Personal Independence Payments

Justin Tomlinson Excerpts

Wednesday 31st January 2018 Westminster Hall

[Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hosie. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for North West Durham (Laura Pidcock), who clearly has a huge amount of passion about this subject. Although I would not necessarily agree with all of the stats she cited, it is important that we continue to do everything we can for those who are often among the most vulnerable people in society. Collectively, we will raise many examples and suggestions on how we can continue to improve the system.

I do not intend to speak for long—I have spoken in every debate like this for the past two and a half to three years, so I will try to avoid repetition. First, I want to make it clear that there have been mistakes. In any system there are mistakes. The hon. Member for Ashfield (Gloria De Piero) raised a classic example of a mistake. That should not have been the case; that is not designed to happen. If people need home visits, those should be a given. That was a genuine mistake.

There were claims that PIP was brought in for financial savings. The concept was actually designed under the previous Labour Government; it just happened to come in as we came into office. We are currently spending £3 billion a year extra, and that figure will increase every single year of this Parliament. That is not a cost saving by any definition.

Under DLA, only 16% of claimants got the highest rate of benefit, but under PIP it is 26%. Only 22% of people with mental health conditions got the highest rate, but the figure now is 66%. That is why we are spending £3 billion more a year, and rightly so. If someone with a mental health condition wanted to access the higher mobility rate, they had to be severely mentally impaired unless they had a physical disability, so only 12,660 people with a mental health condition accessed the higher mobility rate. Since the introduction of PIP, over 100,000 more people are benefiting from that rate.

[Ruth George (High Peak) (Lab)]

Does the hon. Gentleman not agree that in the impact assessment from May 2012 for the introduction of personal independence payments under the coalition Government, the objectives were to ensure that expenditure was sustainable and to save £2.24 billion a year by reducing claimants by 500,000 a year?

[Justin Tomlinson]

And the reality is that we are spending £3 billion more on supporting the most vulnerable people. That is partly because we have an extremely proactive Minister who, rightly, meets regularly with charities, stakeholders, individual users and MPs from across the House. I did the same when I was a Minister, and the system continues to be improved.

Finally, under DLA the higher rate was given for visual impairment at 36%, but it is now 79%. The system is not perfect and we need to continue moving it, but we can all access the stats from the Library. They are independent of the Government. They are the reality. That does not excuse mistakes or times when the system lets people down, but it is a fallacy to think that the old DLA system was better. It was not better, which is why the charities and stakeholders support the principle of PIP.

[Bill Grant (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend recognise that, taking the journey time for the end-to-end process, the waiting time has been reduced by 40 weeks to 13 weeks in the past four years? That has to be an improvement. There is a long way to go, but I am sure my hon. Friend would agree.

[Justin Tomlinson]

That is an important point. [Interruption.] There is an Opposition Member who favours randomly plucking stats out of the air. It is the official statistics, independent of the Government, that I am giving; our teams can go and research them in the Library. I shall give an example of a big difference being made. Those who are terminally ill now have their process speed-tracked and the decision is given within seven days.

I shall not speak for too much longer as many Members want to raise suggestions, but I want to address the question raised about lifetime awards. Under DLA 70% of claimants had a lifetime award, and when I became the Minister I thought, “That is sensible; it does away with the need for an assessment.” However, one in three people with a disability or health condition will have such a significant change within 12 months that their condition will have changed—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for North West Durham sighs, but for the majority of people—[Interruption.] Terminally ill people will be processed within seven days; I am talking about people applying for the benefit for the first time. Their condition will change within the first year—predominantly getting worse. If they enter the benefit on the lower rate and are put on to a lifetime award they will miss out on money they are entitled to. That is one of the most significant changes.

If someone enters the system on the lower rate, the system will try to estimate when they might be in a position to access a higher one, and automatically trigger that. That is one of the reasons why we are spending an additional £3 billion on making sure people do not miss out—and not just for a few years; there were cases of people missing out on money they were entitled to for 20 or 30 years.

I will conclude with appeal rates. It is always a worry, looking at those. The hon. Member for North West Durham claimed every case was wrong—and some were; we need to continue to improve the system, because there should never be a mistake. However, the evidence from those independent appeals is that those cases are ones where additional written or oral evidence has been presented. Something on which I agree with the hon. Lady is that we should be able automatically to get access to health records. There are data protection issues, and we would need to get the consent of the claimant, but if they were willing to do it we would all support that approach. It would make everyone’s life a lot easier and the system a lot smoother. There is also huge support for allowing the claimant, if they wish to, to have sessions recorded. Again, that can be used on appeal.

I encourage the Minister to continue her great work of engaging not just charities and stakeholders—the users—but Members of both Houses. I urge all colleagues in the Chamber, if they are passionate, have first-hand experience and have taken the time to watch an assessment and talk to the staff, to take up the Minister’s invitation to meet and engage. Let us collectively continue to deliver an improved disability benefit.

[Several hon. Members rose—]