Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

These Regulations, which apply in relation to Wales, further amend the National Health Service (Travel Expenses and Remission of Charges)(Wales) Regulations 2007 (“the principal Regulations”). Those Regulations provide for the payment of travel expenses and the remission of National Health Service charges for, amongst others, persons on low incomes, by reference to limits on their income and capital.

In calculating a person’s resources and requirements under the principal Regulations in order to establish whether a person can claim entitlement to the remission of NHS charges and payment of NHS travelling expenses, a modified version of the Income Support (General) Regulations 1987 is applied.

Regulation 3 changes the modification to regulation 53 of the 1987 Regulations by omitting paragraph (1A). Broadly speaking, the effect of this is that claimants living in certain types of residential care accommodation, as specified in paragraph (1B), will no longer have part of their capital treated as income for the purposes of calculating their entitlement under the principal Regulations. The prescribed capital limit (presently £22,000) will continue to apply to such claimants.