Pay the legacy carer premium per qualifying claimant or partner; IS carer route through them only

[MaxGhenis]

#1896, which adds is_claimant_or_partner, merged on 2 October (3525263). This PR targets main, and main has been merged in five times. Three merges were clean: 3c48247 at 33339ab, 6fa14dc at 3f6c166 and 2cbf20c at 0cc1d94. Two had conflicts:

• fcc257c at 3f0a5a5, with Reduce Carer's Allowance and Carer Support Payment by overlapping benefits #1994, in carer_premium.py and care.yaml. Reduce Carer's Allowance and Carer Support Payment by overlapping benefits #1994 had already restricted the premium to claimants and partners entitled to Carer's Allowance or Carer Support Payment, but it kept the couple/single select.
• b1dd418 at 2e9b26b, with Use the State Pension Credit qualifying age, and start-of-year status for Class 4 NI #1907, in income_support_eligible.py. Use the State Pension Credit qualifying age, and start-of-year status for Class 4 NI #1907 rewrote the Income Support conditions, and its carer limb already needs a claimant or partner carer.

Both resolutions keep main's rule and this PR's rule (details below).

Summary

Two caring partners got one legacy carer premium, because gov.dwp.carer_premium.couple has always held the single rate. The law pays the premium once for each qualifying claimant or partner. This PR pays it per person and deletes couple. Since in law two people caring for the same severely disabled person cannot both be entitled, it also caps the premium at one in that case. It corrects the 2025-26 rate to £46.40.

Main has since taken in two parts of this PR's original change:

• the claimant-or-partner restriction on the premium (Reduce Carer's Allowance and Carer Support Payment by overlapping benefits #1994);
• the claimant-or-partner restriction on the Income Support carer route (Use the State Pension Credit qualifying age, and start-of-year status for Class 4 NI #1907).

This PR keeps its tests for both.

Carer premium. IS Regs 1987 Sch 2 para 14ZA(1):

the condition is that the claimant or his partner is, or both of them are, entitled to a carer's allowance under section 70 of the Contributions and Benefits Act or carer support payment.

Para 15(7):

Carer Premium. £48.15 in respect of each person who satisfied the condition specified in paragraph 14ZA.

The same condition and the same "in respect of each person" amount appear in:

• JSA Regs 1996 Sch 1 para 17 and Part IV (8);
• ESA Regs 2008 Sch 4 paras 8 and 11(3);
• HB Regs 2006 Sch 3 para 17 and Part 4 (8);
• HB (SPC) Regs 2006 Sch 3 paras 9 and 12(4);
• CTR England (SI 2012/2885) Sch 2 para 9 and Part 4 (4);
• CTR Wales (WSI 2013/3029) Sch 2 para 9 and Sch 7 para 14;
• CTR Scotland: SSI 2012/319 Sch 1 para 10. SSI 2021/249 Sch 1 para 5(3) pays "in respect of each partner if they both qualify for it, but only if they are not caring for the same severely disabled person".

One entitlement per cared-for person. SSCBA s.70(7ZA): where two people "would have a relevant entitlement for the same day in respect of the same severely disabled person, one of them only shall have that entitlement". SSI 2023/302 reg 5(3) does the same for Carer Support Payment.

All law text was fetched from legislation.gov.uk data.xml: current revised versions plus point-in-time copies of IS Sch 2 for 2015-2026 on 2026-10-01, and SSI 2021/249 Sch 1 para 5 as at 1 April 2025 on 2026-10-04.

