Asked by: David Lammy (Labour - Tottenham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate his Department has made of the potential effect of the extension of the benefit cap to £23,000 per year in London and £20,000 per year outside London on the levels of homelessness.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
The evaluation of the current benefit cap shows very little, if any, impact on homelessness as a direct result of the cap. The small numbers of capped households who had been evicted were noted by Local Authorities as having other reasons for rent arrears and also failing to engage with relevant services; they were considered intentionally homeless. To help ensure Local Authorities are able to protect the most vulnerable housing benefit claimants and to support households adjusting to reforms, the government will provide £870 million funding for the Discretionary Housing Payments scheme over the next 5 years. Housing Benefit paid for specified accommodation such as refuges is ignored when calculating whether or not the cap applies.
Asked by: David Lammy (Labour - Tottenham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate his Department has made of the number of households in (a) Tottenham constituency, (b) the borough of Haringey, (c) London, and (d) the UK whose overall entitlement has reduced since the introduction of the benefit cap in 2013.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
The available information on the number of (a) households and (b) children who have been affected by the benefit cap since it was introduced in 2013 is published and can be found at:
https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk
The available information on the number of households in (a) Tottenham constituency, (b) borough of Haringey, (c) London, and (d) the UK who have had their benefits capped since the introduction of the benefit cap in 2013 is published and can also be found at:
https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk
Guidance on how to extract the information required can be found at:
https://sw.stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk/webapi/online-help/Getting-Started---SuperWEB2.html
Asked by: David Lammy (Labour - Tottenham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate his Department has made of the number of (a) households and (b) children who have been affected by the benefit cap since it was introduced in 2013.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
The available information on the number of (a) households and (b) children who have been affected by the benefit cap since it was introduced in 2013 is published and can be found at:
https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk
The available information on the number of households in (a) Tottenham constituency, (b) borough of Haringey, (c) London, and (d) the UK who have had their benefits capped since the introduction of the benefit cap in 2013 is published and can also be found at:
https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk
Guidance on how to extract the information required can be found at:
https://sw.stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk/webapi/online-help/Getting-Started---SuperWEB2.html
Asked by: David Lammy (Labour - Tottenham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people in Tottenham constituency (a) are entitled to claim child benefit and (b) have experienced payment arrears due to non-resident parents not paying full or any child maintenance within the last 12 months; and what the total value of these unpaid arrears is.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
a) The number of people entitled to claim Child Benefit in Tottenham constituency is not available. However, the number of families who received Child Benefit in the constituency can be found in Table 6 from Child Benefit statistics geographical analysis: August 2015: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/child-benefit-statistics-geographical-analysis-august-2015
b) In the 12 months to June 2016, 450 cases with the Child Support Agency in the Tottenham constituency have experienced new payment arrears due to a non-resident parent either not paying any child maintenance or not paying in full.
The total value of arrears on cases in the Tottenham constituency stood at £5,461,264. This is for all cases, and not just those with arrears that have built up in the 12 months to June 2016, and includes arrears from the whole life of the case.
Information on geographical breakdowns on the Child Maintenance Scheme is not routinely recorded for management information purposes and could only be provided at disproportionate cost.
Notes:
1) Numbers are rounded to the nearest 10.
2) Monetary values are rounded to the nearest pound.
3) Cases have been allocated to a parliamentary constituency by matching the residential postcode of the parent with care or non-resident parent for all cases administered on the CS2 and CSCS computer systems and cases managed off system to the Office for National Statistics Postcode Directory.
Asked by: David Lammy (Labour - Tottenham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many households in (a) Tottenham constituency and (b) the London Borough of Harringey will be affected by the extension of the benefit cap to £23,000; and what the average cut in benefits will be.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
It is estimated that around 500 households in Tottenham constituency and 800 households in the London Borough of Haringey will be affected by the lower benefit cap in 2016/17.
It is estimated that the average reduction to benefits for capped households will be £66 per week in Tottenham constituency and £68 per week in the London Borough of Haringey in 2016/17. These represent the overall average reduction from the benefit cap including the impact of both the existing higher benefit cap and the new lower benefit cap.
Notes:
The benefit cap will be lowered from 7th November from £26,000 to £20,000, except in London where it will be lowered to £23,000 (a lower cap applies to single adult households). To help ensure Local Authorities are able to protect the most vulnerable Housing Benefit claimants and to support households adjusting to our welfare reforms, the Government will provide £870m funding for Discretionary Housing Payments over the next 5 years from 2016/17. Information about this and other measures to ease the transition for families affected by this policy change is included in the latest impact assessment at the link above.
Asked by: David Lammy (Labour - Tottenham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people whose initial claim for employment and support allowance was unsuccessful died before their appeal was heard in each year from 2013 to 2016 to date.
Answered by Penny Mordaunt - Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons
The information requested is not readily available and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.
Asked by: David Lammy (Labour - Tottenham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people died within a year of an unsuccessful personal independence payment in each year from 2013 to 2016 to date.
Answered by Penny Mordaunt - Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons
The information requested is not readily available and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.
Asked by: David Lammy (Labour - Tottenham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether his Department's assessment contractors receive any penalty or fine when a claimant has been initially refused (a) personal independence payment and (b) employment and support allowance and is later awarded the relevant benefit on appeal at tribunal.
Answered by Penny Mordaunt - Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons
The role of contracted Assessment Providers is to carry out assessments on behalf of the Department. They do not determine whether a claim to Personal Independence Payment or Employment and Support Allowance is successful. They provide a report to DWP’s decision makers who then determine entitlement to benefit. No targets are in place as to how many applications are successful.
Where a need for additional support or training is identified, feedback is provided to the assessor and appropriate action taken.
Asked by: David Lammy (Labour - Tottenham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many employment and support allowance (ESA) claimants with (a) chronic disabilities and (b) illnesses were declared fit to work and had their ESA payments stopped in each month of (i) 2013, (ii) 2014, (iii) 2015 and (iv) 2016 to date.
Answered by Penny Mordaunt - Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons
The information requested is not readily available and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.
Information in respect of Employment and Support Allowance work capability assessments can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/employment-and-support-allowance-outcomes-of-work-capability-assessment.
Asked by: David Lammy (Labour - Tottenham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether his Department's assessment contractors received any (a) penalty, (b) bonus and (c) incentive to deny individual claims for (i) personal independence payment and (ii) employment and support allowance.
Answered by Penny Mordaunt - Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons
The role of contracted Assessment Providers is to carry out assessments on behalf of the Department. They do not determine whether a claim to Personal Independence Payment or Employment and Support Allowance is successful. They provide a report to DWP’s decision makers who then determine entitlement to benefit. No targets are in place as to how many applications are successful.
Where a need for additional support or training is identified, feedback is provided to the assessor and appropriate action taken.