Oral evidence: Pension credit uptake in Northern Ireland, HC 740
Oral evidence, 28 October 2026.
Witnesses
Siobhan Casey and Kevin Higgins.
Chair
Welcome to the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee’s session on pension credit take-up in Northern Ireland. We are joined by Siobhan Casey, the Commissioner for Older People for Northern Ireland, and virtually by Kevin Higgins, Advice NI’s head of policy. Welcome to you both. Siobhan, we do not have time for much of a preamble, but could you outline the current picture of pension credit take-up in Northern Ireland and why it matters?
Siobhan Casey
It really matters. What I think people do not understand is that receiving pension credit unlocks so many other opportunities for people. For me, though, it is also about protecting people from poverty. If we cannot reach people entitled to pension credit, that is saying a lot. About 8% of older people in Northern Ireland are in relative poverty, and another 8% are in absolute poverty. We are seeing that, as people move from their 60s to their 70s and 80s, that is growing, and the oldest pensioners are facing the greatest financial vulnerability. We have very low private pension rates in Northern Ireland compared with the rest of the UK. That means that people are particularly dependent on their state pension, which leaves them vulnerable to rising living costs and unexpected expenses. It is difficult to heat homes adequately and maintain a healthy diet. All those things lead to deterioration in physical and mental health, which puts pressure on public services. When public services are stretched, that makes it even harder for people, making them more vulnerable. There is growing evidence, too, of increased food insecurity among older people. That is why getting these types of entitlements to them is really important. There is also the fact that older people are likely to live with one or more long-term health conditions or disabilities, which means that their living conditions can worsen. Many older people live on fixed incomes, so they do not have the opportunity to increase their earnings. Why is this important? I am conscious that the Department for Communities’ analysis dates back to the early 2020s. It is looking to aggregate better data, which is really critical, but the latest trends show that we are having an increase, which is really good. We all know that the Department for Communities has a really good Make the Call campaign, and it is really trying to promote things better. However, our older population—people over 65—is increasing every year by 6,000 or 7,000. It is an ageing demographic, and we have to be aware that this is coming down the line.
Chair
Siobhan, how many eligible people are not claiming pension credit?
Siobhan Casey
Kevin will probably know this, but I think the Department for Communities has said between 23,000 and 30,000 older people.
Chair
That is a lot of people. On average, how much is each person missing out on financially?
Siobhan Casey
I will let Kevin speak to that one, because he will probably know the financials a bit better.
Chair
All right, Kevin, I am going to come to you. Why does it matter, how many eligible people are not claiming, and how much are they missing out on?
Kevin Higgins
Thank you to the Committee for allowing me to dial in remotely. I also thank your staff for all their work to set this up. For me, the uptake issue is so important because older people are not getting what they are entitled to. They are not getting what the law says they need to live on. To me, that cuts to the heart of it. We have people out there—we are talking here about older people—who the law says require a certain amount of money due to their needs and circumstances, and they are not getting that. We are in the cost of living crisis that Siobhan talked about. Older people spend a lot longer in their homes—particularly older older people. If you check out the price of home heating oil in Northern Ireland, it is well over £1,000 for 900 litres of oil. That is just one example. We know that about two thirds of households in Northern Ireland rely on home heating oil. That is one example of why it is so important that every penny of money that should be coming into all households, but particularly those of older people, does come in. I welcome that the Committee is focusing on pension credit uptake, because it is an issue that needs a lot of attention. Regarding the numbers, the estimates from the Department are admittedly dated, from 2019-20. The Department is working on updating those figures, so we expect some shift, but according to those figures, 66,000—about 72%—of those entitled are receiving it. That leaves around 28% or 26,000 pensioner households that are not getting the pension credit they are entitled to. As for amounts, it is about £1.1 million a week in unclaimed pension credit, which totals about £55 million per annum in unclaimed entitlement, which is a significant amount of money—particularly on Budget day. We are all talking about money today, so it is appropriate to talk about the money that is not coming in to older people’s households.
Chair
What is the trend in pension credit take-up in recent years? Is it getting better or worse?
Siobhan Casey
It is increasing, I think in line with the promotion from the Department for Communities, and the fact that we have 6,000 or 7,000 people every year reaching 65 and coming in. The trends are going up.
Chair
Siobhan, you mentioned that, if you claim pension credit, it unlocks other packages of support. What are those other packages of support?
Siobhan Casey
Things like housing benefit and cold weather payments, the free TV licence for those aged 75 and over, and help with dental, optical and hospital travel costs. Kevin will back this up: the reason a lot of people are not claiming is that they are afraid to declare—well, first, as we spoke about outside the room, Tonia, there is their pride. They do not want to go out and say they need extra support. Then you have the whole matter of declaring savings to public authorities. People are afraid to do that because it may take away from other benefits, and because they are private. The thing is, even if you are entitled to a small amount of pension credit—you declare £1 earnings for every £500 of savings—it unlocks so much more. I really do think that is the message that we need to get out.
Simon Hoare
I want to ask about pride and the reticence that it might bring, along with the use of the word “credit”. Credit suggests debt. Have you any thoughts on that? There is a presumption that older people are less keen to apply. Is there any differential in Northern Ireland between urban and rural? It has always been my take that rural communities are more resilient—if I could use that phrase—and less inclined than urban to ask for anything. I just wonder whether you have any observations on that.
