Asked by: Helen Whately (Conservative - Faversham and Mid Kent)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many work coaches there were in each English district in each month since July 2024.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department for Work and Pensions has indicated that it will not be possible to answer this question within the usual time period. An answer is being prepared and will be provided as soon as it is available.
Asked by: Anneliese Midgley (Labour - Knowsley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps he is taking with Cabinet colleagues to help uphold health and safety standards in relation to worker exposure to hazardous substances.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department for Work and Pensions has indicated that it will not be possible to answer this question within the usual time period. An answer is being prepared and will be provided as soon as it is available.
Asked by: Baroness Monckton of Dallington Forest (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to ensure employers are encouraged to support people with disabilities into employment.
Answered by Baroness Sherlock - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Good work is generally good for health and wellbeing, so we want everyone to get work and get on in work, whoever they are and wherever they live. Backed by £240 million investment, the Get Britain Working White Paper launched last November will drive forward approaches to tackling economic inactivity and work toward the long-term ambition of an 80% employment rate.
Disabled people and people with health conditions are a diverse group so access to the right work and health support, in the right place, at the right time, is key. We therefore have a range of specialist initiatives to support individuals to stay in work and get back into work, including those that join up employment and health systems.
Measures include support from Work Coaches and Disability Employment Advisers in Jobcentres and Access to Work grants, as well as joining up health and employment support around the individual through Employment Advisors in NHS Talking Therapies, Individual Placement and Support in Primary Care, WorkWell and NHS Health and Growth Accelerators.
In recognition of employer’s vital role in addressing health-related economic activity, we appointed Sir Charlie Mayfield to lead the Keep Britain Working independent review which led to a report which was published on 5 November. In partnership with DBT and DHSC colleagues we are immediately launching Vanguards to test new employer-led approaches to support individuals to stay in work and develop a Healthy Workplace Standard, putting his key recommendations into action from day one.
Additionally, the DWP and DHSC Joint Work and Health Directorate has developed a digital information service for employers, continues to oversee the Disability Confident Scheme, and continues to increase access to Occupational Health.
In our March Green Paper, we set out our Pathways to Work Guarantee, backed by £1 billion a year of new additional funding by 2030. We will build towards a guaranteed offer of personalised work, health and skills support for all disabled people and those with health conditions on out of work benefits.
The NHS 10 Year Health Plan, published in July, stated our intention to break down barriers to opportunity by delivering the holistic support that people need to access and thrive in employment by ensuring a better health service for everyone, regardless of condition or service area. It outlines how the neighbourhood health service will join up support from across the work, health and skills systems to help address the multiple complex challenges that often stop people finding and staying in work.
Asked by: Baroness Coffey (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have to publish minutes of the meetings of the Occupational Health Taskforce chaired by Dame Carol Black.
Answered by Baroness Sherlock - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Occupational Health Taskforce, chaired by Dame Carol Black, was established and last convened under the previous Government. The Taskforce brought together experts from across health, business, and academia to develop a voluntary framework for occupational health provision.
The Taskforce operated as an expert advisory group rather than a formal decision-making body and there are no plans to publish minutes of the Taskforce meetings that took place in 2024.
Asked by: Neil Duncan-Jordan (Labour - Poole)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps he is taking to support disabled people to access employment by (a) ensuring that the Access to Work scheme is properly resourced and (b) addressing delays in (i) award decisions and (ii) reimbursements.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Access to Work has been providing support for over 30 years, and we know that for many, this support has been invaluable. Demand for the service has increased. In 2024/5 the number of customers in receipt of payment reached 74,190. This is an increase of 10% compared with 2023/24.
Access to Work will continue to be funded as part of the Spending Review 2025. This will ensure continued support for disabled people and people with health conditions to stay and remain in the workplace.
We recognise the importance of clearing the backlog, which is why we increased the number of staff working in this area by 27%.
In the Pathways to Work Green Paper, we consulted on the future of Access to Work and how to improve the programme to help more disabled people into work and support employers. We are currently considering responses to the consultation that closed on 30 June and we will set out our plans as soon as we are in a position to do so.
