Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether people who are in receipt of the Universal Credit health element who were not also in receipt of the Personal Independence Payment daily living component prior to the Work Capability Assessment being abolished will automatically lose their entitlement to the Universal Credit health element once the Work Capability Assessment is abolished.

Our Pathways to Work Green Paper set out why we are scrapping the Work Capability Assessment (WCA). We want to end the binary categorisation of groups and labelling as either ‘can or can’t work’. Instead, any extra financial support for health conditions in UC will be assessed via a single assessment – the PIP assessment – and be based on whether someone is receiving any Daily Living award in PIP, not on capacity to work. This will de-couple access to the health element in from work status, so people can be confident that the act of taking steps towards and into employment will not put their benefit entitlement at risk.

We are considering how any change of this kind could affect individuals who currently meet limited capability for work and work-related activity (LCWRA) criteria due to non-functional special circumstances; for example, those affected by cancer treatment, people with short term conditions that get better, women with a high-risk pregnancy and those currently classed as having substantial risk. Individuals in these categories may not be eligible for PIP, and therefore the UC health element, in the reformed system.

In the reformed system these groups will still be eligible for UC and for the proposed new higher rate Unemployment Insurance if they meet relevant eligibility criteria. Individuals who are nearing the end of their life with 12 months or less to live will continue to be able to access PIP through the existing fast track route (Special Rules for End of Life (SREL) to ensure we protect those who are nearing the end of their life, irrespective of the duration of their illness.

Further details on these changes will be set out in a White Paper in the Autumn.