Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to his oral contribution of 9 January 2017, on health outcomes: work, what the evidential basis is for his statement that his Department will spend an extra £330 million on employment support for employment support allowance claimants compared with current arrangements under the Work Programme and Work Choice.

At Summer Budget 2015, the Chancellor announced a support package of £330m over four years to provide support for people with limited capability for work from April 17. In the Improving Lives, the Work, Health and Disability Green Paper we provided details of this new Personal Support Package.

The £330m additional funding is targeted at new ESA Work Related Activity Group and UC Limited Capability for Work claimants from April 2017 and will deliver a broad range of employment and health support. This will rise from £60m in 2017/18 to £100m in 2020/21.

In addition to the £330m announced at Summer Budget 2015, the 2015 Spending Review announced funding rising to at least £130 million a year by 2019/20 for the new Work and Health Programme. This will provide a new approach which builds on the strengths and lessons learned of current contracted provision including Work Choice and the Work Programme.

The 2017/18 support also consists of a number of trials and proofs of concept to build our evidence base of what works and we will evaluate these measures to build a robust evidence which can inform future years of funding.