Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps he is taking to ensure that the needs of men experiencing incontinence are recognised in Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) 1992 Regulations (‘the Workplace Regulations’) and Approved Code of Practice (ACOP) set broad standards for what employers should provide to ensure the workplace is safe, healthy and provides appropriate welfare facilities to meet the needs of each member of the workforce.
Regulation 20 of the Workplace Regulations state that toilets should be kept in a clean and orderly condition. A business should consider the means to ensure they can fulfil this duty for every member of the workforce. The guidance already places a requirement for any worker with a disability to have access to facilities which are adjusted for their use if necessary.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will take steps to ensure that where children or adults are the subject of a Child Maintenance case and registered in full time education, Child Maintenance is only payable if the Child Maintenance Service is satisfied that they are attending and participating in that education.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
To qualify for maintenance payments a child must meet the Child Maintenance Service's (CMS) criteria.
A person is considered a child for child maintenance purposes if they are under the age of 16 and habitually resident in the UK or if they are under the age of 20 and are considered a qualifying young person.
A qualifying young person is someone who is aged over 16 but under 20, and in full-time non-advanced education or approved training for at least 12 hours a week or if Child Benefit is payable.
The CMS may amend a calculation if we receive evidence that a child is no longer in full-time non-advanced education or approved training, but we do not measure attendance or participation.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, under what circumstances officials in Child Maintenance Service may refuse to meet, either in person or online, a parent who is seeking to resolve issues in their case.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Customers of the service can contact officials online, by telephone or in writing and in cases where customers have concerns, a complaints process including independent review is available and clearly signposted in written and online communications.
The Child Maintenance service undertakes work face to face meetings only in certain prescribed circumstances where there is a legal requirement to do so for instance certain judicial proceedings and interviews under caution.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what sources of information are available to the Child Maintenance Service to help them ascertain whether a child or adult, who is the subject of a case, and who is registered in full time education is actually attending and participating in the course in a meaningful way.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
There is no requirement in law for the Child maintenance Service to gather data on children attending full time education or training.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many errors have been recorded in the payment of winter fuel payments by reason of (a) incorrect address (b) being paid into incorrect bank account, in each of the last three years.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Department for Work and Pensions Is not required to retain this information. In the circumstances the information is only possible to obtain at disproportionate cost to the DWP.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, when her Department plans to publish its review of how the welfare system supports terminally ill people; and for what reason that review has not yet been published.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
The Department is committed to delivering an improved system for claimants that are nearing the end of their lives and is working at pace across government to bring forward proposals.
In July 2019, the Secretary of State announced an in-depth evaluation of how the benefits system supports people nearing the end of their life. The evaluation included 3 strands of research:
- hearing directly from claimants and charities about their first-hand experiences;
- considering international evidence to find out what works in other nations and the support they provide; and
- reviewing current DWP performance to better understand how our Special Rules for Terminal Illness process operates and performs.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether the Self-Employment Income Support Scheme backdated to 1 March 2020 will trigger universal credit over-payments for additional income for claimants encouraged to claim that benefit until the scheme is available.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Universal Credit takes into account any income received for the relevant assessment period (AP). In terms of the Self-employed Income Support Scheme (SEISS), the department has agreed that this will not be applied retrospectively to previous APs.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people have died while waiting for their eligibility for personal independence payments to be determined; and what the main disabling condition was of those people.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
Personal Independence Payment (PIP) is claimed by people with a range of health conditions and disabilities, many of which are degenerative or life limiting and the Department treats the death of any claimant sympathetically. Claims made under Special Rules for Terminal Illness (SRTI) are fast tracked and are being cleared in 6 working days on average (as at the end of October 2019, the latest available published data).
The cause of death of claimants to PIP is not collated centrally by the Department.
Between the introduction of PIP in April 2013 and 31st October 2019, the latest date for which published data is available, 4,617,990 decisions were made on claims to PIP. Of these, 20,830 (less than 0.5%) claimants died prior to a decision being made on their case.
The Department only records the disabilities of claimants who have reached the assessment stage. Therefore, the disabilities of claimants who passed away prior to the assessment stage appear under “Unknown or missing” in the table below.
