The Income Support (General) Amendment No. 4 Regulations 1991

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

These Regulations further amend the Income Support (General) Regulations 1987 in the following respects—

(a) they define the last day of a student’s course, make certain consequential amendments in this respect, increase to £257 the amount to be disregarded from a student’s grant income in respect of books and equipment and clarify the circumstances in which certain disabled students aged 16 and 17 are entitled to income support (regulations 2, 10 to 12 and 14);

(b) they reduce from 24 to 16 the number of hours constituting employment, and below which a person in employment is not treated as being in remunerative work for the purposes of entitlement to income support, amend the circumstances in which physically or mentally disabled persons, and certain persons in residential or nursing care, or residential accommodation, although employed, are treated as not being in remunerative work nor required to be available for employment and make saving provision in respect of certain persons affected by these changes (regulations 3 to 5, 13(b) and (c) and 22 to 24);

(c) hey provide a new definition in respect of those aged 16 and over but under 19 who are entitled to income support while in certain types of education, restrict the applicable amount of those in certain residential care homes who are not receiving personal care, make minor technical amendments in respect of capital and income which a person is treated as having and provide for personal community charge and collective community charge contributions made to a third party in respect of a claimant or a member of his family to be treated as notional income or capital of the claimant (regulations 6 to 9, 18 and 20(a));

(d) they clarify the circumstances in which those caring for others where certain allowances are in payment, are not required to be available for employment, provide for a further exemption from that requirement where the circumstances have ceased to apply and remove the two day minimum period for court attendance in respect of exemption from that requirement (regulation 13(a) and (d));

(e) they further increase, by 25p a week, the personal allowance for certain persons under 18, or under 25, they increase the family premium by 75p and provide that where a claimant who benefits from any of these increases has a protected sum in respect of board and lodging or hostel costs, that sum is not eroded by the increase in the personal allowance (regulations 15(a) to (c), 16 and 17);

(f) hey extend the period to which entitlement to a carer premium applies and provide that, in determining whether that premium is payable, concessionary payment of invalid care allowance is to be treated as if it were a payment of that benefit (regulation 15(d) and (e));

(g) they clarify the manner in which certain applicable amounts are to be calculated where a claimant or his partner is temporarily absent abroad in certain circumstances (regulation 19);

(h) they provide that £10 of certain pensions paid by foreign governments is to be disregarded in calculating income and that the value of a personal pension is to be disregarded in calculating capital (regulations 20(b) and 21).