Unsung heroes win benefit overpayment trial
Tucked away in White Lion Street near the Angel tube station is the main office of Child Poverty Action Group. Their recent Court of Appeal victory will prevent distress for people with social security benefit overpayments.
Child Poverty Action Group ranks high in my appreciation for the superb work that it does. Their aim is to abolish child poverty in the UK. As well as providing highly professional support and training to Welfare Rights organisations across the country, they campaign, influence government policy and bring test cases to court to challenge unfair laws. Recently they defeated the Department of Works and Pensions (DWP) in the Court of Appeal over an issue which affected more than 65000 people with benefit overpayments.
Social Security law
Under Social Security law an overpaid DWP benefit resulting from official error cannot be recovered. In recent years the DWP has not liked this bit of the law. From March 2006 to February 2007 they wrote to people saying that whilst they could not recover the overpayment under social security law, they could recover it through the courts if they did not pay it back. This brought suffering to many people who could not afford to pay, so Child Poverty Action Group took up their cause. The Court of Appeal (October 2009) agreed this was wrong, and ruled that the DWP cannot recover official error overpayments through the court. Thanks to Child Poverty Action Group you do not have to pay back a social security benefit overpayment that has been caused by official error.
But beware! The DWP now have another tactic of making you feel guilty by saying 'because you have had it you should pay it back'. Again this fails to take into consideration whether you can afford to pay it back. If the overpayment is due to official error, you do not have to pay it back and can refuse. They shouldn't have made the mistake in the first place.
I'll shut up now before I'm dragged off in chains. To find out more about the work of Child Poverty Action Group go to www.cpag.org.uk
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Kevin works as a welfare rights officer at Action for Blind People in Lancashire.
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