Changes

• carer_premium: the number of members who are both is_claimant_or_partner and is_entitled_to_carer_benefit, times gov.dwp.carer_premium.single, times 52.
  • That gives 0, one amount or two. It is capped at one amount when partners_care_for_same_severely_disabled_person is true.
  • The entitlement test is main's (Reduce Carer's Allowance and Carer Support Payment by overlapping benefits #1994). It keeps an allowance that an overlapping benefit reduces to nil, and it excludes caring hours without a claim.
  • On main, the premium was couple, which held the single rate, for two or more such members, and single for one.
• gov.dwp.carer_premium.couple is removed.
  • It has never been twice the single rate. Both files were created in 2021 at £37.50, and from 2023 each uprating copied the single value into couple. Two qualifying partners therefore got £48.15 a week instead of £96.30.
  • single is relabelled as the per-person amount.
  • Reforms should change single. A reform that sets couple now fails with "Could not find the parameter" instead of silently doing nothing.
• gov.dwp.carer_premium.single, 2025-26: £46.38 → £46.40. That is IS Sch 2 para 15(7) as in force from 7 April 2025, and SSI 2021/249 Sch 1 para 5(1) as in force from 1 April 2025. Every other year from 2015 to 2026 matches the point-in-time legislation.
  • This fixes the carer-premium half of 2025-26 legacy carer premium and HB personal allowance are extrapolated, not statutory #2110. The HB personal allowance half (£92.04 against the statutory £92.05) stays open there.
  • Main's Count Carer Support Payment as Council Tax Reduction income #1992 test "Carer Support Payment counts in 2025, before the Scottish Carer Supplement" hard-coded £46.38. Its expectations are re-derived by hand:
    • applicable amount (92.04 + 46.40) × 52 = £7,198.88;
    • reduction 2,000 − 0.2 × (11,331.60 − 7,198.88) = £1,173.46.
• New benefit-unit variable partners_care_for_same_severely_disabled_person. When it is true, the premium is capped at one amount for the benefit unit. It can be supplied.
  • Default: true, unless at least two claimants or partners are entitled and have an award. An award is either:
    • a reported Carer's Allowance or Carer Support Payment award (carers_allowance_reported); or
    • an entitlement that caring hours do not explain, which must have been supplied directly: an amount in payment, a pre-overlap amount or the entitlement itself. "Not explained" means fewer than the qualifying hours, or no claim.
  • Qualifying hours: Carer Support Payment's in Scotland from 2025, and Carer's Allowance's otherwise, as in carers_allowance_pre_overlap.
  • Why: in law, two entitlements mean two different people cared for. In the model, though, Carer's Allowance and Carer Support Payment also follow caring hours, and hours cannot show who is cared for. So a couple who both qualify on hours alone get one premium unless the variable is set to false.
  • The two allowances themselves still pay both partners (Carer's Allowance and Carer Support Payment pay two people caring for the same person (SSCBA s.70(7ZA), SSI 2023/302 reg 5(3)) #2028).
  • Scottish working-age CTR also counts a Universal Credit award with the carer element (SSI 2021/249 Sch 1 para 6(1)(c)). The model does not apply that limb (Scottish working-age CTR carer premium ignores the UC carer element limb (SSI 2021/249 Sch 1 para 6(1)(c)) #2124).
• income_support_eligible: the formula is main's (Use the State Pension Credit qualifying age, and start-of-year status for Class 4 NI #1907). Its carer limb needs a claimant or partner who is a carer and under the qualifying age for State Pension Credit, so a dependant's caring never opens it. This PR adds only two references, IS Regs reg 4ZA and Claims and Payments Regs 1987 reg 4, and keeps its route tests.
• Where the premium reaches benefits: in this model, the Income Support, Housing Benefit and council tax reduction applicable amounts, through main's working-age and pension-age premium schedules. Income-based JSA and income-related ESA come from reported awards.

Impact (Enhanced FRS 2024-25, real microsimulation runs)

Both runs use a private copy of the Enhanced FRS 2024-25 file (sha256 e433e532…):

• Base: main at b1dd418.
• Branch: this head, f201e7a.

Main now contains steps 1 and 3 of the earlier tables (#1994 and #1907), so the whole change is the old step 2: one amount per qualifying person, £46.40 in 2025-26, and the same-person cap. There are no step rows.

£m	2025	2026	2027	2028	2029	2030
Carer premium as computed for every benefit unit	+23.06	+22.73	+23.34	+23.90	+24.49	+25.09
Income Support	+0.09	+0.00	+0.00	+0.00	+0.00	+0.00
Housing Benefit	+0.00	+0.00	+0.00	+0.00	+0.00	+0.00
Council tax reduction	+0.05	+0.05	+0.06	+0.06	+0.07	+0.07
Household net income	+0.15	+0.05	+0.06	+0.06	+0.07	+0.07

	2025	2026	2027	2028	2029	2030
Benefit units with two caring partners (k)	9.0	9.1	9.1	9.1	9.2	9.2
of which on IS, HB or CTR (k)	0.12	0.12	0.12	0.12	0.12	0.12
Carers who are not the claimant or partner (k)	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
IS eligibility changes (k)	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Households better off (k)	91.7	0.1	0.1	0.1	0.1	0.1
Households worse off (k)	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Base Income Support (£bn)	0.514	0.000	0.000	0.000	0.000	0.000
Base Housing Benefit (£bn)	13.13	13.87	14.24	14.29	14.65	15.03
Base council tax reduction (£bn)	2.26	2.32	2.39	2.46	2.53	2.61

• The premium: it rises by £22.7m to £25.1m a year.