Siobhan Casey
I worked in Age NI for 15 and a half years before I took this job, and it would have been a constant thing that people were saying they did not want to take money in case it took away from schools or other areas of the economy. They did not realise that this was an entitlement. It is not a favour; it is actually an entitlement. That would have been my experience in trying to convince people: “Yes, you’re entitled to this. You worked hard for it. It is not taking away from other key services. So it’s important that you do claim.” Kevin, do you have more information on the rural-urban split?
Kevin Higgins
Thank you for the question. My sense is that, in rural Northern Ireland, there are certain issues that may make it a bit more difficult for older people to get the information and advice that they might need in order to go ahead and maximise their rights and entitlements. An example is access to services, being able to travel to get to them, and reliance on public transport. That can be difficult; sometimes there are issues with that. Maybe there is just one bus to a certain place and one going back in the evening. Travel can be very difficult. In urban areas, there will be more accessible services, the likes of advice services and advice centres, where you can pop in and seek the information that you may need. There could be more resilience, I agree, in rural areas, but that resilience might mean that people are not pursuing their rights and entitlements; they are getting by. That takes me to some of the other issues. You are right about a lot of older people having a sense of independence. They have worked all their days; they have paid their big stamp and their national insurance, and they want to have the respect and the dignity and the right to be able to live on the stamp and the insurance. That feeds into their being reluctant and thinking, “Why should I have to divulge all my financial information—my bank accounts and so on?” Interestingly, there is another issue, which is almost guilt. Older people are very aware of what has happened generally over the last 10 or 15 years in terms of cuts to the social security system, particularly for working-age people. To a large extent, with the triple lock, older people have been protected, but working-age people have experienced various austerity measures, cuts, reforms, freezes and so on. Older people are very aware of that, and I think that has fed into this as well. There is a “Well, I have enough to do me” attitude. They are seeing other people finding things a lot tighter or a lot more difficult than they are, and therefore there is a certain reluctance to come forward.
Simon Hoare
I am not going to get into the weeds of the overall welfare budget, because I think that the data points in the opposite direction to the one that you suggest, but let me ask this very specific question of you both. A yes or no answer will suffice. In your assessment, is there a problem with the use of the word “credit”?
Siobhan Casey
It is not something that has come to my attention before.
Kevin Higgins
No, I don’t think so. Very often what I find that people are coming through our doors about is cold, hard cash. People are struggling to pay bills, get their oil tank filled and so on. At this stage, because we are in this cost of living crisis, things like what you have mentioned are maybe less important. If we were not in the situation that we are in, things like that potentially would come to the surface and the name of things could be important, but at the moment we are in a place where it is potentially less important.
Mr Kohler
Thank you for joining us, Kevin and Siobhan. I am wondering to what extent this is a Northern Ireland problem or a UK-wide problem. Do you have any figures on the uptake in GB, or the regions of GB, compared with Northern Ireland? Is it better or worse, or do we not know?
Kevin Higgins
We should know. I have not analysed the figures, but there will be uptake figures. I know that the Government have just recently, in GB, launched a pension credit uptake campaign. I can certainly get the numbers for the Committee, but that is not something I have analysed in preparation for this meeting.
Chair
It would be great if you can write to us on that, Kevin.
Robin Swann
Good morning, Siobhan and Kevin. You have touched on the impact on eligible pensioners who do not claim pension credit, as that unlocking mechanism opens up other avenues for support. In your assessment, how much is the low uptake of pension credit contributing to pensioner poverty and fuel poverty? Kevin, you touched briefly on the price of oil, but what about the overall impact?
Siobhan Casey
I think it is definitely impacting it. There is the heating cost, but we can also look at the figures around food insecurity. Older people are the largest group going to the likes of the Trussell Trust. There is a 91% increase in those going for food support. Then there is the reduction in the winter fuel payment too, so there is certainly an impact on people.
Kevin Higgins
I totally agree with that. The independent advice sector has done some benefit uptake work. The Northern Ireland Audit Office says that, in one year, there was something like £17 million generated—this is extra money in people’s pockets—during the benefit uptake campaign with the independent advice sector. It is currently estimated—although the number could be very different from this—that the unclaimed amount is about £55 million. If you do a targeted uptake campaign that generates around £15 million or £20 million, you will have a significant impact on the amount of money that is going unclaimed. I completely agree with you: imagine the impact that that £15 million or £20 million will have on the mental health and wellbeing of older people. They will feel, “I don’t have to get 500 litres or 200 litres; I can fill the tank up. I can get proper food in the fridge. I can get taxis to go to GP and dental appointments.” It would be a fantastic boost if we could maximise the uptake for older people.
Siobhan Casey
Kevin mentioned taxis, and it is about their social life too. Community transport is being used up taking people to health appointments. Particularly in rural areas, Simon, we are trying to get people to use community transport to do their shopping, to get to the hairdresser or to do whatever. That extra money gives them that bit more independence, so it is really important.
Robin Swann
Do you have any information about the eligibility threshold? Would raising it by a few pounds bring more pensioners into eligibility?
Siobhan Casey
Kevin and I did some work on that a couple of years ago. The figures for the people not meeting the threshold were quite staggering then, so I think that needs to be looked at.
