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, what the average response time is for cases that have been sent to tribunal.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The information requested is not readily available and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.
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, whether his Department publishes statistics on response times for cases that have been sent to tribunals.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
DWP does not publish statistics on departmental response times for tribunal cases.
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: Vicky Foxcroft (Labour - Lewisham, Deptford)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to his Department's publication entitled Modernising support for independent living: the health and disability green paper, published on 29 April 2024, if his Department will make an assessment of the adequacy of the existing mandatory reconsideration process as part of its potential reforms.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Modernising Support for Independent Living: The Health and Disability Green Paper explores changes that the government could make to the current PIP system to ensure support is targeted where it is most needed. These options include:
Mandatory reconsideration does not feature in the Green Paper.
Asked by: Vicky Foxcroft (Labour - Lewisham, Deptford)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to his Department's publication entitled Modernising support for independent living: the health and disability green paper, published on 29 April 2024, what assessment his Department has made of the impact of the potential options for reform on benefits spending.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We are looking at different options to reshape the current welfare system so that we can provide better targeted support to those who need it most. We are considering some of these options through our 12-week consultation which was published on Monday 29 April and will close on Monday 22 July at 11:59pm.
We encourage everyone to respond to the consultation which can be found here, so that we are able to hear from as many disabled people, people with health conditions, their representatives, and local stakeholders as possible on these important issues.
Asked by: Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Labour - Streatham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment she has made of the potential implications for her policies of the (a) outcomes and (b) experiences of women with HIV; and what steps she plans to take to reflect those in the next HIV action plan.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government is committed to ensuring everyone benefits equally from progress on human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), including women, as set out in our HIV Action Plan. In collaboration with the UK Health Security Agency, we are continuing to monitor the experiences of people living with HIV within the health and social care system, as well as within community settings, via the Positive Voices survey. Data from the latest Positive Voices report, published in January 2024, revealed that HIV treatment and care service provision has continued to be highly rated and equitable across the country.
We are encouraged by the progress made to date by the HIV Action Plan, driven by excellent leadership and joint efforts with partners across the system. We will be working closely together with our HIV Action Plan Implementation Steering Group partners and other key stakeholders, to understand the data trends and agree on the most effective strategies to continue driving our way forward. We will be considering and sharing next steps for the HIV Action Plan shortly.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether he has made an assessment of the potential impact of benefit claimants receiving over-payments on their mental health; and what steps his Department is taking to support claimants that need to re-pay over-payments.
Answered by Paul Maynard - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
Where overpayments occur, we have a duty to recover taxpayers’ money as quickly and efficiently as possible, without causing hardship to those making repayments. DWP remains committed to working with anyone who is struggling with repayments terms and encourage anyone who is experiencing such difficulty to contact DWP Debt Management to discuss their circumstances.
Claimants who do contact Debt Management, are routinely referred to the Money Advisor Network, who work in partnership with DWP to offer free independent and impartial money and debt advice. We also remain committed to His Majesty’s Treasury’s Beathing Space policy, which provides those with problem debt the right to legal protections from creditor action for a period of 60 days to enable them to receive debt advice and enter into an appropriate debt solution.
In exceptional circumstances, where there are specific and compelling grounds to do so, a waiver can be considered. Full details on this can be found at Chapter 8 of the Department’s Benefit Overpayment Recovery Guide: Benefit overpayment recovery guide - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
Asked by: Vicky Foxcroft (Labour - Lewisham, Deptford)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what progress his Department has made on the Health Transformation Programme.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Government is committed to continuously improving support for disabled people and people with health conditions, including through the Health Transformation Programme which is modernising Health and Disability benefit services to create a more efficient service and a improved claimant experience, reducing the time it takes to process a claim and improving trust in our services and decisions.
The department has started to publish HTP management information (MI). On 19 December 2023, the department published the first in a new series; publication of this MI will continue quarterly in line with the PIP Official Statistics release schedule. This can be found here.
The Programme published its Evaluation Strategy on 25th May 2023 here.
The National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Committee published reports in 2023 on the Health Transformation Programme.
Transforming health assessments for disability benefits (nao.org.uk)
Revising health assessments for disability benefits (parliament.uk)
Asked by: Marsha De Cordova (Labour - Battersea)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps he is taking to ensure that disabled people receive adequate financial support through the benefit system; and with reference to the advance unedited report from the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities entitled Report on follow-up to the inquiry concerning the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, published on 22 March 2024, if he will take steps to implement human rights-based cumulative impact assessments of the potential impact of welfare reforms on disabled people.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
As requested by the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the Government will submit a report by March 2029 with information on how we are implementing the Committee’s recommendations outlined in their latest report published in April 2024. The Government, through the Disability Unit in the Cabinet Office, has already begun considering the recommendations from this report.
The Government continues to implement the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the Committee’s 2016 inquiry recommendations through many policies that improve disabled people’s lives.
These include the Disability Action Plan, the National Disability Strategy and providing unprecedented health and employment support through our £2.5bn Back to Work Plan as well as our Chance to Work Guarantee.
We are also improving the health and disability benefits system, enhancing the accessibility of homes and transport, and continuing other work outlined in our various published follow-up reports and in our dialogue with the Committee.
The Government is providing an unprecedented cost of living support package worth £108 billion over 2022 to 2025 which included £20 billion for two rounds of Cost of Living Payments. This support importantly helped to shield people from the impact of inflation, preventing 1.3 million people from falling into absolute poverty after housing costs in 2022/23.
Since 2010, the Government has overseen significant falls in poverty with 1.1 million fewer people in absolute low income after housing costs in 2022/23 compared to 2009/10
Asked by: Marsha De Cordova (Labour - Battersea)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to recommendation 90(f) of the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities' Report on follow-up to the inquiry concerning the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, advance unedited version published on 22 March 2024, if he will (a) review the Universal Credit system and (b) take steps to (i) identify the additional costs of living with disabilities and (ii) ensure that the level of social security benefits take adequate account of such costs.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
As requested by the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the Government will submit a report by March 2029 with information on how we are implementing the Committee’s recommendations outlined in their latest report published in April 2024. The Government, through the Disability Unit in the Cabinet Office, has already begun considering the recommendations from this report.
The Government continues to implement the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the Committee’s 2016 inquiry recommendations through many policies that improve disabled people’s lives.
These include the Disability Action Plan, the National Disability Strategy and providing unprecedented health and employment support through our £2.5bn Back to Work Plan as well as our Chance to Work Guarantee.
We are also improving the health and disability benefits system, enhancing the accessibility of homes and transport, and continuing other work outlined in our various published follow-up reports and in our dialogue with the Committee.
The Government is providing an unprecedented cost of living support package worth £108 billion over 2022 to 2025 which included £20 billion for two rounds of Cost of Living Payments. This support importantly helped to shield people from the impact of inflation, preventing 1.3 million people from falling into absolute poverty after housing costs in 2022/23.
Since 2010, the Government has overseen significant falls in poverty with 1.1 million fewer people in absolute low income after housing costs in 2022/23 compared to 2009/10