Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether delays have occurred in the roll-out of IT equipment across her Department since the first covid-19 lockdown was announced in March 2020.

Since March 2020 the Department has increased the number of colleagues with IT which enables them to work more flexibly, including from home, by over 50,000. This means almost 74,000 people in total now have kit to enable them to work this way, which is approximately 81 per cent of our workforce.

The Department continues the roll-out of IT kit as quickly as it can, delivering over 2,500 pieces of IT equipment a week to ensure that everyone in DWP is enabled to work flexibly by the end of March.

The roll out has been delivered according to a carefully planned set of priorities in order to keep our colleagues safe whilst keeping our services running and has been delivered to plan.

Some job roles can only be done in the office or individuals’ personal circumstances mean they do not wish to work from home - these colleagues will continue to use their existing desk-based IT. Where colleagues are required to work in an office, please be assured that measures are in place which follow all Government guidance on social distancing to ensure the safety of colleagues.