Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether he has made an assessment of the potential impact of benefit claimants receiving over-payments on their mental health; and what steps his Department is taking to support claimants that need to re-pay over-payments.

Where overpayments occur, we have a duty to recover taxpayers’ money as quickly and efficiently as possible, without causing hardship to those making repayments. DWP remains committed to working with anyone who is struggling with repayments terms and encourage anyone who is experiencing such difficulty to contact DWP Debt Management to discuss their circumstances.

Claimants who do contact Debt Management, are routinely referred to the Money Advisor Network, who work in partnership with DWP to offer free independent and impartial money and debt advice. We also remain committed to His Majesty’s Treasury’s Beathing Space policy, which provides those with problem debt the right to legal protections from creditor action for a period of 60 days to enable them to receive debt advice and enter into an appropriate debt solution.

In exceptional circumstances, where there are specific and compelling grounds to do so, a waiver can be considered. Full details on this can be found at Chapter 8 of the Department’s Benefit Overpayment Recovery Guide: Benefit overpayment recovery guide - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).