Oral Answers to Questions

Tonia Antoniazzi Excerpts

Monday 21st May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Newton]

I am pleased that my hon. Friend took the opportunity to visit her assessment centre; I am always happy to arrange these meetings so that hon. Members can see at first hand what is usually a very professional, very compassionate assessment. But of course we want to go further and make sure that every assessment is a good assessment, and recording is definitely part of our plans for improvement.

[Tonia Antoniazzi (Gower) (Lab)]

Some 75% of claimants in Wales who appealed against decisions to reduce or stop PIP were successful; that is 8,000 people in Wales who have needlessly worried about having payments stopped. The Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Wales were unavailable to comment on this at the Welsh Conservative conference on Friday, but can the Minister tell the House when the Government are going to get a grip on this situation?

[Sarah Newton]

Some 3.1 million PIP decisions have been made, and 9% of them have been appealed and 4% of those have been overturned. I am absolutely determined to make sure that we make the right decision every time; we should get it right the first time, and we have put in place a whole series of actions to make sure that that is the case.