Citation and commencement

1.  These Regulations may be cited as the Rate Relief (Qualifying Age) (Amendment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2007 and shall come into operation on 19th April 2007.

Modification of Part V and Schedule 4

2.  In regulation 17(2)(c) of the Rate Relief (Qualifying Age) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2007(3) (modification of Schedule 4 to Housing Benefit (Persons who have attained the qualifying age for state pension credit) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2006(4) (applicable amounts)) shall be amended as follows—

(a) for head (i) there shall be substituted—

“(i) for a person to whom sub-paragraph (1) applies, by 15%;”;

(b) for head (ii) there shall be substituted—

“(ii) for a person to whom sub-paragraph (2), (3) or (4) applies, by 10%,”.

EXPLANATORY NOTE

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

These Regulations amend the Rate Relief (Qualifying Age) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2007 (“the principal Regulations”) which applies the Housing Benefit (Persons who have attained the qualifying age for state pension credit) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2006 (S.R. 2006 No. 405) (“the Housing Benefit (State Pension Credit) Regulations”) for the purposes of the principal Regulations as they apply for the purposes of the Housing Benefit (State Pension Credit) Regulations with modifications. They are made in consequence of a defect in the principal Regulations and will be issued free of charge to all known recipients of those Regulations.

Regulation 2 amends regulation 17(2)(c) of the principal Regulations which modifies Schedule 4 to the Housing Benefit (State Pension Credit) Regulations (applicable amounts) to correct an error in relation to the calculation of the personal allowance in respect of a person’s entitlement to rate relief so that an enhancement of 15% applies for a single person and an enhancement of 10% applies for a couple.