Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether she has made an assessment of the potential (a) merits of giving claimants the right to request an assessor with knowledge of their condition and (b) effect that may have on the number of claims settled after initial assessment.

The Department operates a robust quality assurance and independent audit process to ensure assessment decisions are consistent. We recognise that improvements could be made to the assessment process and we plan to publish a Health and Disability White Paper later this year following the views shared in response to the Green Paper published last year.