Asked by: James McMurdock (Independent - South Basildon and East Thurrock)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what proportion of eligible cases have the Child Maintenance Service used enforcement powers in including (a) liability orders, (b) bailiff action, (c) passport revocation and (d) driving licence revocation in each of the last five years; and what barriers exist to the Child Maintenance Service applying such enforcement powers in cases of persistent non-payment.
Answered by Andrew Western - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Child Maintenance Service (CMS) is committed to ensuring that children receive the financial support to which they are entitled. Where a paying parent fails to meet their obligations under a statutory child maintenance arrangement, enforcement action is taken.
The Department regularly publishes Child Maintenance Service official statistics. The Enforcement section of the latest bulletin provides details on the enforcement actions used by the CMS, and further details of these for quarter ending June 2015 to quarter ending June 2025 are available in table 6.1 and 6.2 of the accompanying National tables.
Enforcement actions are used by the CMS to collect both the maintenance arranged by the CMS, and Child Support Agency arrears that have been transitioned to CMS systems. Details of the number of paying parents using the Collect and Pay service, and the compliance of those parents, for the same time period are available in the CMS Paying Parents dataset on Stat-Xplore. Users can log in or access Stat-Xplore as a guest and, if needed, can access general guidance on how to extract the information required.
Enforcement can be more challenging where paying parents have irregular income, lack traceable assets, or receive benefits, as deductions may be limited or not feasible. These situations require careful consideration to ensure that enforcement remains proportionate and effective. In some instances, non-payment is used as a form of economic abuse. To support survivors, the CMS has introduced reforms, including easier access to the Collect and Pay service. While enforcement aims to be swift, paying parents have a right to appeal, which can delay proceedings. The CMS must balance timely action with procedural fairness.
The Department continues to monitor the effectiveness of enforcement measures and remains committed to further reforms to ensure that child maintenance is paid promptly and in full.
Asked by: Lee Dillon (Liberal Democrat - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what plans her Department has to help support the financial needs of families, including their (a) eligibility for benefits and (b) access to childcare support.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Universal Credit is designed to be a flexible benefit which offers support for both those in and out of work. It provides an invaluable safety net for millions of customers through the standard allowance and additional elements.
The government recognises the value of this safety net to millions of people and has therefore legislated for the first ever sustained above-inflation uplift to the UC standard allowance.
In September we launched the Best Start in Life website for carers and parents, providing information on the government childcare offers available and an eligibility checker.
Independent, free and anonymous benefit calculators are available to help people check what benefits they may be entitled to. The calculators can be accessed on the Government website at: https://www.gov.uk/benefits-calculators
Asked by: Luke Murphy (Labour - Basingstoke)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps his Department is taking to reduce the time taken to process mandatory reconsiderations for Child Disability Living Allowance applications.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department is clear that decisions should be made without delay. The department has increased resources to help reduce wait times for Disability Living Allowance Child Mandatory Reconsideration decisions, by recruiting additional decision makers and reallocating decision makers from other parts of the department.
If the decision maker considers that more time is needed to gather or consider evidence in an individual case, they must give themselves that time to ensure they are confident that the decision made is correct.
Asked by: Al Pinkerton (Liberal Democrat - Surrey Heath)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent assessment his Department has made of trends in the level of unemployment for (a) younger and (b) older people in Surrey Heath constituency.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The information requested is published and available at:
https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/default.asp
Guidance for users can be found at:
https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/home/newuser.asp
The estimated unemployment levels can be found by selecting “Query data” on the NOMIS home page and selecting “Annual Population Survey/Labour Force Survey” and then “annual population survey (Dec 2004 to Jun 2025)” in the lists of data sources. The Geography will need to be set for the relevant Westminster constituency from the menu, and the Variable set to the desired age group from the “Unemployment rate” Category.
Asked by: Euan Stainbank (Labour - Falkirk)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to his Oral Statement of 11 November 2025 on Pensions, Official Report, col 44, whether the research findings from the 2007 report referred to in that statement have been shared with the Women Against State Pension Inequality campaign group.
Answered by Torsten Bell - Parliamentary Secretary (HM Treasury)
The report, Evaluation of Automatic State Pension Forecasts (research report No 447), is publicly available on the National Archives website, and on 11 November we deposited a copy in the House Libraries.