PIP Changes: Impact on Carer’s Allowance Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Work and Pensions
Andrew Pakes
Main Page: Andrew Pakes (Labour (Co-op) - Peterborough)Department Debates - View all Andrew Pakes's debates with the Department for Work and Pensions
PIP Changes: Impact on Carer’s Allowance
Andrew Pakes Excerpts(6 days ago)
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Sir Stephen Timms
It is very important that the system properly handles fluctuating conditions. One of the benefits of the proposal in the Green Paper to record by default PIP assessments is that we will be able to provide better assurance that the assessments get these judgments right, particularly in the case of fluctuating conditions.
Andrew Pakes (Peterborough) (Lab)
I know from speaking to charities, local groups and people from brilliant projects such as JobSmart in my constituency about the increasing complexity of the relationship between different forms of benefit, including carer’s allowance, and the rules around working. That makes it increasingly difficult for people to use the options they have. Can my right hon. Friend assure the House that the record amount of employment support will address the issue of the flexibility that we need to support sick and disabled people into some form of work, and will not just be for mentoring for those in other categories?
Sir Stephen Timms
My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I join him in paying tribute to organisations such as JobSmart in his constituency. When the previous Labour Government introduced the new deal for disabled people in 1998—I was the Minister then, as I am now—the disability employment gap started to fall, and it fell steadily all the way until 2010, when it stopped falling. I want to get us back to that positive downward trajectory.