1. Analysis
of Housing & Council Tax Benefit
Recipients in the UK
Mihadh Kalubowila
CL 11 0014

2. There are three main parts to this project –
•Analysis of Housing and Council Tax Benefit recipients and forecasting
the number of recipients for the remaining months of 2011.
•Forecasting the working age claimants for 2011 and comparing with
the early estimates.
•Forecasting the lone parents claiming Income support for 2011 and
comparing with the estimated figures.

3. Social benefit recipients evolution and predictions.
Housing benefits consists of two major sectors.
• Private rented
• Social rented

4. Interpretations of housing benefits
The distribution of social rented and private rented over the past years
4,000.00
3,500.00
3,000.00
2,500.00
2,000.00
Social Rented Sector
1,500.00
Private Rented Sector
1,000.00
500.00
0.00
Nov-08
Nov-09
Nov-10
Mar-11
Jan-09
Mar-09
Sep-09
Jan-10
Mar-10
May-10
Sep-10
Jan-11
May-09
May-11
Jul-09
Jul-10
We can see that both social rented and private rented have a increasing trend
over the years.

5. Now to take a summary of the total Housing Benefits we could get some overview about
the HB sector.

6. to interpret the growth of the housing benefits, the means of each year have been
taken in to consideration separately.
Mean of HB
4900
4800
4700
4600
4500 Mean
4400
4300
4200
2009 2010 2011
Mean 4451.0375 4757.525 4867.438333
Now considering the above information we can come to a decision that each year total
housing benefit recipients show an increase.

7. And looking at this increasing pattern of the these benefits we could attempt to
predict the values for the latter part of year 2011.
Forecasted values for the last 6 months of 2011
Time Total (HB) Social Private
Rented Rented
Sector Sector
2011 Jul 5000.34 3364.45 1634.25
2011 Aug 5022.94 3371.42 1650.24
2011 Sep 5045.53 3378.39 1666.22
2011 Oct 5068.13 3385.37 1682.21
2011 Nov 5090.73 3392.34 1698.2
2011 Dec 5113.33 3399.31 1714.19
Now we can see that the number of Housing Benefits will further be increasing
for the next six months.

8. Interpretations for Council Tax Benefits
Council Tax Benefits consist of two major sectors
• Aged under 65
•Aged 65 and above

9. The distribution of claimants aged under 65 and 65 and above.
4,000.00
3,500.00
3,000.00
2,500.00
2,000.00
1,500.00 Aged under 65
1,000.00 Aged 65 or over
500.00
0.00
Feb-09
Aug-09
Feb-10
Aug-10
Feb-11
Nov-08
May-09
Nov-09
May-10
Nov-10
May-11
As we can see both the under 65 and above 65 claimants have an increasing
trend

10. Now to take a summary of the total Council Tax Benefits we could get some overview
about the CTB sector.

11. to interpret the growth of the council tax benefits, the means of each year have
been taken in to consideration separately.
Mean of CTB
5900
5800
5700
5600
5500 Mean
5400
5300
5200
2009 2010 2011
Mean 5470.4 5775.046667 5846.815
Now considering the above information we can come to a decision that each year
total council tax benefit recipients show an increase.

12. And looking at this increasing pattern of the these benefits we could attempt to predict
the values for the latter part of year 2011.
Forecasted values for the last 6 months of 2011
Time Total (CTB) Under 65 Over 65
2011 Jul 5994.84 3770.91 2223.82
2011 Aug 6016.56 3792.28 2224.18
2011 Sep 6038.29 3813.65 2224.55
2011 Oct 6060.01 3835.03 2224.91
2011 Nov 6081.74 3856.4 2225.28
2011 Dec 6103.46 3877.77 2225.64
Now we can see that the number of Council Tax Benefits will further be increasing
for the next six months.

13. Forecast for the working age claimants and compared with
the estimates of DWP
In this section number of working age claimants recorded on a three month basis is
interpreted and the estimates done by the Department of Work and Pensions is
assessed and compared with the forecast done by myself.
In the following table we can see the values given by the DWP and the forecasts
for the next five months.

14. Working-age ESA/IB client group August 2009 to May 2011
(thousands)
National Statistic Early Estimate
Number of Claimants Number of Claimants
Aug-09 2,632.74
Nov-09 2,618.38
Feb-10 2,614.76
May-10 2,613.10
Aug-10 2,606.61
Nov-10 2,586.42
Feb-11 2,578.66
Mar-11 2,565
Apr-11 2,565
May-11 2,565
Jun-11 2,565
Jul-11 2,555
According to these given values there is a decrease in the working age claimants. In
order to get gist of the data we could to construct a graph showing the fluctuations
of the numbers.

15. As we can see there is decrease in the values which means the number of claimants
made by working age people have been reduced.

16. Given the trend we can forecast the future values for the next five months the
forecasted trend analysis is given below.

17. Now we can see the number of claimants will further be reduced by the next few months.
And the forecasted values and the difference between the estimates that DWP published
can be compared through a simple bar chart and a table.
Forecasted figures for the working age claimants for 2011
Period Forecasted Early estimates Difference
Mar-2011 2573.77 2565 8.77
Apr-2011 2565.40 2565 0.40
May-2011 2557.03 2565 -7.97
June-2011 2548.66 2565 -16.34
July-2011 2540.29 2555 -14.71
Defferences between forecasted values and estimated values by DWP
15
10
5
0
1 2 3 4 5 difference
-5
-10
-15
-20

18. Forecast for the lone parent claimants and compared with the
estimates of DWP
In this section number of lone parents claimants recorded on a three months basis is
interpreted and the estimates done for the next five months will be compared to the
forecasts done by myself.
The Department for Work and Pensions have published the following records
and have estimated the values for the next five months.

19. Lone parent client group August 2009 to May 2011
(thousands)
National Statistic Early Estimate
Number of Claimants Number of Claimants
Aug-09 715.73
Nov-09 695.72
Feb-10 692.02
May-10 679.15
Aug-10 672.35
Nov-10 648.30
Feb-11 613.78
Mar-11 600
Apr-11 600
May-11 595
Jun-11 595
Jul-11 595
As we can see there is a decline in the lone parent claimants as well. We can
clearly notice this decline by generating a simple plot graph

20. As we can now clearly see that there is a decline in the lone parent claimants we
can now forecast the future values for the next five months given the trend.

22. According to the forecast we can see that the number of claimants will further reduce in
the future. Now we can compare the forecasted values with the estimates done by the
DWP.
Forecasted figures for the lone parent claimants for 2011
Early
Period Forecasted estimates Difference
Mar-11 613.813 600 13.813
Apr-11 598.8 600 -1.2
May-11 583.787 595 -11.213
Jun-11 568.774 595 -26.226
Jul-11 553.761 595 -41.239
20
10
0
Mar-11 Apr-11 May-11 Jun-11 Jul-11
-10
Difference
-20
-30
-40
-50