  • Almost all of that is in the 9.1k benefit units (6 survey records) where both partners report Carer's Allowance. Only 0.12k of them receive IS, HB or CTR.
  • In 2025 the 2p a week rate correction adds £1.2m across 1.18m benefit units.

• 2025 rate correction: 91.7k households are better off in 2025, mostly through Income Support (+£0.09m; 89.7k benefit units gain).

• No Housing Benefit change: both benefit units on Housing Benefit with two entitled carers (0.12k units, 2 survey records) are passported on main, which took in Disregard the whole income and capital of Housing Benefit claimants on IS, income-based JSA or income-related ESA #2000 after the earlier tables were run. in_receipt_of_income_support_jsa_ib_or_esa_ir holds for both, so housing_benefit_applicable_income is 0, at or below the applicable amount. Their HB applicable amount rises by about £0.3m a year (2025 and 2026), but their Housing Benefit does not change. In the earlier tables the same units gained about £0.2m a year of Housing Benefit. (An aggregate-only diagnostic on main at b1dd418 checked both records.)

• Council tax reduction: CTR rises by £0.05m to £0.07m a year, almost all of it in the two-carer units (£0.052m of £0.053m in 2025, and all of it from 2026). CTR showed no change in the earlier tables.

• Earlier runs: before main took in Reduce Carer's Allowance and Carer Support Payment by overlapping benefits #1994, Use the State Pension Credit qualifying age, and start-of-year status for Class 4 NI #1907, Disregard the whole income and capital of Housing Benefit claimants on IS, income-based JSA or income-related ESA #2000 and its other HB and CTR changes, the household net income change was:

  • +£0.28m in 2025: £0.19m Housing Benefit and £0.09m Income Support;
  • +£0.20m to +£0.21m a year in 2026-30, all of it Housing Benefit.

  The old table is kept locally as tables_before_merge4.md.

• Unchanged facts:

  • No household is worse off in any year.
  • Income Support eligibility changes for nobody.
  • The model pays no Income Support from 2026.

• Same numbers at earlier heads: runs at 86acb01 and 8c12d27 give the same numbers as this head in every year. The review fixes only change results for supplied entitlements or for reforms to the minimum hours, and the Enhanced FRS supplies only reported awards and no caring hours.

Scripts and full comparisons are kept locally: dataset_impact.py, compare_impact.py, make_tables.py, and the run JSONs. They hold aggregates only, with no record-level values.

Tests

• tests/policy/baseline/finance/benefit/carer_premium.yaml (27 cases, hand-computed from the law). PE-UK reads gov parameters at 30 April of the simulation year, so 2025 uses the April 2025 rate. The cases:

  • Single and couple amounts:
    • a single carer; the partner only;
    • both partners with awards, at the 2026 rate (2 × £48.15 × 52) and the 2025 rate (2 × £46.40 × 52).
  • Dependants:
    • a caring QYP or child under 16 gives nothing;
    • a lone-parent carer with a caring QYP gets one premium;
    • two caring partners plus a caring QYP get two. This replaces the Specify carer_premium logic for >2 carers #420 regression test.
  • Applicable amounts:
    • a working-age couple who both care: benefits_premiums and the CTR applicable amount, (HB Sch 3 para 1(3)(b) £150.15 + 2 × £48.15) × 52;
    • a pension-age couple who both receive CA: the HB applicable amount, (HB (SPC) Sch 3 para 1(2)(b) £383.35 + 2 × £48.15) × 52.
  • The same-person rule, supplied:
    • partners supplied as caring for the same person get one premium;
    • partners supplied as caring for different people get two;
    • three members supplied as claimant or partner (a polygamous marriage) get three premiums, or one if they care for the same person.
  • The default:
    • both partners caring by hours alone get one premium;
    • caring hours without a claim, a reported award its holder would not claim, and an allowance an overlapping benefit reduces to nil (still two);
    • supplied entitlement next to an entitled adult who is not a partner;
    • supplied Carer's Allowance (England) and Carer Support Payment (Scotland) for both partners: two;
    • supplied amounts with 35 hours and no claim: two;
    • supplied pre-overlap Carer's Allowance for a pension-age couple whose State Pension overlaps it to nil: two, with HB applicable amount (383.35 + 2 × 48.15) × 52;
    • supplied entitlement without hours or payment: two;
    • a supplied allowance next to 35 hours: not an award.
  • Roles:
    • an 18-year-old 15 years younger than the other adult is a partner, and 16 years younger is presumed a child (the property generator's boundary);
    • a 17-year-old partner supplied through is_claimant_or_partner counts.

