Government to tighten housing benefit rules for new migrants

The prime minister made the pledge as part of a series measures to crackdown on ‘benefit tourism’. Transitional controls limiting Bulgarian and Romanian workers accessing the UK’s labour market expire at the end of the year.

Mr Cameron, in an article in the Financial Times, said: ‘We are changing the rules so that no one can come to this country and expect to get out-of-work benefits immediately.’ He said that the previous Labour government’s decision not to delay the dropping of restrictions from nine new EU member states in 2004 was a ‘monumental mistake’.

In addition to the curbing of housing benefit for new migrants, Mr Cameron announced:

- New migrants will be eligible for out-of-work benefits until after three months residence

- Payments will be stopped after six months unless the claimant has a ‘genuine’ chance of a job

- An earnings threshold will be introduced

- A tightening of the ‘habitual residency test’ used to determine eligibility

- Those not seeking work will be removed and will not able to return for 12 months

- Fines for employers not paying the minimum wage will be quadrupled to £20,000

Migrants wanting to claim benefits have to take an ‘habitual residency test’, which requires them to prove a legal right to reside in the UK and that they intend to settle in the country. Some EU citizens currently do not have to take the test.