To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what progress has been made towards the development of an indicator to monitor numbers of benefit claimants in defined small areas under the new Local Government Performance Framework; and which bodies will be responsible for (a) data collection and (b) distribution of information on performance against the indicator. (253612)

Indicator 153 in the National Indicator Set measures ‘Working age people claiming out of work benefits in the worst performing neighbourhoods’. The data for this indicator is collected through Jobcentre Plus. We have no current plans for any new indicator monitoring benefit claimants in small areas. Consideration of any new indicators within the National Indicator Set will be taken forward as part of preparations for the next government spending review.

Performance against all the National Indicators in each local area will be included in annual reporting of the new Comprehensive Area Assessment (CAA) by the local public service inspectorates. The first CAA reports are expected in November 2009.