Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate she has made of when the backlog created by the suspension of face-to-face health assessments for universal credit and employment support allowance claimants will be cleared.

Throughout the pandemic, our focus has been on supporting claimants to ensure they are assessed at the earliest opportunity. To do this, we have continued to assess claimants on paper evidence, where possible, and began undertaking telephone assessments from May 2020. In parallel, we also introduced a small number of video assessments.

Face to face Work Capability Assessments (WCA) resumed from 17 May 2021, initially for claimants we were unable to assess by telephone. We continue to work with the assessment provider, Centre for Health and Disability Assessments (CHDA), to maximise the number of WCAs completed and ensure claimants receive their correct benefit entitlement as soon as possible.