Nucleus is backing calls for local authorities to use little known power under section 13A of the Local Government Finance Act 1992 to help people who are experiencing problems in paying.

 Under section 13A of the Local Government Act 1992, local authorities have a power to remit or reduce a sum owed in council tax. Their power is discretionary but can be used to help people who are in hardship, unable to occupy their homes or who simply unable to pay. Cases where reductions   may take place include when council tax benefit is not available and for arrears. Such reductions can be for the present year or for bills from earlier years.

A list of situations where councils have used section 13A to reduce bills have included flooding and reduction in value of properties by subsidence, as well as inability to pay. A small number of local authorities mention their powers under section 13A of the Local Government Finance Act 1992 but many do not; some do not appear to know that the power exists and can be used to reduce hardship, although similar powers existed for general rates until 1990 and for local business rates For example between 2004-2009 only two such applications were made in the whole of Westminster.

Applications for reductions under section 13A powers must be made in writing to the Council which is required to consider the application reasonably. Sometimes a local councillor can help with the application and advisers should also encourage the use of the power by the authority. A complaint may be taken to the council and to the Local Government Ombudsman if an application is not delat with properly

Nucleus advises that anyone seeking such a remission needs to make the application as soon as possible, since Government plans under the Local Finance
Government will revise this general power to reduce bills, replacing it with a system of differing local discounts which is likely to vary between authority to authority in future.

Over the last 10 years we have built up a reputation for homelessness prevention work – helping people facing eviction using a holistic advice approach, especially on the West London County Court rota.

During the last 2 years housing advice has been cut  by over 30 % in both the borough of Hammersmith & Fulham and RB Kensington and Chelsea.

Nucleus is launching a 1 year housing project funded by the Cabinet Office’s Advice Fund. The project aims to ameliorate some of the effects of recent cuts to housing advice services in West London.
The post holders will help Nucleus prepare for tendering for the new legal aid services from 2013.

Nucleus has identified  key advice needs locally :

1. Advice and Representation at possession days at West London County Court advice for both private and RSL tenants.

2. Advice and assistance on homelessness eligibility, protected tenant’s rights and lease holders.

We are looking to recruit for 2 posts: 1 solicitor’s post (35 hours pw) qualification experience and an experienced caseworker ( 17.5 hours pw).

Both posts will be expected to help represent defendants at West London County Court Possession days (2 days per month).

Both posts will be expected to take a lead with housing sessions on Nucleus Quick advice sessions.

Both posts require caseworker’s to satisfy the LSC specialist quality supervisor’s standard.

Housing solicitors documents:

Housing-solicitor job description and person specification: http://www.nucleus.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/Housing-solicitor-job-description-and-person-specification.docx
Application form http://www.nucleus.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/Application-Form-1-year-Housing-solicitor.doc

Housing caseworker’s documents:

Part time Housing caseworker job description and person specification http://www.nucleus.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/Housing-Caseworker-job-description-and-person-specification1.doc
Application form http://www.nucleus.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/Application-Form-1-year-Housing-caseworker.doc

Other forms

Equal Opportunities : http://www.nucleus.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/Equal-Opportunities-Statement.doc
Guidance on completing the application http://www.nucleus.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/Guidance-on-completing-the-application.doc

The post holders will be based at Nucleus’ offices and  be line managed by the LSC housing supervisor   Baljit Badesha. Please contact him for further information on 02073732101 or baljit@nucleus.org.uk

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Closing date for both post is 17th April 5.00pm Good luck, we look forward to receiving your application.

The bill proposes to cut the right to legal aid in a number of ‘social welfare’ areas including in housing, welfare benefits, debt, employment, immigration and education.
In Kensington and Chelsea 75% of Legal Help Funding will be lost – this is the highest cut of any London Borough and these cuts come at a time when legal advice services are already under pressure.

We spoke to Harry Tedstone, Co-ordinator of Advice Now about what the cuts mean for local advice agencies and residents.

