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 accessibility of her Department's Claimant Service and Experience Survey for claimants with hearing loss.

The Claimant Service and Experience Survey is a telephone survey conducted with 15,000 claimants annually across the 10 main benefits. Proxy interviews can take place where a claimant with hearing loss feels unable to participate, whereby a person answers on the claimant’s behalf or relays the questions to them and responds to the interviewer. We also offer a paper alternative version of the survey for completion upon request, which covers the key satisfaction questions used to report on the DWP’s customer charter areas. To make reasonable adjustment for a latest interview for a claimant with hearing loss, we are providing a face-to-face interviewer who will be accompanied with a BSL interpreter.