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  This new ``Poll``tax given litmus paper test.
  
  Universal credit pilot to launch with only a few dozen claimants
  
  Radical scaling back of pilot to include only most straightforward cases causes concern for
  
  charities and opposition parties
  
  The first batch of potential claimants likely to be people recently made unemployed.
  
  Only a few dozen people are expected to claim benefits using the government's flagship new
  
  universal credit scheme when it is launched on Monday and the total number who will qualify
  
  will be limited to 300 a month, in a radical scaling back of the pilot.
  
  The tiny scale and extremely soft nature of the launch has prompted concern from charities
  
  and opposition politicians over how useful the trial will be in exposing weaknesses in the
  
  complex new welfare scheme, ahead of its nationwide rollout, which is due to begin in October.
  
  Only the most straightforward benefit claims will be included in the trial, with any cases with a
  
  hint of complexity excluded. Tameside council, (which is the only place piloting the benefit after
  
  pilots in three other areas were postponed last month), expects just 300 people to start claiming
  
  the benefit in the first month.
  
  The critical test of whether the newly-designed computer programme can cope with the pressure
  
  will remain unanswered at this stage because of the small quantity of individuals likely to be
  
  logging on to the system.
  
  Nigel Keohane, deputy director of the Social Market Foundation, a cross-party thinktank, said the
  
  department appeared to have removed any difficult scenarios from the initial pilot
  
  *******. "In essence, they are testing the simplest group and only a very small number of them."******

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