Universal Credit

Baroness Janke Excerpts

Monday 26th November 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Buscombe]

Well, it is helpful because it is constructive. No, we do not expect people to disclose the details of domestic abuse. Any individual can be accompanied by a third-party organisation to provide expert support when discussing their situation with a work coach. Each case is unique and the work coach will therefore ensure that the process is claimant-centric, to best support the needs of the individual. We treat all personal information in confidence and do not disclose it to third parties without explicit consent, but we also ensure mandatory training for our work coaches to give the support that people who are in a vulnerable situation require.

[Baroness Janke (LD)]

My Lords, what assurance can the Minister give that split payments will be part of the test and learn DWP pilot scheme to be introduced early next year? Can she also give assurances that any results will be published before the managed migration takes place in 2019?

[Baroness Buscombe]

My Lords, the noble Baroness may know that during the test and learn phase, we will be working within a co-design phase for seven months on a number of projects with stakeholders from all parts of the welfare system to assist us in the kinds of questions that we need to ask. But we are also going to look at how Scotland implements this. Scotland has made its own decision, which it is entitled to make, to go ahead and implement split payments. We want to learn from Scotland, too, about how this can be done, what challenges there might be and how practical it will actually be when six benefits are being brought into one under UC.