• tests/policy/baseline/finance/benefit/family/income_support/income_support_carer_route.yaml (5 cases):

  • eligible: a single carer; a carer who does not claim Carer's Allowance (Sch 1B para 4(a)); a partner carer;
  • not eligible: a lone parent whose only carer is a QYP; a couple whose only carer is a 12-year-old.

• care.yaml: three of main's cases are removed:

  • two partners supplied as entitled, at the couple rate;
  • the Specify carer_premium logic for >2 carers #420 three-carer case;
  • a no-carer case that fed num_carers. carer_premium no longer reads num_carers, so this case tested nothing.

  The first two are now in carer_premium.yaml, built per person.

• council_tax_reduction_carer_support_payment.yaml (main's Count Carer Support Payment as Council Tax Reduction income #1992): the 2025 case is re-derived at £46.40, as above.

Invariants (tests/test_legacy_carer_premium_properties.py)

The generator. The properties are drawn over families of a claimant aged 18-85, an optional partner, and up to three children or QYPs. Each family has:

• a random reported Carer's Allowance award;
• random caring hours;
• a random would-claim flag;
• for adults, an optional overlapping incapacity benefit.

The generator never draws an adult under 20 who is 16 or more years younger than the other adult, because the model would presume them to be the other's child. That boundary (18 with 33) is pinned with @example.

The properties (Hypothesis).

1. A dependant's caring never changes carer_premium or income_support_eligible.
2. carer_premium = (claimants and partners entitled to a carer benefit, capped at one when treated as caring for the same person) × the per-person amount × 52.
   • So it is bounded by 0 and twice the amount.
   • The reference derives entitlement and awards from the inputs, and checks the model's is_entitled_to_carer_benefit against them.
   • The same test checks the default same-person rule.
3. Caring by the claimant or partner never removes Income Support eligibility and never lowers the premium. Below pension age it always opens the IS route.
4. Supplying "same person" never raises the premium, and caps it at one amount.

A plain test pins the Scottish hours rule. With the Carer's Allowance minimum raised to 40, a Scottish couple in 2026 who each care 36 hours get one premium. In England, and in Scotland in 2024, the same couple gets none.

Test runs

Local runs at this head's code (8c12d27 for the full suites; f201e7a changes only tests, comments and one documentation string):

• the benefit and gov YAML suites: 2,072 passed at 8c12d27; at f201e7a, carer_premium.yaml and the CTR Carer Support Payment file pass (39);
• the property tests: 3 passed at 8c12d27; at f201e7a the new Scottish hours test passes, and it fails under the previous formula;
• ruff format --check: clean.

CI on f201e7a: run 37218386187 passed: Lint, the four smoke imports (Python 3.11-3.14) and Test (the YAML suite, then pytest including the property tests). CI on 8c12d27 (run 37214155858) also passed.

Earlier records:

• at 33339ab: benefit and gov YAML, 1,410 passed;
• at 3f6c166: 1,485 passed;
• at 0cc1d94: 1,784 passed.

Review

Every round ran on a Subfleet lane unless noted. The records are kept locally.

