Asked by: Helen Whately (Conservative - Faversham and Mid Kent)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people had their claim rejected for (a) Universal Credit, (b) the State Pension and (c) other public funds due to having a no recourse to public funds condition in each year since 2020.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Persons subject to immigration control have no recourse to public funds and so cannot access taxpayer-funded benefits such as Universal Credit. Nationals of countries other than the UK and Ireland may have no recourse to public funds because either their immigration status prohibits this or they do not have an immigration status.
The table below gives the number of individuals who have been assessed as ineligible for public funds benefit due to being a ‘Person Subject to Immigration Control’, i.e. having No Recourse to Public Funds from April 2022 onwards (data is not held prior to this period). An individual can be a ‘Person Subject to Immigration control’ due to the conditions of their immigration status or because they have no immigration status.
Date Decision Entered on Admin System | Number of UC HRT ‘Person Subject to Immigration Control’ (i.e. No Recourse to Public Funds) Decisions |
April 2022 to March 2023 | 26,000 |
April 2023 to March 2024 | 35,000 |
April 2024 to March 2025 | 38,000 |
Source: DWP internal analysis of UC Dataworks tables, Rounded to the nearest 1,000 decisions.
Equivalent information for non-Universal Credit benefits is not readily available and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.
The new State Pension is based on National Insurance contributions and payments are not classified as public funds for immigration purposes. Entitlement for any payments of the new State Pension is usually dependent on the individual having a minimum of ten qualifying years of National Insurance when they reach State Pension age.
Asked by: Helen Whately (Conservative - Faversham and Mid Kent)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many people have had their indefinite leave to remain claim rejected because they have applied to lift no recourse to public funds.
Answered by Seema Malhotra - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
A person applying for settlement in the UK must meet several requirements. Not meeting those requirements will result in a refusal. Having their no recourse to public funds restriction lifted is not currently one of those requirements, so no one should have been refused on this basis.
Asked by: Helen Whately (Conservative - Faversham and Mid Kent)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many people have asked for their no recourse to public funds to be lifted in each year since 2020.
Answered by Seema Malhotra - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
Quarterly data regarding NRPF - Destitution Change of Conditions Applications and Outcomes is published in tabs CoC_01 – CoC_07 of the Immigration and protection data: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/immigration-and-protection-data-q4-2024
Asked by: Helen Whately (Conservative - Faversham and Mid Kent)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the Department for Health and Social Care's press release entitled Crack teams get patients off waiting lists at twice the speed, published on 16 March 2025, what estimate he has made of the associated impact on the reduction in waiting lists on employment.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
No formal estimate has been made of the associated impact of the reduction in waiting lists on employment. The Further Faster 20 (FF20) programme continues to support trusts within the cohort to reduce their waiting lists, helping people to return to work. An evaluation across all FF20 schemes will be undertaken and made available later this year.
However, we are clear that cutting waiting lists ensures that patients get the treatment they need quicker, supporting them to stay in or return to work wherever possible.
Asked by: Helen Whately (Conservative - Faversham and Mid Kent)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many households on Universal Credit had (a) five, (b) six, (c) seven, (d), eight, (e) nine and (f) 10 or more children since November 2018.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The latest statistics for the number of children in households on Universal Credit are available on Stat-Xplore for November 2024. As statistics for the number of children are only available from April 2019, the table shows the data for November 2019 to November 2024.
Total number of households receiving a Universal Credit payment, with five or more children in the household, November 2019 to November 2024
Number of Children | Nov 2019 | Nov 2020 | Nov 2021 | Nov 2022 | Nov 2023 | Nov 2024 |
5 | 10,841 | 20,591 | 26,136 | 31,310 | 35,124 | 48,956 |
6 | 3,136 | 5,879 | 7,753 | 9,348 | 10,278 | 14,899 |
7 | 860 | 1,649 | 2,221 | 2,689 | 3,053 | 4,812 |
8 | 286 | 564 | 736 | 914 | 995 | 1,822 |
9 | 83 | 170 | 269 | 288 | 337 | 668 |
10 or more | 40 | 81 | 114 | 169 | 184 | 424 |
Total | 15,256 | 28,934 | 37,224 | 44,712 | 49,972 | 71,580 |
Source: Households on Universal Credit dataset
Notes:
Asked by: Helen Whately (Conservative - Faversham and Mid Kent)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether she has made an estimate of the value of Access to Work claims waiting to be processed.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We have taken claims as those currently awaiting payment.
Estimating the value of outstanding Access to Work (AtW) payment claims would incur a disproportionate cost. To produce an estimate, each claim would need to be manually examined to determine the amount being claimed.
The number of outstanding payment claims currently stands at 21,304.
Please note that the data supplied is derived from unpublished management information, which was collected for internal Departmental use only, and have not been quality assured to National Statistics or Official Statistics publication standard. It should therefore be treated with caution.
Asked by: Helen Whately (Conservative - Faversham and Mid Kent)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many Child Tax Credit claimants were moved onto Universal Credit in each year since 2020.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The number and proportion of Child Tax Credit claimants who have made a claim to Universal Credit following a migration notice can be obtained from Stat-Xplore within People invited to Move to Universal Credit dataset.
Users can log in or access Stat-Xplore as a guest and, if needed, can access guidance on how to extract the information required.
Asked by: Helen Whately (Conservative - Faversham and Mid Kent)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the average time taken was to process Access to Work claims once an invoice had been submitted in each of the last 12 months.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We do not record, and therefore do not hold, data on the average time taken to process Access to Work claims once an invoice has been submitted. To determine this, we would need to review all claims processed over the past 12 months to compare the date each claim was received with the date it was processed. This exercise would incur a disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Helen Whately (Conservative - Faversham and Mid Kent)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what proportion of Child Tax Credit claimants have been moved onto Universal Credit.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The number and proportion of Child Tax Credit claimants who have made a claim to Universal Credit following a migration notice can be obtained from Stat-Xplore within People invited to Move to Universal Credit dataset.
Users can log in or access Stat-Xplore as a guest and, if needed, can access guidance on how to extract the information required.
Asked by: Helen Whately (Conservative - Faversham and Mid Kent)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the number of outstanding Access to Work applications was in each of the last 12 months.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The number of outstanding Access to Work applications in each of the last 12 months was:
June 2024 = 42,403
July 2024 = 48,270
August 2024 = 50,803
September 2024 = 54,530
October 2024 = 56,028
November 2024 = 58,112
December 2024 = 58,129
January 2025 = 60,427
February 2025 = 61,719
March 2025 = 61,674
April 2025 = 62,254
May 2025 = 62,907
Please note that the data supplied is derived from unpublished management information, which was collected for internal Departmental use only, and has not been quality assured to National Statistics or Official Statistics publication standard. It should therefore be treated with caution.