Welfare Reform Bill — Clause 11 — Housing costs — Exemptions from Benefit Reductions Due to Excess Bedrooms — 21 Feb 2012 at 16:56

The majority of MPs voted against adding proposed exclusions from any reduction in housing benefits due to people being deemed to have excess bedrooms.

The majority of MPs who voted supported the following motion:

  • That this House disagrees with the Lords in their amendments 3B and 26B.

The effect of the rejected amendment 3B[1] would have been to prevent a loss of benefit for those deemed to have more bedrooms than they require in particular cases. The specified circumstances the amendment would have exempted were: where a council or registered social landlord was unable to provide suitable alternative accommodation and where the property in question had only one excess bedroom and either the claimant was not subject to work related requirements; responsible for a child with illness or disability related benefits; was a war widow or widower or were routinely providing foster care placements.

Amendment 3B referred to the housing related element of universal credit and 26B[1] had the same effect in relation to the Appropriate Maximum Housing Benefit (AMHB). Housing benefit is the current system for benefits payments relating to housing costs, such payments are intended to become the housing related element of universal credit.

Had these amendments been agreed they would have resulted in more money being spent on benefits paid out in relation to housing.

Debate in Parliament | Source |

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Party Summary

Votes by party, red entries are votes against the majority for that party.

What is Tell? '+1 tell' means that in addition one member of that party was a teller for that division lobby.

What are Boths? An MP can vote both aye and no in the same division. The boths page explains this.

What is Turnout? This is measured against the total membership of the party at the time of the vote.

PartyMajority (Aye)Minority (No)BothTurnout
Alliance0 10100.0%
Con280 (+1 tell) 2092.5%
DUP0 4050.0%
Green0 10100.0%
Independent0 10100.0%
Lab0 235 (+2 tell)091.9%
LDem36 (+1 tell) 9080.7%
PC0 30100.0%
SDLP0 30100.0%
SNP0 4066.7%
Total:316 263090.5%

Rebel Voters - sorted by vote

MPs for which their vote in this division differed from the majority vote of their party. You can see all votes in this division, or every eligible MP who could have voted in this division

Sort by: Name | Constituency | Party | Vote

NameConstituencyPartyVote
Annette BrookeMid Dorset and North PooleLDem (front bench)no
Michael CrockartEdinburgh WestLDem (front bench)no
Mike HancockPortsmouth Southwhilst LDem (front bench)no
Gordon HendersonSittingbourne and SheppeyCon (front bench)no
John LeechManchester, WithingtonLDem (front bench)no
Greg MulhollandLeeds North WestLDem (front bench)no
Andrew PercyBrigg and GooleCon (front bench)no
Bob RussellColchesterLDem (front bench)no
Adrian SandersTorbayLDemno
Ian SwalesRedcarLDem (front bench)no
David WardBradford EastLDem (front bench)no

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