Asked by: Melanie Onn (Labour - Great Grimsby)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps she is taking to support people affected by the potential closure of the Novartis plant in North East Lincolnshire.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
DWP offer a Rapid Response Service (RRS). This is a redundancy service designed to give support and advice to employers and their employees when faced with the prospect of redundancy. It is coordinated nationally by the National Employer and Partnership Team (NEPT) and is managed by Jobcentre Plus. Each Jobcentre Plus district deploy resources according to the situation and the requirements of the workforce. This service is available to be deployed in Grimsby and surrounding area should Novartis require support from Jobcentre Plus. The RRS is delivered in partnership with a range of national and local partners, including National Careers Service and local service providers.
The range of support available from Jobcentre Plus and partners may include:
Asked by: Melanie Onn (Labour - Great Grimsby)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment she has made of the trends in the level of unemployment in Great Grimsby constituency.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
The number of people claiming unemployment-related benefits in Great Grimsby has fallen by 45% in the last six years and stands at 3,406 as at February 2019.
Across the local authority of North East Lincolnshire, and the unemployment rate for North East Lincolnshire has fallen from 11.5% in 2010 to 6.4% in 2018.
The rate of unemployment across the UK is at its lowest since 1974.
Asked by: Melanie Onn (Labour - Great Grimsby)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps her Department is taking to reduce the level of unemployment in Great Grimsby constituency.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
Since 2010, the Office for National Statistics’ (ONS) Labour Force Survey data shows that the level and rate of unemployment has fallen in every region and country of the UK.
This Government is committed to providing targeted support for people so that everyone, no matter what their start in life, is given the very best chance of getting into work.
Jobcentre Plus is geared-up to offer advice to those claiming welfare benefits. Through Jobcentre Plus, individuals can get advice on finding a job; help with retraining or skills advice, CV and job applications; and access to thousands of new vacancies we record every day. They can also access a range of tailored opportunities to improve their likelihood of entering or re-entering the labour market, including demand-led training for higher skilled jobs in specific sectors.
Asked by: Melanie Onn (Labour - Great Grimsby)
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 effectiveness of universal credit in assisting claimants into sustainable employment in Great Grimsby constituency.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
The Universal Credit Full Service Claimant Survey shows that 9 months into a Universal Credit claim, 40% of claimants are working for an employer in a paid role, as opposed to only 23% at the start of their claim. People on Universal Credit spend around 50% more time looking for a job than they did under JSA and 86% of people on Universal Credit were actively looking to increase their hours, compared to just 38% of people on JSA. This is because they can take on more hours without losing their benefit. We cannot break this information down to constituency level.
Asked by: Melanie Onn (Labour - Great Grimsby)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that claimants of universal credit in North East Lincolnshire remain in sustainable employment when they find work.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
The Universal Credit Full Service Claimant Survey, published in June 2018, shows that 9 months into a Universal Credit claim, 40% of claimants are working for an employer in a paid role, as opposed to only 23% at the start of their claim. Universal Credit provides more help with childcare costs, a dedicated Work Coach and scraps the 16-hour ‘cliff edge’, removing barriers to work and progressing in work. The support provided by Work Coaches need not stop when the claimant finds a job, unlike the legacy benefit system. Claimants can access support from a Work Coach to help them progress their earnings and to ensure they remain in sustainable employment.
In her speech on 9 May 2019, the Secretary of State announced work which will develop support for Jobcentre Plus staff to enable them to have conversations with employers about the range of things that employers can consider to support employees to progress.
Asked by: Melanie Onn (Labour - Great Grimsby)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many kinship carers were affected by the benefit cap of (a) £20,000 and (b) £23,000 in 2017-18.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
The Department does not hold data which would allow us to identify capped households under Housing Benefit or Universal Credit, who are kinship carers.
Asked by: Melanie Onn (Labour - Great Grimsby)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many kinship carers that applied for universal credit were exempt from the two child limit in 2017-18; and what proportion of those carers were affected by the benefit cap.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
The number of exemptions to the policy to provide support for a maximum of two children for kinship carers up to 2 April 2018 can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/child-tax-credit-and-universal-credit-claimants-statistics-related-to-the-policy-to-provide-support-for-a-maximum-of-2-children-april-2018
The Government does not hold information about how many kinship carers were affected by the Benefit Cap.
Asked by: Melanie Onn (Labour - Great Grimsby)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what (a) training and (b)guidance has been provided to staff in her Department on the variation in the two child limit exemption for kinship carers and adopters applying for (i) child tax credit and (ii) universal credit.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
We have provided comprehensive training for all of our Work Coaches to ensure that they can effectively apply the variation in two child limit exemptions. The guidance which supplements this training was updated on 28/11/18 and is published in the House of Commons Library is called “UC Full Service Guidance ‘Additional Amounts for Children’”.
Asked by: Melanie Onn (Labour - Great Grimsby)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the average proportion of a person's net income is paid out in child maintenance by people in (a) employment and (b) self-employment.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
We have made no estimate of the average proportion of net income paid out in Child Maintenance. Child Maintenance is calculated using a set percentage of a Paying Parent’s gross income. The percentages used are the same for those employed or self-employed.
The calculation process and rates are set out in:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/how-we-work-out-child-maintenance
Asked by: Melanie Onn (Labour - Great Grimsby)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment she has made of the causes of the changes in the number of claimants aged between 16 and 64 in Great Grimsby constituency between April 2017 and April 2018.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
The number of unemployment related benefit claimants aged 16 and over in the Great Grimsby constituency was 2,885 as of April 2018 – up by 270 since April 2017 but down by 1,475 since April 2010.
The claimant count is currently designated as an experimental statistic by the Office for National Statistics as a result of the roll out of Universal Credit. Universal Credit full service expands the ‘Searching for Work’ conditionality group to cover a wider group of claimants, to encourage these claimants into work or to work more. This policy decision has the effect of bringing additional people into the claimant count compared to the pre-Universal Credit system and the number of people recorded as being on the Claimant Count is therefore likely to rise. DWP have published a consultation on developing a new measure for labour market performance over time. This can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/proposals-for-a-new-statistical-series-to-count-unemployed-claimants
Using estimates from the Labour Force Survey, the unemployment rate in the Yorkshire and Humber region is at 4.6% for the period January to March 2018 - down 4.9 percentage points since the period February to April 2010. The number of people in employment is 2.59 million, up 211,000 since 2010.
This is consistent with the continuing improvements in the wider economy. The UK’s unemployment rate is currently 4.2% and has not been lower since 1975. The employment rate in the UK stands at a record high of 75.6% and there are a near record 806,000 vacancies throughout the economy.