Most benefit claimants will have transferred onto the government's universal credit scheme by the end of 2018, Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith has predicted.
A Department for Work and Pensions report said there were "encouraging" early results from pilot projects. The credit, which merges six working-age benefits into a single payment, is being phased in across the UK. Labour said Mr Duncan Smith had "broken his promises" on delivering the scheme. Universal credit combines income-based jobseeker's allowance, income-related employment and support allowance, income support, child tax credit, working tax credit and housing benefit in an attempt to make welfare simpler, reduce fraud and get more people into work. It has initially been introduced in north-west England.
'Secure delivery'The DWP originally promised to have one million people on universal credit by April 2014, but the project has been delayed a number of times since its creation and MPs have criticised the way it has been managed......Read more here