Outer House rules DWP can require Universal Credit claimant to provide unredacted bank statements

About this case:

• Citation:
  [2026] CSOH 97
• Judgment:
  External link
• Court:
  Court of Session Outer House
• Judge:
  Lady Haldane

Lady Haldane held that regulation 38(2) of the Universal Credit, Personal Independence Payment, Jobseeker’s Allowance and Employment and Support Allowance (Claims and Payments) Regulations 2013 empowered the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions to require the information in order to determine whether an award should be revised or superseded. She also rejected challenges based on Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, data protection law and the public sector equality duty.

The petitioner, Q, had received Universal Credit since 2020. In February 2026 her claim was randomly selected for a Universal Credit Review forming part of the DWP’s wider Targeted Case Review programme. She was asked to provide several documents, including four months of unredacted bank statements showing all incoming and outgoing transactions. Q supplied other information requested of her but refused to provide the bank statements, questioning both their relevance and the statutory basis for requiring disclosure of her personal expenditure.

Her Universal Credit payments were suspended on 13 March 2026 after she failed to provide all documents required to complete the review. The suspension was reconsidered the following month and payments were restored. Q, who appeared as a party litigant, sought judicial review of the Secretary of State’s actions. Dewart, instructed by the Office of the Advocate General, appeared for the respondent.

Power to request information

At the centre of the petition was regulation 38(2) of the 2013 Regulations. It requires a person entitled to benefit to supply such information or evidence as the Secretary of State may require for determining whether an award should be revised under section 9 of the Social Security Act 1998 or superseded under section 10.
Q argued that the provision did not confer a general information-gathering power. In her submission, it could be used only where there was already some identified basis for potentially revising or superseding an award. A random review under the Targeted Case Review programme was neither a revision nor a supersession and therefore fell outside the statutory scheme. 

Lady Haldane described the argument as “superficially attractive” but rejected it. Reading the regulation as a whole, she held that the power could be exercised before the Secretary of State had decided whether an award should be revised or superseded. The relevant question was not how the administrative process was labelled, but whether the information was required to determine whether one of those decisions should be taken.

Regulation 38(2), she said, formed part of “a sequential process” enabling the respondent to decide whether to revise, supersede or retain the existing award.
She concluded: “Regulation 38(2) permits the respondent to require such information as is necessary to make a decision whether or not to revise or supersede and thus, prima facie, the request made of the petitioner is within the power accorded to the respondent within the regulations.” 

Four months not irrational

The court accepted that the power was not unlimited. Information requested under regulation 38(2) had to be required for the statutory purpose of determining whether benefit entitlement should be revised or superseded.

Q argued that requiring unredacted bank statements was unnecessary and that four months of statements was excessive.

The DWP relied on evidence from its head of Targeted Case Review policy that bank statements were considered the only effective means of assessing and verifying capital and income during such a review. Four months was said to strike a balance between obtaining an accurate picture of the claimant’s circumstances and minimising intrusion.
Lady Haldane held that it was not for the court on judicial review to decide whether four months was the “right” or “wrong” period. The question was whether the policy was so manifestly arbitrary, unreasonable or irrational as to justify judicial intervention.

The court was required to approach decision-making in the field of social and economic policy with a relatively low intensity of review and appropriate respect for the judgment entrusted to public authorities.

Lady Haldane found that the threshold for intervention had not been met. The reasons given for requiring four months of statements and for requiring them to be unredacted could not be characterised as irrational or unreasonable.

Although the four-month period itself was not prescribed by legislation, it was not so arbitrary or illogical as to produce a manifestly unfair result. 

Article 8 challenge

The Secretary of State accepted that requiring unredacted statements interfered with Q’s Article 8 right to respect for private life.

Lady Haldane nevertheless held that the interference was lawful and proportionate. The request had a lawful basis in regulation 38(2) and pursued the legitimate aim of the economic well-being of the country, there being a public interest in ensuring that means-tested benefits were being paid at the correct level.

She rejected the argument that there were less intrusive means of achieving that aim. The court was also required to give appropriate respect to governmental decision-making in the field of social and economic policy rather than substitute its own assessment of how the competing interests should be balanced.

Lady Haldane concluded that she could not find the admitted interference with Q’s Article 8 rights to be disproportionate. 

Data protection and equality

The court also rejected Q’s arguments under the UK GDPR and Data Protection Act 2018. Lady Haldane held that processing information contained in the bank statements fell within the lawful basis in Article 6 of the UK GDPR for processing necessary in the exercise of official functions. There was also no material before the court capable of establishing Q’s allegation that unlawful automated profiling or decision-making had taken place.

The court was satisfied that the Secretary of State had discharged the public sector equality duty under section 149 of the Equality Act 2010. The affidavit and policy material produced were sufficient to rebut Q’s contention that inadequate regard had been paid to her status. Although entitlement to welfare benefits could in principle engage rights under Article 1 of Protocol 1 to the ECHR, Lady Haldane held that those rights were not engaged in Q’s circumstances because she had failed to satisfy a condition of eligibility by supplying information lawfully requested of her. 

Suspension lawful

Q separately challenged the suspension of her Universal Credit payments. Lady Haldane held that this challenge followed the fate of the principal argument. Once the requirement to provide the bank statements was found to be lawful, the decision to suspend payment when the information was not supplied within the required period was also lawful.

She noted that Q ultimately suffered no financial loss from the suspension because her payments had continued to be made since April.

Refusing the petition, Lady Haldane commended Q for her “eloquent presentation” of a wide range of arguments despite appearing without legal representation, her disabilities and having become unwell during the hearing.

The court sustained the respondent’s pleas and refused the petition, reserving all questions of expenses.