Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask His Majesty's Government how many complaints the Independent Case Examiner has received in the last three years (1) in total and (2) regarding child maintenance; and of those, how many were found in favour of the complainant.

ICE does not accept every case that it receives, for example, ICE cannot accept a case until it has exhausted DWP’s complaints process (premature referrals), nor can it accept those outside its jurisdiction.

ICE only considers complaints about maladministration or service failures and cannot deal with complaints about matters of law, that are, or have been, subject to legal proceedings, about how any of the businesses fulfil their responsibilities as an employer or any that involve the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman or the Northern Ireland Ombudsman.

Once a case has been accepted, if appropriate, ICE will attempt to broker a resolution with the customer before gathering all of the evidence relating to the case. Where resolution cannot be reached, evidence is collated, and an investigation is conducted. On the basis of findings made, the case may be upheld/partially upheld in favour of the customer or not upheld. The number of cases received, accepted, and upheld/partially upheld, is in the table below.

*ICE reviews complaints made by customers of the Department for Work and Pensions (which includes the Child Maintenance Service), Northern Ireland Department for Communities – benefits, pensions and child maintenance only, contracted DWP services and Pension Protection Fund.