Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps her Department is taking to reduce the number of disabled people living in food poverty in (a) Coventry North East constituency, (b) Coventry, (c) the West Midlands and (d) England.

Answered by Chloe Smith

In 2021/22, we are spending £59 billion supporting disabled people and people with long-term health conditions, the highest ever level. The latest statistics for 2019/20 show rates of absolute poverty, both before and after housing costs, for individuals living in disabled families are down since 2009/10.

We are working to make sure that money spent on supporting disabled people and people with health conditions has a positive impact on their lives and we want to go further to support and empower disabled people and people with health conditions. Following the publication of Shaping Future Support: The Health and Disability Green Paper, published last year, we are actively considering changes that we could introduce to improve support for disabled people and people with health conditions. We will bring forward our proposals in a White Paper later this year