1. How will the cuts affect advice services in the borough?
The precise details of how the agencies will be affected are not yet known. However, the reduction in funding wills inevitable lead to a reduction in services especially at the specialist level. All the advice agencies will be affected to a greater or lesser extent and cuts in central and local government funding at the same time could easily act as a “double whammy” to the sustainabilityof some organisations.

2. Locally, how many people will be affected?
We currently advise2540 people via Legal Help funding. This figure will reduce to 635 which will only be in a few cases in housing and debt. However, the number of people affected may be much wider as many voluntary sector services run very tight ships financially and the withdrawal of one part of their funding could easily tip the scales of their financial viability.

3. How are agencies working to limit the impact of the cuts?
A lot of agencies are looking to use volunteers to maintain their capacity, many of whom have been trained by Advice Now.In Kensington and Chelsea the local authority and the advice sector are working together to cope with the reduction in funding to provide services, recognising that local knowledge is vitally important to understand and deal with local need. The voluntary sector generally is known for its agility to adapt to a changing environment. However, with tri-borough issues still unknown, and both central and local government not providing any vision for the future it has been challenging to develop any long term business plan.

4. Is anybody challenging the cuts?
There are many national campaigns fighting the cuts – Access to Justice Campaign being the most high profile. Locally the importance of the voluntary advice sector is recognised at officer level. I believe that the cuts not only have to challenged but ultimately managed. The local voluntary sector in the Borough has a long history of working together in the best interest of those who live work or study in Borough. Its focus will remain the same – to provide a quality advice service to those in most need in our community.

5. Where can people find out about what advice services are available in the borough?
The Advice Now partnership has worked hard with rest of the voluntary sector community and the local authority to create better pathways to advice. We have provided training to many local community client specific groups who are now equipped to recognise issues that residents may require advice on, where they can assist in giving initial advice and where they recognise that they should refer to a specialist adviser. For more information see www.advicehubkc.org or ring 0300 012 54 64.

The Kensington and Chelsea Advice Forum brings together the borough’s main advice providers. It meets five times per year and its next meeting is on Thursday 12th April. All advice providers are welcome. www.kcsc.org.uk/kcaf

• To promote and support survival of quality existing specialist and community based advice services through the process of change

•  To promote partnership work in social welfare law especially the links built between generalist and specialist services.

• To use the platform as a foundation upon which to build a sustainable support structure for the future

The primary goal of the consortium of members would be to help maintain, improve and sustain the provision of social welfare law in West London through the provision of high quality generalist and specialist service initiatives.

We see a real need to share resources in order to cut the costs of delivering legal advice.

A key aim of the project is to reduce individual advice providers’ overhead costs and increase advice productivity and sustainability. We want to see if, in a time of falling budgets, we could use the network to help each organisation make backroom costs and time savings freeing up scarce advice resources.
We have already organised a meeting of West London law centres where the outline of the project was discussed. The response was positive with an agreement to explore initially reducing spending by group purchasing.

We want to set up further meetings with generalist services in West London, if you are interested please contact Baljit on  020 7373 2102 or baljit@nucleus.org.uk

Much has been made in the press of families supposedly receiving more in benefits than in work. It is important to clarify that the bulk of welfare payments a family receives is almost always going on housing benefit which goes to landlords, not for the personal enrichment of the family concerned.  This is the result of the operation of the housing benefit system created in 1987 and the removal of rent controls. 

Since the abolition of rent control on January 15th 1989 under the Housing Act 1988, rent levels have rocketed. The housing benefit bill has risen accordingly. Effectively, housing benefit has become a welfare state for landlords, being the second most expensive benefit payment after old age pensions.

Thus, the bulk of any £26 000 claim or higher in benefits will actually end up in the pocket or bank account of  private landlords who since 1989 have been allowed to charge whatever figure in rent they wish, the so-called “market rent”.

One aspect that has hitherto received little attention is that much of this money is actually flowing out of London to absentee landlords, many of who are not UK taxpayers.  Experience over the last three years, of Nucleus and other advice agencies with clients claiming housing benefit is that the money is ultimately paid on to landlords living in Ireland, Spain, Italy, the United States, Cyprus, Nigeria, Lebanon, South Africa and in one case Ethiopia. Obviously, this has become an opportunity for fraud, particularly in central London boroughs.

