196501-242981 FOI Benefits / Housing

I am writing to make a Freedom of Information request concerning your Council’s expenditure on Discretionary Housing Payments (DHPs) for the 2021/22 financial year. 
I am aware some information on DHPs is submitted to the Department for Work & Pensions in its analysis of End of Year returns from local authorities. This includes the total number of awards, DHP financial expenditure and Government contribution original allocation. These monitoring returns provide details of the purpose of the DHP award, such as to secure and move to alternative accommodation and rental costs, split by the welfare form for which households have been affected. 
What is not included in this information is the amount of DHPs that were awarded per purpose of DHP award, and the amount/value of DHPs applied for which are not awarded. I am requesting this information, as detailed in Table 1 below, and also request splits of this data by the age band of the claimant. If possible, please can the figures just for those where the claimant is aged between 16 and 30 be provided. 
With regards to this request, it may be the case that you do not hold the summary data of total DHP applications by age. If this is not held accessibly, and to provide age details would require opening each case manually and thus take longer than the Freedom of Information request grants, I would ask for you to please ignore the age part of the request and would only ask for the total numbers/values of successes/declines of DHP applications. 
In summary, I am requesting (as per Table 1): 
•    Total number of DHPs granted, split by purpose of payment 
•    Total value of DHPs granted, split by purpose of payment 
•    Total number of DHPs declined, split by purpose of payment (if records are kept of this) 
•    Total value of DHPs declined, split by purpose of payment (if records are kept of this) 
•    The above information broken down by age groups detailed in Table 1 – although if processing this would be beyond the scope of the FOI, please ignore this element. 
Separately, I am requesting information on your Council’s use of rent guarantee schemes: these are typically used to help people facing homelessness by providing a written guarantee to the landlord to cover any unpaid rent/damage. The information I require is written below, but also in Table 2: 
•    Total amount of rent guarantees issued in 2021/22 
o    How many rent guarantees were issued to care leavers 
o    Age bands of those issued rent guarantees (if this data is available / accessible within the time allocated to FOI requests) 
 
In summary, I am requesting the following from the 2021/22 financial year (as per Table 1): 
               IF UNAVAILABLE / ABLE TO ACCESS WITHIN FOI TIME LIMIT, PLEASE IGNORE 
          TOTAL     16-24     25-34     35-44     45-54     55-64     65+     ≤30 
Total number of DHP applications 
 
 
     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
Total value of DHP applications 
 
 
     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
Total number of DHP applications to help secure and move to alternative accommodation (eg rent deposit) 
     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
Total value of DHP applications to help secure and move to alternative accommodation (eg rent deposit) (£)     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
Total number of DHP applications to with short term rental costs while the claimant secures and moves to alternative accommodation     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
Total value of DHP applications to help with short term rental costs while the claimant secures and moves to alternative accommodation (£) 
     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
Total number of DHP applications to help with short term rental costs while the claimant seeks employment 
     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
Total value of DHP applications to help with short term rental costs while the claimant seeks employment (£) 
 
 
 
     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
Total number of DHP applications to help with on-going rental costs for disabled person in adapted accommodation 
 
 
     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
Total value of DHP applications to help with on-going rental costs for disabled person in adapted accommodation (£)     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
Total number of DHP applications to help with on-going rental costs for a foster carer     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
Total value of DHP applications to help with on-going rental costs for a foster carer (£)     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
Total number of DHP applications to help with on-going rental costs for any other reason     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
Total value of DHP applications to help with on-going rental costs for any other reason (£)     TOTAL                                         
    Successful                                          
    Declined / Unsuccessful                                         
 
Table 2: Rent guarantees: financial year 2021/22 
          IF UNAVAILABLE / ABLE TO ACCESS WITHIN FOI TIME LIMIT, PLEASE IGNORE 
     TOTAL     Care leavers     Not care leavers     16-24     25-34     35-44     45-54     55-64     65+     ≤30 
Rent guarantees issued                                                   
Rent guarantees declined