Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of enabling personal independent payment claimants who are appealing a decision to retain the use of their Motability vehicle until the conclusion of a Tribunal hearing.

To be eligible for the Motability Scheme, claimants must be in receipt of a qualifying benefit. To keep a Motability car, pending an appeal being heard, DWP would need to continue to pay PIP even though a decision had been made that there was no entitlement. Should the appeal not succeed, this approach would also have created a large non-recoverable overpayment - a considerable cost to the taxpayer.

However, Motability Scheme customers who leave the Scheme due to losing eligibility following a PIP award review now receive a £1,000 Stopped Allowance Payment from Motability providing the vehicle is returned within 8 weeks and in good condition.