Welfare Reform Bill — Clause 5 — Exclusion of Up to Fifty Thousand Pounds in an ISA from Capital Used to Determine Universal Credit Eligibility — 13 Jun 2011 at 20:20

The majority of MPs voted against a proposal to exclude up to £50,000 contained within an Individual Savings Account (ISA) from the assessment of someone’s capital used to determine eligibility for Universal Credit for a person who is in work.

The capital limit, above which there would be no eligibility for Employment and Support Allowance, was subsequently set in regulations at £16,000^[1]; with no exemption for any funds held in an ISA.

The motion voted on, listed as number 23, was to amend the financial conditions for receiving Universal Credit it stated^[2]:

• page 3, line 7, after ‘it’, insert
• ‘excluding any amount in an Individual Savings Account, up to a prescribed maximum of no less than £50,000, where the claimant is in work’.

Prior to the amendment clause 5 stated^[3]:

• 5 Financial conditions
• (1)For the purposes of section 3, the financial conditions for a single claimant are that—
• (a)the claimant’s capital, or a prescribed part of it, is not greater than a prescribed amount, and
• (b) the claimant’s income is such that, if the claimant were entitled to universal credit, the amount payable would not be less than any prescribed minimum.

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• [1] Regulation 18 of the Universal Credit Regulations 2013
• [2] Official Record, House of Commons, 13 June 2011
• [3] Webpage containing p3 of the Welfare Reform Bill which the amendment would have acted on

Debate in Parliament | Source |