Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what proportion of current Personal Independence Payments recipients do not meet four points on a single descriptor on the daily living activities assessment criteria.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Information on the impacts of the Pathways to Work Green Paper will be published in due course, and some information was published alongside the Spring Statement. These publications can be found in ‘Pathways to Work: Reforming Benefits and Support to Get Britain Working Green Paper’.
A further programme of analysis to support development of the proposals in the Green Paper will be developed and undertaken in the coming months.
Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many Personal Independence Payment claimants there are in each (a) constituency and (b) local authority area.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Data on Personal Independence Payment (PIP) can be found on Stat Xplore. The requested data can be found in the ‘PIP Cases with Entitlement from 2019’ dataset. You can log in or access Stat-Xplore as a guest user and, if needed, you can access guidance on how to extract the information required.
For data on claimants in receipt of PIP by local authority area there is a pre-populated table with the latest data. For data by constituency, you can filter by using the ‘Geography’ filter to select ‘Westminster Parliamentary Constituency 2024’.
PIP has been devolved to Scotland since April 2020 and existing claims are currently being moved to the Scottish replacement benefit Adult Disability Payment.
Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to paragraph 139 of the Pathways to Work: Reforming Benefits and Support to Get Britain Working Green Paper, published on 18 March 2025, for what reason it is her policy that people should no longer be eligible for the daily living component of the Personal Independence Payment if they need (a) assistance to be able to cut up food, (b) supervision or prompting to be able to wash or bathe, (c) assistance to be able to wash either their hair or body below the waist, (d) assistance to be able to get in or out of a bath or shower, (e) supervision or prompting to be able to manage toilet needs, (f) assistance to be able to dress or undress their lower body and (g) supervision, prompting or assistance to be able to manage medication and, or, to be able to monitor a health condition.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We have committed to introducing a new requirement whereby, in addition to the existing eligibility criteria, people must score a minimum of four points in at least one daily living activity to be eligible for the daily living component of Personal Independence Payment. Our intention is that – subject to parliamentary approval – the changes will apply to new claims and award reviews from November 2026.
A high number of people get PIP by having multiple but low-level functional needs across several activities. These could individually be managed with small interventions or the addition of aids or appliances. This change will focus PIP more on those with the greatest needs, ensuring those who are unable to complete activities at all, or who require more help from others to complete them, still get support.
Through the Green Paper we are consulting on how best to support those who may lose any entitlement because of this change.
Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the total value is of grants provided by her Department under the Access to Work scheme in each financial year since 2020-21; and how much her Department plans to provide in the (a) 2025-26 and (b) 2026-27 financial years.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The most recently available data on Access to Work (AtW) outturn expenditure is available in the Access to Work official statistics. Expenditure on Access to Work elements, for financial years 2020/21 to 2023/24 was:
Financial year | 2020/21 | 2021/22 | 2022/23 | 2023/24 |
Nominal Terms | £106,624,000 | £147,717,000 | £179,679,000 | £255,171,000 |
Real Terms (2023/24 prices) | £120,536,000 | £167,867,000 | £190,777,000 | £255,171,000 |
This includes expenditure on all AtW elements, including the Mental Health Support Service (MHSS), but excludes expenditure on the Transitional Employer Support Grant (TESG). Further information on AtW expenditure, including breakdowns of expenditure by AtW element type, is published in the Access to Work official statistics and currently covers financial years 2007/08 through to 2023/24.
The most recently available data on AtW grant expenditure forecast under the current policy is published here for 2025/26 and 2026/27: Access to Work grant expenditure forecasts - GOV.UK. These figures do not align with figures from the AtW official statistics as they exclude grant expenditure on MHSS and include expenditure on TESG.
The department has budgeted £385m for grants in 2025/26 based on the current expenditure forecast. The budget for 2026/27 has not been set.
The budget is subject to significant change due to the uncertainty in the forecast and based on affordability and departmental funding pressures
Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if she will open a public consultation on the measures not being consulted on in Annex A of her Department's Pathways to Work: Reforming Benefits and Support to Get Britain Working Green Paper, published on 18 March 2025.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We urgently need reform to stop people from falling into inactivity, restore trust and fairness in the system and protect disabled people. There are some measures announced in the Pathways to Work Green Paper on the 18 March 2025 that we will not be consulting on.
