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<p>The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has a duty to protect public funds and
an obligation to ensure that, in accordance with social security legislation, any
overpayment of benefit resulting from claimant error or fraud is recovered.</p><p>
</p><p>I can confirm that there were 92,760 Universal Credit claimants who had a deduction
from their Universal Credit as a recovery against a benefit overpayment within October
2018.</p><p> </p><p>Housing costs are defined in two ways:</p><ol><li>Owner-occupier
service charges and</li><li>Rent, including service charges</li></ol><p> </p><p>The
information on (a) is not readily available and could only be provided at disproportionate
cost.</p><p> </p><p>The latest available data is for eligible claims to UC Full Service
that are due a payment in September 2018. Of these claims, 5% have a deduction from
their standard allowance to repay rent arrears. This equates to 45,000 claims (rounded
to the nearest 1,000).</p>
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