1. Round 1 (REQUEST CHANGES): the Scottish same-person overpayment, other IS gates, boundary cases and wording. All were fixed. The other IS gates are in Apply the Income Support conditions to the claimant and partner only #2013, which is stacked on this PR.
2. Round 2 (REQUEST CHANGES): the generator age bound, and the default's stated reason. Both were fixed in 9c7cde8.
3. Round 3 (APPROVE WITH NITS): its nits were fixed in aa360aa.
4. After the Reduce Carer's Allowance and Carer Support Payment by overlapping benefits #1994 merge (APPROVE WITH NITS, at fa9a8b6):
   • It confirmed the composition: the premium counts Reduce Carer's Allowance and Carer Support Payment by overlapping benefits #1994's entitled claimants and partners, per person and capped, and nothing from Reduce Carer's Allowance and Carer Support Payment by overlapping benefits #1994 is lost.
   • Its findings were fixed in 3179fd3:
     • a directly supplied allowance now counts as an award;
     • the CTR comment names para 6(1)(c), and Scottish working-age CTR carer premium ignores the UC carer element limb (SSI 2021/249 Sch 1 para 6(1)(c)) #2124 was filed;
     • the IS route tests cover para 4(a) and quote para 4(b).
   • An in-session Opus check of 3179fd3 then returned APPROVE WITH NITS. Its nits were fixed in da1cb37: a supplied allowance paid to someone who would not claim is an award.
5. After the Use the State Pension Credit qualifying age, and start-of-year status for Class 4 NI #1907 merge (REQUEST CHANGES, at 86acb01):
   • It confirmed the IS conflict resolution and the composition with main's new premium schedules. It checked the hand-computed HB and CTR amounts and every new YAML case.
   • Fixed in 8c12d27:
     • main's Count Carer Support Payment as Council Tax Reduction income #1992 CTR test still expected £46.38;
     • a supplied entitlement without a payment was not read as an award;
     • the default used Carer's Allowance hours for Carer Support Payment, which only mattered under a reform.
   • Its other nits:
     • this description was stale; it is rewritten here;
     • the removed couple parameter gives a bare error rather than migration directions, which is left as a follow-up;
     • the property generator supplies no allowance amounts, so the YAML pins those cases.
6. Confirmation of 8c12d27 (APPROVE WITH NITS):
   • It checked 14,976 couples comparing the old and new default. The two give the same result whenever nothing is supplied and the two minimum-hours parameters are equal, and no input over-pays.
   • Its nits were fixed in f201e7a:
     • the Scottish CTR citation (SSI 2021/249 Sch 1 para 5(1));
     • a docstring note to supply an entitlement for every member;
     • the Scottish hours test;
     • the property-test docstring.

The model's 2026 IS personal allowances (£104.43 single 25+, £164.06 couple) differ from IS Sch 2 para 1 (£95.55, £150.15). That is why no case asserts the IS applicable amount. #1925 rewrites those parameters.

Downstream

• PolicyEngine/impact-iran-war-living-standards lists gov.dwp.carer_premium.couple in CPI_UPRATED_BENEFIT_PARAMETERS. It pins policyengine[uk]==5.3.0, so it is unaffected until its next bundle bump, which should drop that entry (its Assign ESA_income to a single person #66).
• Set DWP benefit rates to the announced amounts, not CPI projections #1925 (open) rewrites gov.dwp.carer_premium.couple to twice the single rate. Once this PR merges, that file should stay deleted there, because carer_premium now multiplies single by the number of qualifying claimants and partners. Both PRs set the 2025-26 single rate to £46.40.
• Means-test the Council Tax Reduction applicant and partner, not the benefit unit's claimant #2078 (open, stacked on Give Council Tax Reduction to the household head's family, not the oldest adult's #2009) adds a head-alone CTR path in council_tax_reduction_premiums. By its own composition note, whichever PR lands second carries this PR's per-person premium into that path.
• Apply the Income Support conditions to the claimant and partner only #2013 (Income Support conditions for the claimant and partner only) is stacked on this PR and will be retargeted to main when it merges.

axiom: TheAxiomFoundation/rulespec-uk#403 queued (no module encodes the carer premium condition or IS Sch 1B para 4; HB Sch 3, HB (SPC) Sch 3 and ESA Sch 4 are in the pinned corpus, IS Sch 2/1B and JSA Sch 1 need ingesting)

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

[MaxGhenis]

Composition note from #2078 (stacked on #2009), which makes the CTR means test assess the applicant and partner rather than the benefit unit's claimant and partner.

#2078 adds council_tax_reduction_premiums, which the CTR applicable amount now reads in place of benefits_premiums. For ordinary families it is benefits_premiums, so this PR's premium changes flow through unchanged. Where the household head applies alone (council_tax_reduction_head_applies_alone: the head is liable but is not the benefit unit's claimant or partner), it computes the head's own premiums at the single rates, mirroring the single-claimant rules on #2009's base.

A property test in #2078 (test_head_applying_alone_matches_her_own_benefit_unit) checks that a head who applies alone gets the same applicable amount as the same head entered as her own benefit unit. Whichever of the two PRs lands second should therefore carry this PR's rules into the head-alone path of council_tax_reduction_premiums. For example: pension-age schedules with no adult disability premium; severe disability premium conditions; the carer premium per qualifying claimant. That test fails until it does.