Key reforms to improve the system, such as our ‘Pathways to Work’ support offer, reducing assessments for those with severe conditions and recording assessments, are needed urgently and not consulted on in this Green Paper.
This also includes changes to PIP. It is right that we bring this forward via Primary Legislation so that Parliament can fully debate and vote on these changes. In the Green Paper, we are consulting on how best to support those who are affected by this change, and we intend to launch a wider review of the PIP assessment. We will bring together a range of experts, stakeholders and people with lived experience to consider how best to do this.
Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps she is taking to ensure that people with multiple sclerosis are supported through the Personal Independence Payment system.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
It is important that all claimants to Personal Independence Payment (PIP) are able to access our services and that they do not face obstacles in applying and communicating with the Department and its providers. We have a variety of reasonable adjustments to make the claims process and communications easier for some of our most vulnerable customers.
The process is kept under continual review to ensure it meets the needs of claimants and helps the Department provide an accurate assessment of an individual’s entitlement. Since PIP was created, the Department has introduced, for example, dial-in-for third parties, a digital PIP 2 questionnaire and evidence upload function, email as a reasonable adjustment and telephone and video assessments in addition to paper-based and face-to-face assessments.
In the Green Paper Pathways to Work: Reforming Benefits and Support to Get Britain Working published on 18 March we outline plans to improve the experience for people who use the health and disability benefits system, including exploring ways to use evidence from eligibility for other services to reduce the need for some people with very severe conditions to undergo a full PIP functional assessment.
Over the longer term, the Health Transformation Programme is modernising health and disability benefit services to improve the customer experience. The Programme will transform the entire PIP service, introducing an option to apply and track applications online.
We are exploring a case management model - a personalised approach for customers from initial contact through to the end of the application, including signposting to other benefits and services. This approach will help the Programme to better understand our customers, tailor their service, and help to build customer confidence and trust that their case is being progressed appropriately.
Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether her Department has made an assessment of the potential impact of welfare reform on people with multiple sclerosis.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Information on the impacts of the Pathways to Work Green Paper will be published in due course with some information published this week alongside the Spring Statement.
A further programme of analysis to support development of the proposals in the Green Paper will be developed and undertaken in the coming months.
Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps she is taking to ensure that changes to the Work Capability Assessment prevent disabled people from entering poverty.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Health and Disability Green Paper published on 18th March 2025 outlines why we think removing the Work Capability Assessment and moving to using an amended version of the PIP assessment to determine what financial support people receive for health and disability in the Universal Credit system is the correct decision for the reformed system. We will be publishing estimated impacts on claimants for the changes announced on 18 March 2025 on the day of the Spring Statement or shortly after.
We understand that for some people, work is simply not possible. We will work through how, without a WCA, these people can be identified and appropriate protections put in place, such as considering award reviews. Engagement with employment support will be determined on a personal basis, according to needs.
Following the Green Paper consultation, we will bring forwards a White Paper in autumn 2025 to set out our full proposals.
Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the average Personal Independence Payment was in the 2023-24 financial year, broken down by (a) total, (b) daily living part and (c) mobility part.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The average weekly Personal Independence Payment (PIP) award for the 2023-24 financial year can be found in the table below.
Average Weekly PIP Award | ||
(a) Total | (b) Daily Living Component | (c) Mobility Component |
£126 | £83 | £44 |
Source: PIP Administrative Data
Notes:
Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if she will make an estimate of the number and proportion of disabled households that will be in poverty by financial year (a) 2025-26, (b) 2026-27, (c) 2027-28 and (d) 2028-29.
Answered by Alison McGovern - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Making an estimate of future disability poverty rates is difficult to do robustly. It would involve both projecting forward the impact of economic conditions on every household’s income and individual circumstance, and future trends in disability prevalence and distribution.
Statistics on the number of people in families with a disabled person are published annually in the Households Below Average Income (HBAI) statistics publication, available here: Households below average income (HBAI) statistics - GOV.UK. The latest statistics show that in 2022/23 there were 6.2m (24%) people in families where someone is disabled in relative poverty after housing costs (AHC).
Data for 2023/24 will be published on 27th March 2025.