Kevin Higgins
Yes. The point about thresholds is very interesting. The Committee will know about the new state pension that has come in for people who retired after 2016. For those with a full contribution on the new state pension, the weekly amount is £241.30. The standard minimum guarantee in pension credit for a single person is £238—just a couple of pounds below. That speaks very clearly to your point about amounts of money. It is good that people claim their state pension, but on the downside there is scope to be able to get a top-up of pension credit. As we have touched on, that is so important for the likes of passporting. In Northern Ireland, we have a home heating oil support scheme. No doubt, there will be other targeted schemes to help with the cost of living in the Budget, but you can bet that a lot of those schemes will require you to be on pension credit to get an entitlement. That reinforces how important it is that people get their pension credit entitlement. If they do not, they will lose out on some of the cost of living measures that will be announced, maybe in the Budget.
Gavin Robinson
Good morning to you both. To follow on from Robin’s point about thresholds, about 20-odd years ago, when I was starting to help in political office, a lady came to me and we talked to her about pension credit. At that stage, £6,000 was the maximum that you were allowed as savings, and she had about £7,000. I have never forgotten her looking me in the eye and saying, “But, son, £4,000 of that is for Wilton’s,” which was the local funeral director. That showed the sort of savings and preparations she had made—so that she wasn’t burdening anyone else. At that stage we were able to talk to her not about divesting savings, but about maybe taking a prepayment plan, so that she could invest in the funeral but also bring herself within the eligibility criteria for pension credit. Whether it is Advice NI or even the Make the Call service, do they give practical and tangible advice that would allow somebody to come within the criteria for pension credit?
Kevin Higgins
Thank you for that question. There are a couple of really important aspects. It was £6,000 and my understanding is that it is now £10,000, but the point still applies. That lady could come in with £11,000 and say exactly the same thing, so it’s a fair point. In terms of thresholds, if we could shift it from £6,000 to £10,000, which was some years ago, there is a debate to be had around shifting it from £10,000 to £15,000 and so on, or up to £16,000. So there is a point well made there as well. On another point, often in advice centres people come through the door, we start the calculation, and we find, as you did, Gavin, that the person has no entitlement to pension credit. For whatever reason, they are slightly under. What you have to do is not leave it there and not just park that issue. You look at the circumstances of the individual. Very often you will explore other health problems or disabilities and so on. Then it becomes a circuitous route. If you can get an entitlement to attendance allowance, not only is that a bit of additional money, but attendance allowance unlocks additional premiums within the pension credit calculation, and that will then allow you to get a successful pension credit application. Your point is well made. You know this in constituency offices and advice centres. The case has an initial face value, but your work only starts at that point. Then it is about exploring and doing a holistic piece of work, exploring every avenue, and very often, as in the example that I gave you, you can get to a place where you can unlock the additional income that that household is entitled to. There is an issue on the savings—I agree with you, and I also agree that very often there is more than meets the eye to doing this pension credit uptake work. It is about not accepting what comes forward at face value, and unlocking the entitlement that will come after you do some hard, hard yards.
Siobhan Casey
Every £500 of savings is equivalent to £1 of income. If you are out by £2,000 or £3,000, that is £6 of income. It is about beginning to help people understand the nuances of this and the fact that even if they are not going to get the maximum amount, it will open up other opportunities, as Kevin says, for other benefits.
Claire Hanna
Siobhan, you mentioned briefly that private pension build-up is lower in Northern Ireland. Do you have any high-level data on that?
Siobhan Casey
No, not here.
Claire Hanna
It rings true, but I wasn’t sure if there was data. How effective is pension credit at tackling poverty? Do you think that the level of pension credit is adequate where it is currently set?
Siobhan Casey
You could always be asking for more, Claire. The challenge is getting people to receive what is there now, and then there are onward negotiations on that. In terms of recommendations, at the minute we are calculating the number of people applying. There was a report two weeks ago on planning for an ageing society. As a Department we need to look past publicity and application numbers and actually look at the successful awards and additional income. With this demographic increasing year on year by 7,000 or whatever, how are we going to do the proactive thing? Also, at the stage of digitalisation, we have to engage people who are missing out on key support. At the minute the Department—Kevin will know about this because we have been working with the Department—are going in now, targeting specifically the 23,000 to 30,000 older people who they believe are missing out. They write a letter and send it to their homes. That type of targeting is not scattergun; it is direct, and that is really good. We have worked with them on the outreach letters, and will work with them on the promotion of it. A person receiving a letter at home might still be a bit concerned. It is about Advice NI, Age NI and the commissioner’s office getting together and saying, “Look out for this. This is important to you.” That is a good proactive approach that has been adopted by the Department. The point I made earlier about the independent advice sector is also important. There needs to be support for those organisations, for accessible claim handling and capacity. People would prefer to come to Advice NI or Age NI or their local resource centre to get support. We have to be seen in the collaborative and collective approach. The other two recommendations are that other public bodies need to be signposting as well; it is about working right across. I know they will do that. The Housing Executive and others will all be working to try to identify people; good work is being done but, because of that ageing demographic coming up, it has to get better and be more targeted. I know the Department is doing more about aggregation of proper data and analysis, which will be good.
Claire Hanna
Are those eligibility criteria and the income and savings thresholds at the right level? With the cost of living, do you think those are set at the right place to bring into the remit all those who need support?
