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A woman who was told she could not receive child care benefit to help care for her disabled son has won her discrimination claim, writes Katie Leason.

The disabled person’s tax credit provides parents with up to £94.50 per week towards child care costs for a single child. However this is only available if carers are drawn from a specific list of categories for care at home, generally registered childminders.

Marian Hill could not find a registered childminder to care for her son Daniel after he suffered a brain haemorrhage three years ago. She found a registered foster carer, but the benefits agency refused to help pay for this care under the tax credit scheme.

Human rights organisation Liberty advised the case to be pursued under articles 8 and 14 of the Human Rights Convention claiming discrimination in relation to her, and her son’s private and family life. The convention is enshrined in English law through he Human Rights Act 1998.

A social security appeal tribunal in Liverpool concluded that the regulation on this payment "can only be treated as compliant with article 8 and article 14 of the Human Rights Convention if payment of child care charges to a foster carer is deemed included in the list of allowable child care charges…such a list should not be deemed to be exclusive."

Liberty’s counsel Shami Chakrabarti said that this shows the power of the Human Rights Act to ensure justice can be done where regulations are too narrowly drawn to promote their own real purpose.