Business of the House

Philip Davies Excerpts

Thursday 19th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

We are very clear that the service provided by Concentrix was poor, and it was right that the contract was scrapped. HMRC has apologised, and it knows that it has to learn some lessons from that contract and what happened there. When it became clear that Concentrix’s customer service issues could not be rectified by Concentrix, HMRC took back 181,000 incomplete cases, and rightly redeployed hundreds of its own staff to deal with this work. All those cases were finalised by 3 November. HMRC has then also had to deal with mandatory reconsideration requests, of which 36,000 have been received, and it has allocated additional staff to that work so that requests can be dealt with quickly and payments restored where claimants are entitled to them. There may be an opportunity for a Back-Bench or Westminster Hall debate on this issue, further to the airing it has already had in this Chamber, but I think HMRC was right to give priority to the incomplete cases and to deal with those first. It is now proceeding as rapidly as it can to sort out the remaining mandatory reconsideration requests.

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

Can we have a debate on dementia? I am sure the Leader of the House will join me in congratulating Incommunities—the social housing provider for Bradford, which is based in my constituency—on training its staff to support residents with dementia. In such a debate, we could encourage other organisations to do the same. We could also find out what more the Government could do to help people who suffer from dementia—an estimated 6,500 people in the Bradford district are affected by it—and what further support could be given to their families, who have the difficult job of caring for them.

[Mr Lidington]

I hope my hon. Friend will have that opportunity, perhaps in Westminster Hall. I add my salute to those groups and individuals in his constituency, and in many others, who have highlighted the challenges posed by dementia and worked not only to encourage more people to become dementia friends but to ensure that we treat people living with dementia with the respect and dignity to which they are entitled and that they get the solidarity and support from their fellow citizens that they are entitled to expect.