Kevin Higgins
It is a fair point. During your whole working life, you are always encouraged to save for your retirement and be responsible. To some extent, you should not be penalised for that. There is a judgment call to be made there on whether the level of savings is a bit too low and punitive. As we discussed earlier, if you raised that threshold from £10,000 to £15,000 or whatever, there is a balance to be struck in providing support to those people. It is not an awful lot of money. Older people like to have a bit put by to leave to future generations or to take care of themselves later on. There is definitely a debate now; I would support those levels increasing. I have a couple of comments on your point, Claire, around levels. To repeat, the new state pension is £241, and the minimum guarantee of pension credit is £238. Structurally straightaway, if there are no other circumstances, that person will not be entitled to pension credit because the new state pension is those couple of pounds over. There is a systemic and structural issue there. A bit of thought is required in terms of trends and so on. In May 2021, there were 63,450 pension credit claimants; in May 2026, there are 60,030. That has gone from roughly 63,500 to 60,000. I take Siobhan’s point that recent months have bucked the trend. There has been a slight increase in pension credit claims, but it is a downward trajectory. It is understandable, given the increased amounts in the new state pension, and the increased state retirement age. I think shortly we may get to the point where we are below 60,000 in pension credit claims for the first time ever. There is more to the statistics; it takes a little bit of nuance. There could be a slight increase now, but the overall trend could be down. That makes it even more important that for every single household that should be getting even a little bit of pension credit, for the reasons we outlined, there should be more effort. The Department needs to put in more effort—we all do—to ensure that those households are getting every pound they are entitled to.
Gavin Robinson
That helpfully leads us into the next question. Kevin, you were talking about the Department needing to do more. As you know, this Committee is Westminster-based and clearly interested in Northern Ireland, but there is obviously a wider Whitehall discussion to be had. Could you help us understand the breakdown in responsibility for the funding, promotion and delivery of pension credit between the Department for Communities in Northern Ireland, which is a devolved Department, and the Department for Work and Pensions in Westminster?
Kevin Higgins
Others can correct me if I am wrong on this, but I believe that as social security is devolved to Northern Ireland, complete responsibility lies with the Department for Communities and the Minister in that Department. To me, it is very straightforward in that respect. We do not have to look over to Westminster and the DWP; we can take responsibility ourselves in Northern Ireland to do what we have to do, which in this case is to increase pension credit uptake. There are systems and so on, and there is the issue of parity, but the fundamental point is that social security is devolved, and therefore the responsibility lies with the Department and the Minister.
Gavin Robinson
To unpack that a little bit, it is devolved, but we operate the same system on exactly the same terms with the same criteria and legislation. The money is coming directly from Westminster, and the systems used are Westminster systems. To deviate from any of that, there is a cost. At the moment, while it is the Department’s responsibility, it is an English or Westminster system that is being deployed in Northern Ireland, is it not?
Kevin Higgins
That is exactly right. That is why we would operate on this principle of parity, so that we can achieve the efficiencies and savings by using the same systems, and we do not build our own system here. Yes, we are devolved and independent, but the principle of parity would carry across for the vast amount of time. One example—and you will know this well, Gavin—is the introduction of welfare reforms and universal credit. There was an intense debate about that because of the potential differential impact in Northern Ireland, particularly around the introduction of PIP. Twice as many people per head of population claimed working-age DLA at the time, so there was concern about the impact of welfare reform. We did introduce all of that, but you will remember that the Evason working group was set up, and then we put our own unique mitigations in place. For example, our benefit cap mitigation was put in place following the Evason report recommendations. That benefit cap mitigation is worth its weight in gold now, because the Government abolished the two-child limit. So for families with children in Northern Ireland, we have the two-child cap abolished, and we have the benefit cap mitigated—it is fantastic. But you are right: we had to build an IT system to deliver our unique mitigation system, and we have to fund it. The Executive took the decision to fund it out of the block grant. I digress a little bit there. In terms of the pension credit, yes, we tend to plough the same furrow, but the responsibility is local. In terms of uptake, we can do a lot around awareness raising and uptake campaigns, giving a little bit of funding to places like Age NI, Advice NI and the advice sector to maximise the effectiveness of uptake campaigns.
Gavin Robinson
Thanks, Kevin. Before I bring you in, Siobhan, let me just put it this way. There are three things: funding, promotion and delivery. Delivery is the Department for Communities, but using Westminster systems; funding is Westminster; and promotion is the Department for Communities.
Siobhan Casey
Kevin mentioned unique mitigations. I spoke earlier on about the fact that there are 660,000 leaflets going out from the Department for Work and Pensions here to promote this. That is going out to certain localities across the UK, whereas the Department for Communities is planning to do direct targeting. Sometimes the unique mitigations can even be an improvement—they might be an example.
Gavin Robinson
How effective do you think the co-ordination is between the Department for Communities and the Department for Work and Pensions?
Siobhan Casey
I wouldn’t be in a position, really, to understand that.
Kevin Higgins
In terms of the targeted letters and so on, that data is held by the Department for Communities. That is a unique exercise, and we will be writing out to our own people here in Northern Ireland, completely separate to what the DWP are doing. They will have their database of people who may be entitled to pension credit. It is stand-alone, in terms of the data and the work that is being done. It also speaks to the issue of us needing to be a lot smarter about data sharing. A lot of information is held in the Department for Communities, and the various benefits that are within that, and between Departments. For example, Health might be able to see that certain older people’s health problems are increasing, their health declining a little. That means, if you put your benefits hat on, there could be entitlement to attendance allowance or the severe disability premium on pension credit. The Department for Communities could be better joined up not only within the Department, but with other Departments, such as Health in particular. As Siobhan was saying, there is real scope for targeting and being able to have a more personalised conversation, almost at an individual level: “Kevin Higgins, I think you could have an entitlement to pension credit.” That becomes a more powerful conversation than, “Oh, you might be entitled to ring this number,” which people might not engage with to a great extent. This issue around data sharing is something that we should be able to push the barriers a little to get the results we want to get.
