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 causes of the increase in Universal Credit claimants who are not required to work; and what steps he is taking to reduce the number of Universal Credit claimants who are not required to work.

The vast majority of the increase in the UC Health caseload is because the decision was taken by the last government to move sick and disabled people from Employment and Support Allowance onto Universal Credit at scale - a transition we inherited, along with a system where the incentives were wrong and health claims had been growing since 2019.

We’re determined to fix the broken system we inherited and are removing the financial incentives in Universal Credit that discourage work, and we have redeployed 1,000 work coaches to help thousands of sick and disabled people who were previously left without contact for years.