Asked by: Emma Reynolds (Labour - Wycombe)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether her Department engages enforcement agents.
Answered by Will Quince
Where a claimant is no longer in receipt of benefit, and all other recovery options have been exhausted, the Department for Work and Pensions may refer a debt to a Private Sector Debt Collection Agency.
In March 2015, Indesser, was appointed as the provider of cross-government debt services under a joint-venture with the Cabinet Office.
Asked by: Emma Reynolds (Labour - Wycombe)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what impact assessment her Department has undertaken on the recent reform of pension credit; and if she will publish that impact assessment.
Answered by Guy Opperman
The change to the Pension Credit rules was legislated for in the Welfare Reform Act 2012. As part of the Parliamentary process, an Equality Impact Assessment published on the 9 November 2011, which included an assessment of the impacts of Universal Credit reforms on older couples, including mixed aged couples. This can be found at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/universal-credit-equality-impact-assessment
On 28 February 2019 we published an ad-hoc statistical release which provides analysis relating to mixed age couples estimated to be affected by the change in policy to be implemented on 15 May 2019. This can be found at:
Asked by: Emma Reynolds (Labour - Wycombe)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether she has plans to update the training module on Fibromyalgia issued by her Department on 18 April 2018; and whether her Department has made an assessment of (a) the level of compliance with the training module by benefits assessors and (b) the effectiveness of the guidance in identifying suffers of Fibromyalgia.
Answered by Sarah Newton
The training module is due to be reviewed in April 2019 and Fibromyalgia UK will be invited to quality assure the document which they previously reviewed in March 2018. The Department’s Independent Audit Team conducts an audit of a statistically significant sample of the Centre for Health and Disability Assessment reports that includes Fibromyalgia cases. The role of Healthcare Professionals conducting assessments is to provide advice on the functional impact of a condition and not to diagnose or advise on treatment.
Asked by: Emma Reynolds (Labour - Wycombe)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment her Department has made of the effect of universal credit on levels of rent arrears.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
I refer the hon Member to the reply to Question 181577 on 29 October.
Asked by: Emma Reynolds (Labour - Wycombe)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what his Department's policy is on the payment of bereavement benefits for unmarried partners with children.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
Bereavement benefits are paid to a surviving spouse or civil partner; they can only be paid to those in legal unions. Therefore, they cannot be paid in respect of cohabitees, either with or without children. We are currently considering how to proceed following the recent Supreme Court judgement which ruled it incompatible with ECHR principles to provide that cohabitees with children are not entitled to Widowed Parent’s Allowance.
Cohabitees do have access to income-related benefits. They may also qualify for help with funeral costs from the Social Fund and may of course choose to provide security for their families by way of private pension or life insurance arrangements.
Asked by: Emma Reynolds (Labour - Wycombe)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people in Wolverhampton North East constituency have applied for advance payments of universal credit.
Answered by Lord Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
Applications for a Universal Credit advance payment can be made in person, by telephone or (since July 2018) online. For applications made in person or by telephone, only applications that are successful are recorded. To collect information on unsuccessful applications made in person or by telephone would incur a disproportionate cost.
Our latest internal management information data as of July 2018 shows that, nationally, over 60% of new claims currently receive either a ‘New Claim’ or ‘Benefit Transfer’ advance which shows claimants are getting the support they need. Data is not available at constituency level.
Asked by: Emma Reynolds (Labour - Wycombe)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent assessment her Department has made of the reasons why the level of unemployment in Wolverhampton North East constituency is more than twice the national average; and what steps her Department is taking to lower the rate of unemployment in that constituency.
Answered by Lord Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
The Office for National Statistics estimate between July 2017 to June 2018, with 95% confidence, that the unemployment rate in Wolverhampton North East was between 5.7% and 13.1%, with a central estimate of 9.4%.
Employment in the West Midlands is up by 78,000 on the year and 307,000 since 2010, to 2.78 million.
This Government’s Industrial Strategy sets out how we will build a Britain fit for the future – and help businesses create better, higher-paying jobs with investment in the skills, industries and infrastructure of the future.
Asked by: Emma Reynolds (Labour - Wycombe)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people in Wolverhampton North East constituency are in receipt of universal credit.
Answered by Lord Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
The latest available information on the number of people on Universal Credit by parliamentary constituency is published and can 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.html
Asked by: Emma Reynolds (Labour - Wycombe)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how much money her Department has spent to date on the development of the pensions dashboard.
Answered by Guy Opperman
Aside from the usual staff running costs, the costs to the Department to date for undertaking the pension dashboard feasibility study are around £100k. This covers the period from October 2017 when the Department assumed policy responsibility from HM Treasury, to end of August 2018 when I published the written statement.
Asked by: Emma Reynolds (Labour - Wycombe)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether it is the Government's policy to continue the roll-out the Pensions Dashboard; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Guy Opperman
On Tuesday 4 September 2018, I published a written statement providing an update on pensions including the pensions dashboard. This can be found here: : https://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-statement/Commons/2018-09-04/HCWS933/
We will shortly report on the findings of the Feasibility Study, and will engage with industry, consumer groups and other stakeholders to agree timelines for delivery.