Gavin Robinson
Do you have anything to add, Siobhan?
Siobhan Casey
No. I think I was saying that earlier. There is a move towards that data sharing, from what we can see from our conversations with the Department for Communities.
Gavin Robinson
Paul Kohler was asking about the difference between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and whether this was a UK-wide phenomenon or just a Northern Ireland issue. Simon Hoare was asking questions about the rural and urban divide, and the support for and resilience of people in separate communities. What do you think are the main barriers to uptake in Northern Ireland that differ from Great Britain?
Siobhan Casey
I do not know that they differ. The barriers are that people wrongly assume that owning a home, having savings or receiving a small occupational pension excludes them, and some think that awards will be too small to justify applying. Others fear disturbing existing benefits, as I said earlier. Many find the system confusing. The application process is quite rigorous, and you can imagine that if you are in your 70s or 80s, it might be off-putting. We talked about people feeling uncomfortable to ask. I work closely with the commissioner in Wales, and I understand from them that the same issues arise there.
Gavin Robinson
Kevin, I presume you are pretty NI-based, whereas Siobhan is now engaging with people across the United Kingdom, so I will move the question on just for you, if that is okay. We talked about trust, and Simon asked about whether “credit” is the right phrase, because that implies a level of debt or some sort of burden. You have not picked that up as an issue, but do you want to expand a bit more on some of the pressures around stigma, complexity and trust in Government and whether you believe those to be significant barriers?
Kevin Higgins
We would find that, and it is to be expected. Older people will not know the intricacies of the benefits system, and the starting point for many is this fear of doing something wrong and not knowing what they do not know. Obviously, there will be a fear factor, so to me the fear factor is very important, as is the complexity of the system, as I said. When people come into advice services and we unlock entitlement, the severe disability premium additional amount on pension credit is actually £86 a week. The basic minimum is £238, but if you meet that other bit of the criteria, you can actually boost that by almost £90 or £100. For a couple who satisfy that, it is £172. There is that fear of doing something wrong, but often when we unlock that money for people, they will still look at the adviser and go, “Are you sure about this? I don’t want to be doing something wrong. I’m not sure I should be claiming this additional money at all.” There is that almost fear of taking the step even to get advice and then, even when you present the additional money to people, they say, “Oh, I’m not sure. I don’t know about that.” There is that reticence. It is just inherent in older people that they have enough to get by—they have the state pension and so on—but they could be more aware of the amount of money that they could be missing out on and that they could be deploying towards the cost of living, oil and everything else. Perhaps we should also think about that word “credit”. People will have very mixed opinions about universal credit, and there are conversations about that all the time. Whether the word “credit” is linked to debt, I am not so sure, but pension credit might somehow be linked to universal credit, so perhaps there might be mixed views of that out there in the public domain. That might be a tangible point, but a piece of research could be needed just to unpick that.
Gavin Robinson
Thank you very much, both.
Katrina Murray
Thank you both for coming in. There are a couple of things that I am exceptionally aware of. I think about my grandparents and how their lives were fundamentally changed when they got benefits—those days were pre pension credit. They got the support that they were entitled to compared with the generations that followed, who have had the benefit of workplace pensions investment. Certainly, that is borne out by Government statistics that pensioner poverty is most obvious in the over-75 age group. I am really interested in the targeting proposal—particularly, how you are using that to drive the take-up. Is it just going to be, “Right, we know you fit these criteria. How can we convince you to complete the forms?”
Siobhan Casey
The Department for Communities identified the target number of people, and then it reached out to Advice NI, Age NI and other advice providers, and the commissioner’s office, for help. I said, “Make sure you let us see the script—what you’re writing to people,” because sometimes the language is important. I know that Age NI co-designed it and passed it by their older people, so it is just about that collaboration. It is based on the Department’s database—the information that they have. But they have said that they will do more work on what Kevin was talking about—cross-departmental targeting. As you know, data protection is the most important thing, and getting to people over 75. It is very targeted. What they did add was that the letters said to contact Advice NI or Age NI to get more information, so that people did not automatically have to go to the Department and their Make the Call campaign.
Katrina Murray
One thing that we would be interested in seeing is, how do you know that that bit works? How many people then pick up the phone or appear at an advice centre and say, “I’ve got this letter. What do I do next?”
Siobhan Casey
That would be a good measurement.
Katrina Murray
It is about how that is being addressed; how you are getting to people who are digitally excluded or potentially do not have English as their first language.
Siobhan Casey
I think that is why a letter went through the door.
