Families in Suffolk are likely to be missing out on support from the NHS Healthy Start scheme, which provides up to £8.50 a week to people who are pregnant or have children under 4 to buy essentials like fruit, vegetables, milk and infant formula, because of IT issues.
Nationally, 46,000 people were ruled incorrectly ineligible for support last year when the Healthy Start scheme transitioned from a paper-based voucher system to a digital pre-paid card system. Those affected are eligible for backdated payments, but this process has been plagued by delays. The average waiting time between an applicant’s original application and receiving backdated payment is 254 days, but some families have waited for more than a year to receive support.
This issue has been exacerbated by the fact that the Government has stopped publishing local data on how many eligible families are missing out on the scheme.
In January 2021, a campaign was started to raise awareness of Healthy Start vouchers, with more than half of eligible families not claiming them in Suffolk. At this point, there were 5,664 families eligible to claim Healthy Start, but just 2,559 – 45% – were doing so. By March 2022, more than 1,200 additional families in the county were claiming the vouchers, bringing the overall total to 3,775 families, 71% of all those eligible.
However, while this represented a big increase, nearly a third of eligible families were still not claiming the vouchers, meaning £6,672.50 worth of food vouchers were going unclaimed each week. Now, authorities are unsure how many people are missing out, hampering local efforts to ensure food is reaching the babies and children who need it most.
Jack Abbott, Labour’s prospective parliamentary candidate for Ipswich who has led the Healthy Start campaign in Suffolk, said:
“We have worked hard over the past two years to raise awareness about Healthy Start vouchers, but this latest Conservative shambles is really hampering efforts. Crucially, it could be preventing families accessing this scheme.
“It’s totally unacceptable at the best of times for people to not receive the support they’re entitled to, but the fact that the Government are dragging their feet on backdating claims is staggering given the cost-of-living crisis.
“I have no doubt that families in Ipswich and Suffolk have been affected by the latest in a long line of Government incompetence in managing this scheme. Healthy Start is designed to help give babies and young children from the hardest hit families access to fresh fruit, vegetables, and milk. The Conservatives are failing them.”
Jim McMahon MP, Shadow Secretary for the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), added:
“The Government should be prioritising food security in all its work. People need proper access to healthy and nutritious food.”
Healthy Start vouchers – which can be used to buy fresh fruit, vegetables and milk – provide crucial access to healthy food for those who need it most: qualifying pregnant women, babies and toddlers.
You can qualify for Healthy Start if you are at least 10 weeks pregnant or have a child under four years old and you or your family receive:
· Income Support
· Income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance
· Income-related Employment and Support Allowance *
· Child Tax Credit with a family income of £16,190 or less per year
· Pension Credit; or
· Universal Credit with no earned income or total earned income of £408 or less per month for the family.
You also qualify if you are under 18 and pregnant, even if you don’t get any of the above benefits.
More information about Healthy Start can be found here: https://www.healthystart.nhs.uk/