Part of 2. Questions to the Minister for Housing and Local Government – in the Senedd at 2:31 pm on 13 November 2019.
Okay. Well, Community Housing Cymru have suggested using discretionary housing payments to help those people affected. Now, my preferred option is for Wales to have administrative control over social security so we could solve this problem overnight, and it wouldn't cost us any money either. There's no point in asking you if you agree with that, Minister—we've been round the houses on this many, many times.
So, I want to broaden the subject. You'll be aware of the lengthy list of reductions to social security payments over the last decade, and how each one of those has not only made poverty worse, but has also hindered the ability of our housing associations to support people. The Wales Audit Office a few years ago noted most of the alleged savings from benefit cuts have been swallowed up by housing associations having to focus resources on administrative tasks that have been caused by many of these cuts, in addition to the wider costs public services have had to bear from homelessness, arrears, stress, and so on. Has the Government conducted an up-to-date assessment as to how much Westminster's social security cuts have cost Welsh public services?