Kevin Higgins
To pick up a few other points, I know that when we were procured to deliver benefit uptake exercises generally, and pension credit uptake in particular, specific targeting was done for older people who were getting housing benefit but not getting pension credit. Obviously, if you are getting housing benefit, some element of means testing has taken place, so it is used as a bit of a proxy that there could be entitlement to pension credit. Using housing benefit as a proxy was one thing that we did, and it was effective. The issue was people who were getting attendance allowance but not getting pension credit, for the reasons that I talked about earlier—it can trigger additional premiums. Again, that can act like a filter and targeting can be effective. The other layer that we used to do was to take age—that is not to say that as you get older, your health will always decline, but there can be a sense that as you get older, things become more difficult and health problems can emerge. Again, there can be targeting almost by age segment. That would be saying, “Could there be an entitlement to attendance allowance that would bring in entitlement to pension credit as well?” There are various things that could be very effective, and they were effective. The one final thing I would say to Siobhan’s point is that I welcome the Department’s targeted letters—you will expect me to say this anyway—but they may well generate increased demand for the advice services, where people will come in and we will have to do the work with that. I would gently ask that the Department consider doing it as part of a procured, contracted and paid-for service. That would contribute to the sustainability of the advice service, and I am sure would also get great results for those people targeted.
Katrina Murray
I hope you take this in the right manner, Kevin: I hope it does generate more work for the advice services. The only question is, what linkage has there been with the Department of Health? If you are talking about increased levels of dependency, GPs and the health service will probably have more contact with people as well.
Kevin Higgins
Very often there is signposting from GPs, and advice centres will put their posters up in GP surgeries, but that can be hit or miss. We should do something where the GP says, “Contact your local advice service, because I think there are benefits that you could be entitled to, given the health problems that you are presenting with.” I think that joined-up-ness could be really effective.
Siobhan Casey
There is also the point at which people are getting to pension age. Those 7,000 or 6,000 people coming through every year could be given a letter directly to say, “You are now approaching taking your state pension. Here is more information around what you might be entitled to.”
Chair
That leads nicely on to Mike’s question.
Mike Kane
My question is also on targeted outreach. I understand that Age NI ran a campaign, “Are you entitled to more?”, specifically targeted on Fermanagh and Omagh. Are you aware of the campaign and what was your evaluation?
Siobhan Casey
I am not sure that it is finished yet, as it was quite recent, but it is really good. Age NI frequently looked at who was calling from the different areas in Northern Ireland and the numbers from Fermanagh were always quite low—I do not know what the statistics for Advice NI are. That is the type of thing. It will be augmented by this targeted letter.
Kevin Higgins
I commend the local authority or council for doing that work. Very often, it is an individual in the local council that drives this or the anti-poverty measures within the council area. It will be interesting to see the results. Obviously, we would want to see that rolled out across all local council areas. However, there could be particular reasons for low uptake in the very rural area of Fermanagh and Omagh. That could be particular to some areas, but we would be keen for it to be rolled out across all council areas.
Mike Kane
Great. I will give a shout-out to Manchester University NHS foundation trust, which has deployed live well hubs in all three of its hospitals across the city of Manchester. They are looking at eligibility checks in terms of pension credits, application assistance and other perks, such as free TV licences and council tax discounts. They are also helping with debt, which is a huge issue in my constituency. Kevin, you mentioned the joined-up-ness of services. Do you think that the NHS is a good place to house these benefit advice checkers who provide the advice where people actually are?
Kevin Higgins
That is a fantastic idea. It is absolutely brilliant. If you look at the pension credit criteria, there is the basic guaranteed amount and then there are the additional premiums. The additional premiums are often linked to health, disability and so on. Where do people go when they have health problems? They go to their GP or their hospital. If we were really serious about it—if our lives depended on making sure that every possible older person entitled to pension credit got it—we would just take the information and the service to where the people are. Otherwise, you can signpost and advertise, but that will not get you the results that you really want. If you break down those barriers, you make it easy for people. It could even just be a triage at that level; it need not be all experts on the benefits system, but just people able to take it far enough with a personalised service that actually does the job. If there was any more complexity, they could then refer it on for independent advice or whatever. I think it is a fantastic idea.
Siobhan Casey
Greater Manchester does a lot of good things right.
Mike Kane
Indeed. I will give a shout-out to the Cadent Foundation and Citizens Advice Manchester, which are helping to deliver this service currently.
Chair
Kevin and Siobhan, I think you need to go and have a little visit to Manchester!
Siobhan Casey
I have done that frequently.
Chair
You have been?
Siobhan Casey
Quite a lot.
David Smith
Morning, Kevin and Siobhan; good to meet you. You have touched on some of this, but I wonder if you could elaborate further. Gavin Robinson was asking about the relative responsibilities of the Department for Communities versus the DWP and so on. In simple terms, what more should the Government—especially the Department for Communities, by the sounds of things—be doing to increase pension credit take-up in Northern Ireland?
Siobhan Casey
Earlier, I talked about them developing a really targeted plan for the existing demographic and the demographic that is coming through, because it is really increasing. That is, again, about moving from general awareness to proactive help—doing initiatives and things like that. I know the Make the Call team will go out to any meeting that we want them to go to, and they will come out with us if we need them to, so they are trying to be more in situ and on the ground. We also need the sustainable funding for independent advice, as Kevin said. It is a collaboration; not everybody wants to go to the Department—some people want to go to the independent advice service. That is important. Kevin also mentioned procurement. The other thing was about every relevant contact with public services. I think that does happen to a certain extent, but it is just about making it more co-ordinated. Earlier, Kevin mentioned the link with housing benefits and the link with the Housing Executive, which is probably the main manager of property in Northern Ireland, and right across the health service. It is very difficult to get into GP surgeries to get information to them; I always find it easier to get through with pharmacies. It is more about really getting the information out to where people are—you have 100,000 people coming through pharmacies every day to get things. It is about making every relevant contact work, from housing, heating and so on, and about really robustly looking at these things, as well as measurement and a better use of data. They are all the things we talked about earlier.
