The Employment and Support Allowance Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2008

Condition relating to youth – claimants aged 20 or over but under 25

9.—(1) For the purposes of paragraph 4(1)(a) of Schedule 1 to the Act, a claimant who satisfies the conditions specified in paragraph (2) falls within a prescribed case.

(2) The conditions are that the claimant—

(a) registered on a course of—

(i) full-time advanced or secondary education, or

(ii) training,

at least 3 months before attaining the age of 20; and

(b) not more than one academic term immediately after registration attended one or more such courses in respect of a period referred to in paragraph (3).

(3) The period mentioned in sub-paragraph (2)(b) is a period which—

(a) began on or before a day at least 3 months before the day the claimant attained the age of 20; and

(b) ended no earlier than the beginning of the last 2 complete tax years before the relevant benefit year which would have applied if the claimant was entitled to an employment and support allowance having satisfied the first contribution condition and the second contribution condition.

(4) For the purposes of this regulation a claimant is to be treated as attending a course on any day on which the course is interrupted by an illness or domestic emergency.

(5) In this regulation—

“advanced education” means education for the purposes of—

(a)

a course in preparation for a degree, a diploma of higher education, a higher national diploma, a higher national diploma of the Business and Technician Education Council or the Scottish Qualifications Authority, or a teaching qualification; or

(b)

any other course which is of a standard above ordinary national diploma, a diploma of the Business and Technical Education Council or a higher or advanced higher national certificate of the Scottish Qualifications Authority or a general certificate of education (advanced level);

“full-time” includes part-time where the person’s disability prevents attendance at a full-time course;

“secondary education” means a course of education below a course of advanced education—

(a)

by attendance at an establishment recognised by the Department as being, or as comparable to, a university, college or school; or

(b)

elsewhere where the Department is satisfied that the education is equivalent to that given in an establishment recognised as being, or as comparable to, a university, college or school.