But why are the Government oblivious to the obvious remedy of controlling rent levels, rather than cutting benefits? If rents were controlled again to the equivalent of the 1970s – 1980s the benefit bill would be cut and properties would be affordable. It is also predictable that homelessness would be greatly reduced. Effectively, it might be said a political choice has been made to subsidize landlords – wherever they are in the world – rather than actually look after the interests of British taxpayers and people receiving welfare in the UK. Could it be that many decision-makers are simply unaware of the system that has been brought into existence?

Much could be done by saving the £20 billion being paid out for inflated rents, so how has the Coalition missed two obvious solutions to reduce housing benefit bills by (1) re-introducing rent controls and (2) ensuring wherever possible that money  is ultimately being s paid to landlords who are UK taxpayers or whose identity can be clearly ascertained, if resident abroad?

Nucleus has come across cases where the official receiver is still allowing direct deductions to be made for overpayments. If this is happening to you please get in touch with one of our debt team who can help.

The Rt. Hon. the Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers
President of the Supreme Court of England & Wales

Walking 40 miles in darkest February
To raise funds for London’s legal advice charities

Do you want to join our team to help raise money , if so please get in touch.
Do you want to sponsor a Nucleus Team member – either get in touch with us or the virgin giving site – remember you would get tax relief on your donation to make your donation count even more!

We will re-open for business on Tuesday 3rd January 2010

The first drop in will be Tuesday 3.30pm – 6.00pm
followed by another on Thursday 10.00 – 12.30pm

In case of a housing emergency please ring
Shelter hostels on 0808 800 4444 (8am to midnight)

RBKC is closed from 24th until 28th December 2010 and then again from 31st December to the 3rd January 2011
The RBKC council out of hour’s number is 020 7361 3002
_________

The benefits agency is closed from 24th until 28th December 2010 and then again from 31st December to the 3rd January 2012
In case of emergency you can go and ask help at your local police station at:
72 Earls Court Road
Kensington, London W8 6EQ
Tel: 0300 123 1212
__________

We wish all our users
Season’s greetings and all the best for 2012.

Increases in unemployment, government austerity measures
including benefit caps coupled with soaring fuel prices are causing many
families to fall into debt. Between 2009/10 and 2012/13 household incomes are
predicted  to fall by a further 7%, while
the average annual fuel bill is said to likely to be above £1,300.

Nucleus has a new worker to help people, especially EDF
customer access grants to help people:

- Better understand their bills

- Save money by budgeting

- Claim grants to help clear arrears

The new caseworker, Bernadette, works in an established team
of money advisers who can help you to maximise your income , reduce your
outgoings and take control of your debts.

They are able to provide all the help you need to take
control or even start again by applying for Debt relief order or bankruptcy.

The team works with the benefits and housing advisors to help ensure provide we
provide holistic

Nucleus has been helping local people for nearly 40 years. We
are an independent charity which works with local trusts, the local council and
community groups  to enable people  through advice. We want to help people to take
control of their life’s and make positive decisions.

Over the last year we
managed to bring in an additional £4milion in benefits, grants or debt write
offs.

Ring   020 7373
2102 and ask for Bernadette  for help.

The challenge in coming months is to preserve and maintain these improvements, especially at a time when support and benefits are being cut and local residents are facing a massive increasing cost of living.

Nucleus Legal Advice Centre will be taking on the role of lead agency of the project for this final stage.

The project steering group membership remains the same:
Oliver Fisher solicitors
North Kensington Law Centre
Nucleus Legal Advice Centre
Kensington and Chelsea Citizens Advice Bureaux
Worlds End Neighbourhood Advice Centre
Migrant and Refugee Community Forum
Age Concern Kensington and Chelsea
Action Disability Kensington and Chelsea
Kensington and Chelsea Social Council
Midaye
Al-Hasaniya

Advice Now staff and service provision, remain the same.

For Advice, Information and sign posting to an appropriate agency:

Visit Advice Now website site: www.advicehubkc.org or

Call the new Telephone Triage service, Number: 0300 012 5464