David Smith
Kevin, what would you add to that about what the Government in Northern Ireland, and the Department for Communities in particular, can do?
Kevin Higgins
That is a great question, and it gives the opportunity to give a good, straight answer. I take Siobhan’s point around pharmacies, because increasingly GPs have a telephony-first service now. It is not like the old days where you put up posters and people would see them and so on. Things have moved on with the GP aspect, so going to pharmacies is an excellent idea as well. The two things for me would be, first, to reinstate the targeted exercises or programmes that were run in partnership between the Department for Communities and the independent advice sector. They were targeted, and people were invited to contact their local advice service. The results were all verified then, and we would share the data back to the Department, so the amount of additional money that was generated for people was verified pound-for-pound. It was not just that we did X amount of letters and so on; it was about what it resulted in and what extra money was generated for people. No. 1 would be reinstating those targeted exercises. No. 2 would be maximising data sharing within and between Departments. There are easy wins, and there is low-hanging fruit that we could be using to target people and to make sure that people are getting what they are entitled to. If we have all the data on these people that would fairly indicate that there could be an entitlement, why are we not using it to its maximum?
David Smith
It seems that one of the most frustrating things in Government, full stop, is getting the Government to work together. Moving beyond Government, my second and final question is more about what Government cannot do. Before I became an MP, my background was in charities for over 20 years. This is a proposition, so agree or disagree: it always struck me that charities could do things that Governments can never do because of the dynamic. This partly goes to the issue that my colleague Simon Hoare raised about pride when it comes to pension credit with older people, but it fundamentally boils down to relationships and the type of relationship you have with a local community group, a local church or a local charity that you trust. Would you agree that there should perhaps be a bigger role for charitable organisations and civil society in Northern Ireland to take advantage of those relationships, for the benefit of the people they serve, to encourage greater take-up? How might that compare with the sort of interface that people often have with a Government Department?
Siobhan Casey
I totally agree with you, David. In my experience of working with Age NI for years, it is really important that people have a trusted independent charity to go through, where they know that they are not talking to officials at that early stage when they are trying to determine what their entitlements are. It goes back to funding and, as Kevin says, data collection, data sharing and measurement—but you are absolutely right.
Kevin Higgins
If you are asking whether I agree or disagree with your proposition, I would have to agree. Not to be hammering the Department on this—they are trying their best in terms of the uptake, and I think we could do more—but they also have a responsibility and quite a public-facing campaign around fraud. They have to do both, but it is very difficult to balance them. People, particularly older people, will hear the message about fraud and think to themselves, “Well, should I embark on a journey to get information about increased entitlement?” because of the fear of doing something wrong. It is not to be over-critical of the Department—they have to do both—but it is difficult for them to do both. That is why I think contracting out the uptake work, at least to some extent, has benefits and needs to be reinstated.
David Smith
I am pleased we are in agreement.
Chair
We spoke right at the beginning about the data from the Department for Communities. You said it was from 2019-20, so it is seven years old now. Do the Department have adequate, up-to-date data? David touched on data. Are they doing it now? When are you expecting it? How regular should it be? I would have thought that the data would be available for every financial year.
Siobhan Casey
Yes, you would have thought so. From my conversations with them, I understand that they are bringing it up to date and that they are trying to do the data sharing a bit better. It is about linking it to poverty statistics and all of that—the cross-mapping. There needs to be more of a think-tank approach in terms of innovation. But I would say that this targeted campaign is really good.
Kevin Higgins
You make a fair point, and I think if the Department were here, they would say you make a fair point as well—2019-20 is far too dated. I will give them a bye-ball to an extent, because we all embarked on covid in 2020, and everybody had their focus elsewhere for two or maybe three years, but now these statistics need to be annualised because they are so important. We cannot have older people existing on income that is less than the law says they need to live on. You make an astute point. Although they may be about to release some more statistics, what year will those statistics relate to? If they relate to 2023-24, we will soon be in 2027, so you could argue that they will become dated very quickly as well. We need to try to get to a position where we are reporting now—we are coming up to Christmas—on 2025-26. There will always be a bit of a lag, but to my mind, having a lag of two or three years is excessive.
Chair
I am acutely aware that we are talking about something that is devolved. As a Welsh MP, it is really important to me that we get the picture in devolved countries. For me, it is important that this data is available in Wales and, for my Scottish colleagues, in Scotland. Is that then a UK Government responsibility? It has also been asked, “Why is Northern Ireland different? Why are we looking at this?” Evidence shows that it could be, and that is why we are having this session today. Should it then be a UK Government responsibility, an NIO responsibility or a DWP responsibility to look at that data and see what the picture is across the UK?
Siobhan Casey
I think it should be all those things. It should be a co-ordinated responsibility in terms of how people interact—they will have to share the data anyway. What gets measured gets done, which is why it is important that the data is there and is shared between the nations. Who co-ordinates it? It will have to come from local sources anyway, in terms of benefit applications. Whatever way it happens, it needs to happen.
Kevin Higgins
As we know, social security is devolved in Northern Ireland and, to a large extent, in Scotland. It becomes an issue of co-ordinating the essential, high-level data that needs to be harvested so that we get a consistent approach across the UK. You could legislate for that, or you could place a responsibility on the Minister for the statistics to be available. If there were that responsibility, I am sure they would become available. I would have thought that it is a matter of co-ordination, given that social security is devolved in those particular regions.
