Families in the Cowdenbeath area will be helped with the cost of school uniforms, following a decision at Fife Council’s Cabinet Committee recently.

The change will protect those families who are being moved from Tax Credits to Universal Credit. Where they would previously have qualified for School Clothing Grant, a move to Universal Credit means that around 300 children are likely to now be disqualified from receiving the grant.

Council Leader, Cllr David Ross, said: “We don’t think that some of our most vulnerable families should be disadvantaged because of an administrative change in the benefits system. Now that this issue has been identified, I’m pleased that this is an anomaly the Council can do something about.”

The current School Clothing Grant is awarded to those on the following benefits:

• Income Support
• Job Seeker’s Allowance (Income Based)
• Child Tax Credit (only with annual income below £19,995)
• Universal Credit (monthly earned income of no more than £796)
• Support under Part VI of the Immigration & Asylum Act 1999
• Long Term Incapacity Benefit (clothing grant only)
• Widows Allowance (if not in FT employment) (clothing grant only)
• Child and Working Tax Credit (with annual income below £19.995)

To rebalance the inequality between the Tax Credit system and Universal Credit, councillors agreed to fund a raise in the qualifying threshold, to a monthly income of less than £1,666 for those on Universal Credit. This will protect those customers who are being migrated from Tax Credits to UC.

The change won’t just benefit families who are about to make the move though, those who have moved onto UC since 2017 may qualify again for the clothing grant. This will reverse the reductions seen in the amount of clothing grant awards, which have reduced between 2021 and 2024 by around 1,200.

Councillor Ross continued: “We have been working really hard to protect Fifers from the worst effects of the cost of living crisis for the last three years. We don’t believe that anyone should be worse off when moving from one benefit to another and this is just one way we are helping.”

“I’d urge anyone who has been affected by this change to use our Fife Benefit Calculator to see if you are missing out on any other benefits. We want to make sure that everyone is getting what they are entitled to and a quick benefit check will do this. You can check online or call the Community Support Line where one of our trained stagg can help you through the process.”

For more information and support with the cost of living or to do your own online benefit check visit https://our.fife.scot/gethelp or call 0800 952 0330.