Personal Independence Payment: Older People

(asked on 15th March 2022) - View Source

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, for what reason (a) people over the state pension age who wish to claim Personal Independence Payments (PIP) rather than Attendance Allowance (AA) are not entitled to do so and (b) AA does not include a mobility component as PIP does; and if her Department will make an assessment of the potential merits of allowing people over the state pension age to claim PIP.


Answered by
Chloe Smith Portrait
Chloe Smith
This question was answered on 21st March 2022

The aim of Personal Independence Payment (PIP) is to focus additional help with the extra costs of disability on people who become severely disabled earlier in life and who, as a consequence, face limited opportunities to work, earn and save compared with other people. Once PIP has been awarded, and subject to the conditions of entitlement continuing to be met, it can continue in payment after reaching State Pension age (SPa), including the mobility component where that was awarded prior to SPa.

Attendance Allowance (AA) does not include a mobility component. It is normal for social security schemes to contain different provisions for people at different stages of their lives, which reflect varying priorities and circumstances. The rules for AA recognise that developing mobility needs is a common and foreseeable feature of the ageing process.

We have no plans to review these rules.

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