Our September 2021 e-bulletin about advising Black and ethnic minority communities.

CPAG's support and information for advisers with the judicial review process.

4.2 million children are growing up in poverty in the UK. They are isolated and excluded.

CPAG has brought a challenge in the Upper Tribunal to HMRC's refusal to backdate payments of the disability element of child tax credit (CTC), following underpayments of benefit prior to April 2016. A decision is currently awaited. 

This case concerned the approach a First-tier Tribunal should take in a case where the DWP had offered to revise the decision under appeal but the claimant had elected instead to continue straight to appeal. The Upper Tribunal held an FTT should treat the offer made to the claimant as its starting point and should ensure that if it was minded to award less than had been offered it would warn the claimant and possibly allow an opportunity for an adjournment.

The Upper Tribunal in this case gives guidance on how HMRC should calculate the earnings in a period of a term time worker and advises that this should not be done by looking at the wages they receive in a period but rather by looking at the wages they expect to receive for work done in a period. This should mean more term time workers on low incomes who are paid a monthly salary should now qualify for 30 hours free childcare.

On 12 May 2020, the Court of Appeal handed down judgment in favour of the appellants in this case. The appellants were originally in receipt of legacy benefits but had to claim universal credit (UC) when the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (SSWP) decided that they were no longer entitled to legacy benefits and terminated their awards.  Even though those decisions were ultimately overturned on revision, the appellants were stuck on UC and received less than they would have if they had remained on legacy benefits.  The Court found that there had been a difference in treatment of the appellants compared with legacy benefit claimants who had not had any wrongful decision terminating their legacy benefit awards and therefore would be moved to UC through managed migration and benefit from transitional protection. This difference in treatment was found by the Court to be manifestly without reasonable foundation and the Article 14 non-discrimination rights of the appellants (in conjunction with Article 1 to the First Protocol) had been breached. The SSWP applied directly to the Supreme Court for permission to appeal but that application was refused on 26 February 2021. 

This was a challenge to the two child limit, introduced by the Welfare Reform and Work Act 2016, which restricts support for children in families claiming child tax credit or universal credit to the first two children (subject to limited exceptions). The limit applies to families where the third or subsequent child is born after 5 April 2017. The legal challenge was partially successful in the High Court but an appeal to the Court of Appeal on the lawfulness of the overall policy was unsuccessful. An appeal to the Supreme Court was heard remotely across 20-22 October 2020 and judgment given on 9 July 2021 dismissing the appeal. Complaints were filed with the European Court of Human Rights (Dec 2021) on behalf of three different families.

In a judgment of 15 May 2023 the Upper Tribunal ruled that an EEA national who was a carer for his disabled wife who was in receipt of income related ESA, in circumstances where the amount of ESA decreased due to his presence in the household (loss of some premiums and taking account of carer's allowance more than offset increase to couple rates), had a right to reside as a self sufficient person. When the couple then claimed universal credit, the additional cost of £347.07 a month which awarding that benefit to the couple rather than just awarding it to his British wife as a single person, along with the cost of similar such claims which would also now fall to be allowed, was not an unreasonable burden on the UK social assistance system and therefore the claimant continued to have a right to reside as a self sufficient person and was therefore entitled to a joint award of universal credit. The Secretary of State now has permission to appeal that decision in the Court of Appeal.

This is a challenge to the policy of the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (SSWP) that she will not make payments of universal credit (UC) or advances unless and until a claimant has a national insurance number (the ‘NINo Rule’). The judicial reviews were unsuccessful at first instance but the claimants appealed to the Court of Appeal. The case was heard in the Court of Appeal on 30 March 2023 and judgment was given in favour of the claimants on 25 May 2023. The Court of Appeal refused SSWP's application for permission to appeal to the Supreme Court on 13/06/2023 and SSWP made an application to the Supreme Court. On 18/10/2023, the Supreme Court refused SSWP's application for permission to appeal.