Asked by: Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask His Majesty's Government what information is provided to newly unemployed people about the availability of new style jobseeker's allowance (JSA); and what is their estimate of the number of newly unemployed people who are not entitled to universal credit and who have not received new style JSA despite meeting the contributory conditions.
Answered by Viscount Younger of Leckie - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
It has not proved possible to respond to this question in the time available before Prorogation. Ministers will correspond directly with the Member.
Asked by: Baroness Buscombe (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether the benefits system continues to recognise polygamy in social security regulations and, if so, why.
Answered by Viscount Younger of Leckie - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
Polygamous marriages are illegal in the UK
Universal Credit does not recognise polygamous households in the benefit system. Any adults living in the household would each have to claim as a single person on the basis of their own circumstances.
Benefits such as Income Support, Jobseeker's Allowance, Employment and Support Allowance and Housing Benefit do recognise a small number of polygamous marriages which took place in a jurisdiction where polygamy is permitted. This number is very small and declining, since the Immigration Act 1988, it has not been possible for people polygamously married overseas to bring second wives to the UK through the spouse visa route.
Asked by: Angela Eagle (Labour - Wallasey)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what percentage of new Jobseeker’s Allowance claims have been completed within the planned processing timescales by (a) nation and (b) region in each year since 2010.
Answered by Paul Maynard - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
Table 1 - Percentage of new claims that have been completed within the planned processing timescales by benefit.
| 2016-17 | 2017-18 | 2018-19 | 2019-20 | 2020-21 | 2021-22 | 2022-23 | 2023-24 |
Jobseekers Allowance | 88.6% | 86.8% | 80.6% | 53.1% | 82.5% | 87.1% | 67.8% | 58.7% |
Employment and Support Allowance | 84.6% | 85.3% | 73.3% | 96.1% | 70.9% | 42.5% | 47.4% | 39.5% |
State Pension | 87.9% | 73.7% | 86.8% | 86.7% | 76.2% | 45.6% | 72.0% | 96.2% |
Pension Credit | 71.0% | 55.2% | 53.4% | 44.8% | 88.2% | 74.3% | 45.7% | 77.7% |
Disability Living Allowance (child) | 96.8% | 96.5% | 96.2% | 91.3% | 92.1% | 35.6% | 4.6% | 3.5% |
Personal Independence Payment | 85.1% | 77.2% | 72.3% | 40.4% | 23.0% | 6.8% | 38.4% | 51.7% |
Child Maintenance Service | 82.8% | 87.4% | 88.3% | 91.6% | 84.3% | 84.3% | 79.4% | 79.6% |
Universal Credit |
|
| 80.4% | 85.2% | 90.9% | 85.7% | 84.4% | TBC |
Comments to note:
Service Performance Context:
Jobseekers Allowance
Employment and Support Allowance
State Pension
Pension Credit
Disability Living Allowance (Child)
Personal Independence Payment
Child Maintenance Service
Universal Credit
Table 2: Planned Timescales for new claims (current methodology)
Jobseekers Allowance | Within 10 working days |
Employment and Support Allowance | Within 10 working days |
State Pension | Within 20 working days of State Pension entitlement date or 20 working days of Initial date of claim if claiming after entitlement has started. |
Pension Credit | Within 50 working days |
Disability Living Allowance (Child) | Within 40 working days |
Personal Independence Payment | Within 75 working days |
Child Maintenance Service | Payment within 12 weeks |
Universal Credit | % Full Payment 1st Assessment Period |
Notes: The planned timescales detailed above relate to those used for the 23/24 financial year. The timescales and methodologies to calculate them have changed over time to reflect new processes, technology and demands on our services.
Asked by: Owen Thompson (Scottish National Party - Midlothian)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people under the age of 25 have claimed jobseeker's allowance for more than (a) one and (b) two years in each year since 2019 in Midlothian constituency.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Statistics for the number of people on jobseeker's allowance by age, duration of claim and parliamentary constituency, are published every three months on Stat-Xplore, and are currently available to August 2023.
Users can log in or access Stat-Xplore as a guest user and, if needed, can access guidance on how to extract the information required.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what proportion of appeals to the tribunals service in (a) Coventry, (b) the West Midlands and (c) England relating to (i) personal independence payments, (ii) employment and support allowance, (iii) jobseeker's allowance and (iv) universal credit were successful in (A) the most recent period for which figures are available and (B) each of the last three years.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
Information about the outcomes of appeals in the First-tier Tribunal (Social Security and Child Support) (SSCS) is published at: www.gov.uk/government/collections/tribunals-statistics.
