97.Section 5 provides that any income or capital of the claimant’s partner, whether or not they are married, is treated as the income or capital of the claimant for the purposes of the Pension Credit income assessment. This includes the assessment of the guarantee credit (at section 2) and the savings credit (at section 3). In effect this means that the income of a couple, whether married or unmarried, is added together for the purposes of calculating how much Pension Credit they will receive.
98.This will be the case except in circumstances to be prescribed by the Secretary of State in regulations. There are no immediate plans to use this power to make regulations. A corresponding power exists in relation to Income Support and is replicated here in order to provide sufficient flexibility for the future. If this power were to be used, the effect of not aggregating a couple’s income or capital would be to disregard totally the income or capital of the claimant’s partner.