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Exclude joint occupiers and separately liable sharers from the severe disability premium's non-dependant test

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Assessment

Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Newbie friendliness
54/100
Issue type
Bug
Clarity
Mostly clear
Activity status
Active
Tech stack
python
Domain
backend

Research direction

Start by reading has_non_dependant_for_severe_disability_premium in the BenUnit model and the liable_for_share_of_household_rent variable added in #2006. Check the parallel regulation references listed in the issue, then review the relevant tests and #2015 property tests. Done when jointly or separately liable sharers are excluded as required and the regression tests cover the effect on the premium.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Description

What the model does

has_non_dependant_for_severe_disability_premium (BenUnit) bars the legacy severe disability premium where a non-dependant aged 18 or over lives in the household. It counts every household member at or over gov.dwp.disability_premia.severe_non_dependant_age who is neither blind nor receiving a qualifying benefit, less the claimant's own family (claimant, partner, and Child Benefit children and qualifying young persons). Its documentation says the model "cannot identify the other people the Regulations exclude from the definition (for example joint occupiers, commercial lodgers or landlords, and carers engaged by a charity)".

So an adult in a sharer family, who is jointly or separately liable for the rent, counts as the claimant's non-dependant.

The law

Housing Benefit Regulations 2006 (SI 2006/213) reg 3, read on legislation.gov.uk on 2026-10-07:

  • Reg 3(2)(d) takes out of "non-dependant" "a person who jointly occupies the claimant's dwelling and is either a co-owner of that dwelling with the claimant or his partner ... or is liable with the claimant or his partner to make payments in respect of his occupation of the dwelling" (subject to reg 3(3), which concerns people treated as not liable under reg 9(1)).
  • Reg 3(4) says a person resides with another "only if they share any accommodation except a bathroom, a lavatory or a communal area ... but not if each person is separately liable to make payments in respect of his occupation of the dwelling to the landlord".

The variable's reference list also cites the parallel definitions in SI 2006/214 reg 3 and SI 1987/1967 reg 3; check them when fixing this.

Why it can be fixed now

#2006 added liable_for_share_of_household_rent (BenUnit). It marks a family that shares liability for the household's rent with the head's family, either as a joint tenant or as a sharer with its own agreement for part of the same accommodation. Those are the people reg 3(2)(d) and 3(4) exclude.

Effect seen in tests

In #2015's property tests (CI on 2b5ffe38d, reproduced in that PR's after-merge review), a Welsh sharer's simulated Council Tax Reduction moved from £840.79 to £0 when another family's disability benefits changed. That family's swapped-in DLA care was below the qualifying rate, so has_non_dependant_for_severe_disability_premium flipped from false to true and changed the sharer's applicable amount. #2015's property 4 now holds the means test fixed so that its own claim (no other family's circumstances reach a family's scheme or exemption) is tested in isolation.

Related

  • #2074: the same exclusions for Pension Credit's severe disability addition (SPC Sch I para 2(5)-(7), para 3).
  • #2029: a non-dependant shared by joint tenants in each tenant's Housing Benefit size criteria.

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Dominant language
Python
Stars
50
Forks
34
Avg merge
2d 3h
Merged PRs (30d)
100

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  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

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