SSCS appeals are listed into the hearing venue nearest to the appellant’s home address. The published data (which can be viewed at the link above) provide information about the outcomes of (i) Personal Independence Payment (PIP), (ii) Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) and (iv) Universal Credit (UC) appeals for hearing venues covering (a) Coventry, (b) the West Midlands and (c) England for the period requested.
The table below contains the requested information for (iii)Job Seekers Allowance (JSA):
| Coventry | West Midlands1 | England2 |
2019/20 | ~ | 27% | 39% |
2020/21 | ~ | ~ | 27% |
2021/22 | 80% | 42% | 28% |
Q1 2022/23P | ~ | 26% | 25% |
Q2 2022/23p | 0% | ~ | 17% |
Q3 2022/23p | ~ | ~ | 23% |
Notes:
SSCS data is normally registered to the venue nearest to the appellant’s home address. We cannot retrieve data based on the appellant’s actual address but can produce reports detailing the numbers of cases that were dealt with at one of our Regional centres or heard at a specific venue.
The proportion of successful appeals is based on the number of cases found in favour of the appellant at a tribunal hearing as a percentage of the cases heard at a tribunal hearing.
Data up to December 2022 in line with latest published statistics.
Although care is taken when processing and analysing the data, the details are subject to inaccuracies inherent in any large-scale case management system and are the best data that are available.
These data may differ slightly to that of the published statistics as these data were run on a different date.
1. West Midlands includes the venues: Birmingham, Wolverhampton, Walsall, Coventry, Nuneaton, Stoke, Telford and Worcester
2. Excludes SSCS Scotland Region and Wales Region.
~ Suppressed in line with official published stats
P Provisional, in line with published data.
Asked by: Jonathan Ashworth (Labour (Co-op) - Leicester South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many people in traineeships were in receipt of (a) Universal Credit and (b) Jobseeker's Allowance in each of the last 12 months for which data is available.
Answered by Robert Halfon
The table below sets out the data the Department holds on the number of trainees who started a Traineeship that month who were recorded as claiming either Universal Credit or Job Seekers Allowance. The data is for the2021/22 academic year, which is the last 12 months of full reporting available. Volumes are rounded to the nearest 10.
Month | Aug 21 | Sept 21 | Oct 21 | Nov 21 | Dec 21 | Jan 22 | Feb 22 | March 22 | April 22 | May 22 | June 22 | July 22 |
Universal Credit | 280 | 400 | 330 | 450 | 150 | 190 | 280 | 290 | 270 | 370 | 230 | 180 |
Job Seekers’ Allowance | 20 | 20 | 20 | 50 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 | low | 20 |
It is not mandatory for providers to state whether a trainee is in receipt of benefits when completing the Individualised Learner Record, nor is there a requirement for those claiming benefits to declare this information when enrolling on a Traineeship. This data may not be fully representative of the numbers of trainees in receipt of benefits.
Asked by: Jonathan Ashworth (Labour (Co-op) - Leicester South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what was the average amount of time between a person first receiving Jobseeker's Allowance and receiving a job offer, for people who gained employment in the past year.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The information requested is not readily available and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Neale Hanvey (Alba Party - Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what was the total (a) expenditure on and (b) number of benefit claimants receiving Job Seekers Allowance in each of the last five years, in (i) England, (ii) Scotland, (iii) Wales, (iv) Northern Ireland, (v) each local authority and (vi) each constituency.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The available information on the number of claimants who received benefits in the last five years, broken down by various geographies, is published and can be found on Stat-Xplore. Benefits include Universal Credit, Pension Credit, Income Support, Jobseekers’ Allowance, Employment and Support Allowance and Personal Independence Payment.
You can log in or access Stat-Xplore as a guest user and, if needed, you can access guidance on how to extract the information required.
Benefit statistics for Northern Ireland are published by the Department for Communities.
Asked by: Stephen Farry (Alliance - North Down)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether the (a) New Style Contributory Employment and Support Allowance, (b) Contribution-based Jobseeker's Allowance and (c) Income-related Jobseeker's Allowance will be uprated by the inflation rate announced in his Autumn 2022 Statement.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Yes, they will.
Asked by: Baroness Altmann (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask His Majesty's Government how much the threshold for (1) income support, (2) income-based Jobseeker's Allowance, (3) income-related Employment and Support Allowance, (4) housing benefit, (5) child tax credits, and (6) pension credits, has increased (a) in line with inflation, and (b) in monetary terms, each year since 1997.
Answered by Baroness Stedman-Scott
For the benefits listed there are many different rates. The tables in the spreadsheet attached show a selection of illustrative examples for each benefit in both cash and real terms.
Child Tax Credits are administered by HMRC and are not a DWP responsibility. Rates are therefore not provided here.