Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people have (a) applied for and (b) received employment and support allowance, whose main disabling condition was recorded as Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis, in each of the last 10 years.

Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) was introduced in October 2008.

The available information is shown in the following tables:

Table 1: Number of individuals making an initial claim to Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) whose main disabling condition was recorded as Crohn’s Disease or Ulcerative Colitis, Great Britain, 2008 - 2016

Table 2: Number of individuals assigned to ESA Support Group or the ESA Work Capability Group following their Work Capability Assessment (for initial, repeat or IB reassessment claims), whose main disabling condition was recorded as Crohn’s Disease or Ulcerative Colitis, Great Britain, 2008 - 2016

Source for Tables 1 and 2: Application data is derived from administrative data held by the DWP and assessment data provided by the Healthcare Provider.

Notes for Tables 1 and 2:

1. The figures are rounded to the nearest 100. ‘–‘denotes figures that are zero or less than 50. ‘.’ denotes not applicable.
2. The information for 2016 is provided up to September 2016 only; this is the latest data available at time of request.
3. Data is available for ESA from October 2008 and for IB reassessment claims from April 2011.
4. An individual may have made more than one ESA claim or assessment in any given year. These individuals will only be counted once in each of the figures provided.
5. The primary medical condition recorded on the claim form does not itself confer entitlement to ESA. So, for example, a decision on entitlement for a customer claiming ESA on the basis of Crohn’s disease or Ulcerative Colitis would be based on their ability to carry out the range of activities assessed by the work capability assessment.