Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alun Cairns and Lord Grayling

Monday 5th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

I am pleased to be able to reassure my hon. Friend on this. I was in his county of Cornwall last week to meet Work programme providers in both the private and voluntary sectors, and what I saw was very encouraging. The progress they are making is similar to that being made elsewhere in the country, and there is no obvious sign of the regional variation he describes. I wish to pay tribute to the voluntary sector organisations I met, which are very involved in the Work programme. I pay particular tribute to Groundwork, which is running one of the most innovative motivational programmes for some of the hardest to help I have yet seen in the Work programme. That is, of course, helping his constituents and will do the right thing to help them into work.

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

18. What progress has been made on the implementation of the recommendations in Professor Harrington’s review of work capability assessments.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Chris Grayling)]

We are continuing to implement the reforms recommended to us by Professor Malcolm Harrington. He argued for a number of changes in his first report, all of which have been implemented, and we are in the process of implementing the changes recommended in his second report.

[Alun Cairns]

I thank the Minister for his response. One third of employment and support allowance claimants have mental health conditions and a significant number of initial work capability assessment decisions are overturned on appeal when further evidence becomes available about their condition. What action is the Minister taking to ensure that medical evidence is taken on board at a very early stage in order to prevent a number of appeals?

[Chris Grayling]

This is one area where we have worked very hard to secure a change. A large amount of new evidence was indeed appearing only at the appeal stage and that was one of the key things that Professor Harrington suggested we address. We are now bringing in medical evidence much earlier—at the start of the process, when the decisions are taken or when a reconsideration is taking place in Jobcentre Plus. There are now few circumstances in which new evidence appears at the appeal stage, and that is really important.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alun Cairns and Lord Grayling

Monday 13th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

T4. The mental health charity Mind has suggested changes in the work capability assessment to capture better the complexity of the conditions of those suffering from mental illness. What reassurance can the Minister give about how the process can be enhanced to reflect those needs better?

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Chris Grayling)]

We have already introduced mental health champions to the network of health care professionals who carry out the assessments, and we believe that the changes introduced at the beginning of April will bring more people with mental health conditions into the support group. However, we now have on our desks a new set of proposals from the charities which we asked them to supply to us. We are considering them carefully, and hope to respond in the very near future.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alun Cairns and Lord Grayling

Monday 22nd November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

The hon. Lady must understand that we are seeking to maximise the incentives in the system. What we inherited from the previous Administration is a system that is full of disincentives to go back to work. If we do not remove some of those disincentives, create a push to get people back into work and combine that with support to do so, we will end up with the same 13 years of failure as we saw under the previous Government.

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

T10. The Barry branch of the mental health charity Mind often advocates in favour of service users at work assessment appeals, with a very high success rate. This demonstrates the difficulty in assessing people with mental health illnesses. What action is the Minister taking to ensure that they are treated fairly in the new work capability assessment?

[Chris Grayling]

My hon. Friend will see tomorrow, with the publication of the Harrington review, some innovative suggestions about how we can deal with that problem. It is a very real problem. I am determined to ensure that we do everything we can to avoid people with mental health problems being wrongly diagnosed by the assessment. I pay tribute to Paul Farmer of Mind, whose input into the process has been hugely valuable.