Table: Disability of claimants who died prior to a decision being made on their PIP claim (Great Britain only).
| Normal Rules (at registration) | Special Rules (at registration) | Total |
Autoimmune disease | 40 | # | 40 |
Cardiovascular disease | 320 | 30 | 350 |
Diseases of the immune system | # | # | # |
Diseases of the liver, gallbladder, biliary tract | 320 | 90 | 410 |
Endocrine disease | 70 | # | 70 |
Gastrointestinal disease | 30 | 10 | 40 |
Genitourinary disease | 120 | 30 | 150 |
Haematological Disease | 10 | # | 10 |
Hearing disorders | # | # | # |
Infectious disease | 20 | # | 20 |
Malignant disease | 1,740 | 4,510 | 6,250 |
Metabolic disease | 10 | # | 10 |
Multisystem and extremes of age | # | # | # |
Musculoskeletal disease (general) | 200 | # | 210 |
Musculoskeletal disease (regional) | 190 | # | 190 |
Neurological disease | 450 | 40 | 490 |
Psychiatric disorders | 820 | 10 | 830 |
Respiratory disease | 500 | 40 | 540 |
Skin disease | 30 | # | 30 |
Unknown or missing | 10,460 | 700 | 11,160 |
Visual disease | 30 | # | 30 |
Total | 15,370 | 5,470 | 20,830 |
Please note that the DWP is only responsible for benefits in Great Britain. Social security benefits, including PIP, are a devolved matter in Northern Ireland. Questions about PIP claimants in Northern Ireland should be directed to the Department of Communities in Northern Ireland.
Notes:
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many times her Department has used its discretionary waiver in respect of universal credit overpayments as a result of Departmental error in each of the last three years.
Answered by Will Quince
Waivers can only be granted by the Secretary of State where the recovery of an overpayment is causing substantial medical and/or financial hardship, and clear evidence of this can be provided. The discretion to waive benefit overpayments can only be exercised in line with Her Majesty’s Treasury’s guidance on ‘Managing Public Money’.
Prior to the start of 2019/20, the reason that the overpayment occurred (fraud, claimant error or Departmental error) was not recorded on waiver requests. Therefore, for the years 2017/18 and 2018/19, I have instead provided the total number of successful waivers. It is important to note that these may not all have been for overpayments arising as a result of Departmental errors.
In 2017/18, there were no waivers granted for Universal Credit overpayments. In 2018/19, there were 5 waivers granted for Universal Credit overpayments, of these, 4 were granted on medical grounds. In 2019/20 year to date, there were 3 waivers granted for Universal Credit overpayments, these were all granted on medical grounds.
*The data in this response has been sourced from internal management information and was not intended for public release. It should therefore not be compared to any other, similar data subsequently released by the Department.
Asked by: Carla Lockhart (Democratic Unionist Party - Upper Bann)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many times her Department has used its discretionary waiver on health grounds in relation to universal credit over-payments as a result of Departmental error.
Answered by Will Quince
Waivers can only be granted by the Secretary of State where the recovery of an overpayment is causing substantial medical and/or financial hardship, and clear evidence of this can be provided. The discretion to waive benefit overpayments can only be exercised in line with Her Majesty’s Treasury’s guidance on ‘Managing Public Money’.
Prior to the start of 2019/20, the reason that the overpayment occurred (fraud, claimant error or Departmental error) was not recorded on waiver requests. Therefore, for the years 2017/18 and 2018/19, I have instead provided the total number of successful waivers. It is important to note that these may not all have been for overpayments arising as a result of Departmental errors.
In 2017/18, there were no waivers granted for Universal Credit overpayments. In 2018/19, there were 5 waivers granted for Universal Credit overpayments, of these, 4 were granted on medical grounds. In 2019/20 year to date, there were 3 waivers granted for Universal Credit overpayments, these were all granted on medical grounds.
*The data in this response has been sourced from internal management information and was not intended for public release. It should therefore not be compared to any other, similar data subsequently released by the Department.