Chair
Should those figures be available annually?
Kevin Higgins
Available annually, and then you would want to refer to the year. It could be annually but with data that is two or three years old, so you wouldn’t want that. You would be stipulating that you want it annually based on the previous financial year. You would have to give some time for it to be analysed and so on, so there will always be a lag, but annually for the last financial year would mean that they could publish it around Christmas. Now, for instance, it would be for 2025-26 and published during Christmas.
Chair
So five years of data need to be published, by year?
Kevin Higgins
Yes.
Chair
Siobhan, in your response to the Executive’s anti-poverty strategy, you highlighted the importance of not treating older people as a single, uniform group. How should that be reflected in how the Executive and Government encourage uptake of pension credit?
Siobhan Casey
We are pushing this not just in pension credit but right across the piece. The data on older people is basically 65-plus. Take crime, for example. You cannot break down what type of crime, where and what age groups. It is really important that it is in blocks of maybe five years. In the poverty stats I was looking at earlier, it says that it is 16% at 65 and over, but when it came to 75 it was 17%, and at 80 it was 18%. Older people are not a homogeneous group, and you need to be able to break it down into age groups. You can be looking at data from 65 to 95 or 105—that is 40 years.
Chair
Do you think it would be important to look at it by sex?
Siobhan Casey
Absolutely. We know from the poverty statistics around older women that there are people on low incomes who maybe had caring responsibilities and did not have the opportunity to build a private pension over the years. Even though our poverty statistics are slightly lower in Northern Ireland than in the rest of the UK, we can go in and discern that women in their 80s are disproportionately disadvantaged. It is really important for crime. Really, it is important across the piece: health, housing, crime or whatever. We are looking at older renters as well. Data needs to be disaggregated in blocks of five years.
Chair
I think you have answered this question, but I will ask it again: which groups of older people in Northern Ireland are most at risk of poverty or of missing out on pension credit?
Siobhan Casey
Obviously, people on low incomes and in areas with health inequalities. It is people on low incomes and people living with long-term conditions and disabilities.
Chair
You brought up rural areas as well.
Siobhan Casey
I think that was Simon. It is not something I am conscious of, although Mike mentioned the target in Fermanagh and Tyrone. Age NI would have discerned that there were not very many calls coming from there, so they are trying to build it. I think it would be rural areas, health conditions and low incomes.
Chair
Do you have anything to add, Kevin?
Kevin Higgins
One group I will add is people who were self-employed during their working life. They get to the point where they are no longer able to work—they are mechanics or farmers, or whatever it is—but their contribution record may not be complete. They may therefore not have a retirement package that is equivalent to their peers’. I think the self-employed could be a particular area as well.
Chris Bloore
Thank you for your answers so far, Siobhan and Kevin. We may hear more later today about the tax liability of pensioners. My question is about what the Government should do to support pensioners in Northern Ireland who go over the tax-free allowance. I suspect we might hear in an hour or two about what will happen, but what is your opinion on how we support and protect those pensioners?
Siobhan Casey
I am hearing that everywhere I go, from every pensioner group I talk to, and this is deeply concerning. If there is a suspicion that there might be a shield, I think that would be—
Chris Bloore
It would be welcomed.
Siobhan Casey
Welcomed, yes.
Kevin Higgins
To me, the simple answer would be to raise the personal allowance, although there does not seem to be a flag flying about that. Failing that, Siobhan says there is talk about a shield, but I am not convinced about it. The devil will be in the small print of this so-called shield. They are saying it is if you are on the state pension only. What if you have the same amount of money and you are on a reduced state pension with a small private pension? Those two people are on the same amount of money, yet one is not having to pay tax and one is. I think the devil will be in the detail of the shield. My view would be to raise the standard-rate personal allowance.
Chris Bloore
Kevin, you may have stolen some of the questions I might have in the debate following the Budget announcement. I look forward to that detail as well. A conversation on linking the personal allowance to inflation, as they do in Canada and other countries, might be worth consideration. Moving on to another announcement on which we do not have a huge amount of detail: the proposed changes to the triple lock that were floated in the Prime Minister’s address to the Labour party conference in September. How do you think that suggested policy shift will impact pensioners in Northern Ireland?
Kevin Higgins
It is unconfirmed, you are right, and we will be listening very closely to the official position when it is announced, likely today. A lot of the time it is about tailoring your message to the audience out there. This will be for older people, so it is about being clear on what is and what is not being said. It is not as if the state pension is going to be frozen; it will simply remove the link to earnings. There will still be a link to inflation or 2.5%, as I understand it. Those are simple things, but it is about getting the simple things right in the messaging to the people who are listening. I speak to a lot of older people about work and so on. They are interested and very worried about money, as well as about health, care and being able to stay in their home. I am open to a discussion about any money generated there being used to help people to stay in their home and have adequate care. Part of that is community carers being paid a real living wage. There are places where the money could go. My concern is whether it will happen. That would be my big question. I am open to the debate, but that would be my response.
Chris Bloore
That is a very fair question.
Siobhan Casey
My question to you, then, would be on social care, because we are different in Northern Ireland in how we handle it. The devil is in the detail of how it will impact over there.
Chris Bloore
Maybe we shall hear more today, but thank you for your answers.
Chair
Thank you very much for your time today. I call the session to a close.