, and perhaps this is what you mean, but the inclusion of the "goods" getout does suggest that conversion to a form of capital which is disregarded could still be deprivation (goods would generally be disregarded as capital due to being 'personal possessions').

https://www.rightsnet.org.uk/pdfs/cis/112_94.pdf

https://administrativeappeals.decisions.tribunals.gov.uk/Aspx/view.aspx?id=536

I think I was questioning whether, given the way the legislation was written, they never intended for capital transfer from one type to another to be considered as potential DoC. Otherwise, why didn't they specifically mention it and cover for that scenario? After all, it's clearly been contested under older types of benefits?

I've also seen somewhere that it could reasonably be argued that land/property in the form of the claimant's home should be included within the general definition of goods.

Also, why did they relax the rules for DoC in the UC legislation, did they remove the requirement of a debt having to be due to be repaid to be a legitimate use of capital? It seems perfectly reasonable that only the agreed regular repayments are strictly necessary, and any over payments beyond that ought to be fairly considered for DoC? Why remove that from UC and allow someone to massively overpay their mortgage by choice, reducing their capital and becoming eligible for benefits. I'm not complaining about it, just wondering why they chose to relax the rules so generously, when they appear to have tightened up in other ways?