Oral Answers to Questions

Christina Rees Excerpts

Monday 17th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[John Nicolson (East Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

10. What steps his Department is taking to ensure that personal independence payment assessments are undertaken fairly and appropriately.

[Christina Rees (Neath) (Lab/Co-op)]

21. What steps his Department is taking to ensure that personal independence payment assessments are undertaken fairly.

[The Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work (Penny Mordaunt)]

Our policy is developed by utilising service user panels. Provision is strictly monitored and measured by independent audit, and the provider is held to account through the contract that we have with them.

--- Later in debate ---

[Penny Mordaunt]

I hope that the hon. Gentleman will write to me with further details of that case. Under PIP, more people are entitled to use the Motability scheme, but clearly we want to make sure that any decision taken on a PIP assessment is the right one. A key part of that, as we know from looking at cases that have been overturned on appeal, is getting the evidence submitted earlier in the process.

[Christina Rees]

Reports suggest that Capita rewards its assessors on the basis of how many assessments they complete every month, which leads to rushed assessments where applicants are not given enough time to describe how their condition affects them daily. What is the Minister doing to ensure that applicants are given enough time and that such a reward system is not operating?

[Penny Mordaunt]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question because it gets to the heart of what I have just described. If we do not have a good-quality assessment and good quality in all the evidence needed early in the process, we will end up causing distress to an individual who has to go to mandatory reconsideration or an appeal. We are doing work in the Department to address this, including giving a bit more flexibility for certain cases at that early stage, with the hope that the evidence we need will then be submitted at that stage. That is recent work, and we are rolling it out at the moment.