Income support and part-time training courses

Abstract

A case that came before me on appeal recently in a Social Security Appeal Tribunal raises a difficult problem in relation to the entitlement to income support of a person trying to obtain a training qualification by part-time study. The purpose of this note is to demonstrate the problem and to suggest an answer through a possible stretch of one of the regulations; the tribunal indulged in this particular stretching exercise, largely because we thought unanimously that the result otherwise was totally unacceptable. Whether our decision was legally sustainable is another matter.