A Scottish Parliamentary committee has called for abolition of the ‘bedroom tax’, describing the levy as ‘iniquitous and inhumane’.
A meeting of the Welfare Reform Committee in Holyrood said the UK Government’s under occupation levy – more commonly known as the ‘bedroom tax’ – was having a ‘real and harmful impact’ on the lives of the ‘most vulnerable in society’, including people with disabilities and children in separated families.
Committee members said the UK Government needed to scrap the policy ‘immediately’ or grant the Scottish Parliament powers to abolish the levy itself.
Welfare reforms launched in April 2013 reduced the amount of housing benefit payments to tenants living in social housing thought to be larger than their need.
In its interim report on the ‘bedroom tax’, the committee concluded many people had been ‘trapped’ into losing up to 25% of their housing benefit because there was not enough one bedroom properties available to help them downsize.
Despite reducing the housing benefit budget, the levy might ‘cost more than it saves’ thanks to numerous charges to tenants, housing associations, councils and the Scottish Government - MSPs concluded.
The Committee also said levels of Discretionary Housing Payments passed on by the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) to support transitional problems incurred by the ‘bedroom tax’ did not match the scale of the problem.
Responding to the report, a DWP spokesperson said: ‘Reform of the spare room subsidy is absolutely necessary to make a better use of our social housing when thousands of Scots are living in overcrowded homes.
‘We have announced more than £15m in funding for Scottish local authorities for 2014-2015, an increase of more than £1.7m to ensure we can support vulnerable claimants and help them make the transition.
‘Britain has a very strong housing safety net and even after our necessary reforms we continue to pay the majority of most claimants' rent if they are affected by the ending of the spare room subsidy.’
