Asked by: Natalie McGarry (Independent - Glasgow East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will carry out an impact assessment on the freedom and choice pension reforms.
Answered by Lord Harrington of Watford
Government has already assessed, and continues to assess, the impact of the pension freedoms.
In advance of the introduction of the freedoms a Tax Information and Impact Note was published by HM Revenue and Customs. This is available on the Gov.uk website.
An impact assessment was also published for amendments to the 2015 Pension Schemes Act which covered transfers from private sector defined benefit schemes. This is available on the Parliament website.
Looking forward, HMRC publishes quarterly releases on flexible withdrawals from pensions, and the Financial Conduct Authority also produces regular bulletins on retirement income market data. My Department regularly meets with other government departments, non-departmental public bodies, regulators, think tanks and industry representative groups to consider how industry and individuals are responding to the freedoms.
The Government committed in its response to the Work and Pensions Select Committee in December 2015 to publish findings from the Pension Wise evaluation research in 2017. This work is now underway with Ipsos MORI and the early findings covering customer experiences of the service were published in October 2016 on the Gov.uk website. Further publications from this programme will follow in 2017 including a comparison between users of the service compared with non-users to identify the impact of the service on understanding of the new pension freedoms.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many applications were made for short-term benefit advance and hardship payments in the last 12 months; and what proportion of such applications were successful.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
The information requested in relation to Short Term Benefit Advance (STBA) is shown in the following table.
October 2015 - September 2016 | |
STBA Applications Received | 202,083 |
STBA Primary Benefit Paid - (where the primary benefit has been paid negating the need for STBA) | 47,114 |
STBA Referred for Decision | 101,600 |
STBA Awarded | 98,826 |
% STBA Awarded against those Referred for Decision | 97.3% |
For context we have also supplied the number of claims which have been referred for decision and those which have not been submitted for decision due to primary benefit being paid.
Notes:
STBA Applications Received cannot be calculated using the totals of Primary Benefit Paid and Referred for Decision due to other categories being included that are not shown.
Only Working Age Benefits (i.e. ESA, IB, JSA and IS) are included in the above information for benefit advance applications as the number of applications received for State Pension Credit and Carer’s Allowance is not available.
Source:
STBA Applications Received, Primary Benefits Paid & Referred for Decison - Management Information System Programme (MISP). This collation is based on clerical counts submitted by the each Centre and is Internal MI which has been agreed for use in publications of Parliamentary questions and Freedom of Information requests.
STBA Awarded - Benefit Expenditure Business Information system
The information requested in relation to hardship applications and awards is shown in the table below.
April 2015 – March 2016 | |
Hardship Applications Received | 138,300 |
Hardship Awards Made | 123,200 |
Notes:
Source:
Hardship applications and awards - The numbers are collated from aggregate DWP MISP Management Information. This data is a combination of system and clerically sourced Management Information. As such it may contain duplicates and other inaccuracies. It does not form part of the official statistics outputs that are released by the Department in accordance with the UK Statistics Authority’s Code of Practice, and is subject to potential future revision.
Asked by: Owen Smith (Labour - Pontypridd)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to the Answer of 4 May 2016 to Question 35718, what his Department's combined legal costs were for the cases EE/2013/0145, EA2013/0148 and EA/2013/0149 heard at the First Tier Tribunal on 22 February 2016.
Answered by Priti Patel
The total recorded external legal cost of these cases up to March 2016 is around £94,000.
This case raised important issues both for the Department, and for the Government as a whole, with regards to being able to create a safe space for free and frank provision of advice to officials and Ministers. The Government remains of a view that this was a case worth pursuing as the principles here are important ones for the proper conduct of public affairs.
Asked by: Owen Smith (Labour - Pontypridd)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what his Department's total legal costs were in case EA/2013/0148/9 heard by the First-Tier Tribunal General Regulatory Chamber Information Rights on 22 February 2016.
Answered by Priti Patel
At the First Tier Tribunal on 22 February 2016 3 cases were heard together - EE/2013/0145; EA2013/0148; EA/2013/0149 . We can not break down the costs for the individual cases.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many and what proportion of applications for short term benefit advance were successful in the most recent 12 months for which data is available; and what reasons were given to those people who made unsuccessful applications in that period.
Answered by Priti Patel
Please see table below for Short Term Benefit Advance (STBA) applications and those which have been successful;
March 2015 - February 2016 | |
STBA Applications Received | 220,004 |
STBA Primary Benefit Paid - (where the primary benefit has been paid negating the need for STBA) | 48,750 |
STBA Referred for Decision | 110,303 |
STBA Awarded | 93,307 |
% STBA Awarded against Decision Made | 84.6% |
For context we have also supplied the STBA Applications Received and the number of claims which have not been submitted for decision due to primary benefit being paid.
The Department does not hold data on reasons for unsuccessful applications.
Notes
STBA Applications Received cannot be calculated using the totals of Primary Benefit Paid and Referred for Decision due to other categories being included that are not shown.
Only Working Age Benefits (i.e. ESA, IB, JSA and IS) are included in the above information for benefit advance applications as the number of applications received for State Pension Credit and Carer’s Allowance is not available.
Source
STBA Primary Benefits Paid & Referred for Decision - Management Information System Programme (MISP). This collation is based on clerical counts submitted by the Centres and is Internal MI which has been agreed for use in publications of Parliamentary questions and Freedom of Information requests.
STBA Awarded - Benefit Expenditure Business Information system.
Asked by: Ian Blackford (Scottish National Party - Ross, Skye and Lochaber)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what discussions his Department has had with the equity release industry on the potential contribution of equity release to supporting the income of pensioners.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
The Government has created the foundation for saving for retirement via automatic enrolment and the State Pension reforms and given individuals the freedom to use their own savings and access other sources of income or capital in the way that best suits their needs. The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics indicate that around 80% of pensioners hold some form of housing equity. However, people who might choose to access potential sources of income, such as equity release or flexible pension products, will need to give careful consideration to whether it best suits their needs and how it could affect their income and entitlement to welfare, both now and in the future.
That is why the government set up Pension Wise to provide information and guidance on how people can access their pension saving flexibly. Information is widely available in terms of how income and capital are treated in the means-tested benefits. Officials have held discussions with the equity release industry in May 2014 and February 2015 to explain the interactions between equity release and means tested benefits.
Asked by: Stephen Timms (Labour - East Ham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the reasons were for the recent changes in the proportion of resolvable Freedom of Information requests whose answers were fully withheld.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
This Department considers and responds to each request for information under the Freedom of Information Act, on its own merits. I can confirm that there have not been any changes to Departmental Policy in doing so.
Asked by: Louise Haigh (Labour - Sheffield, Heeley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what average time his Department took to respond to freedom of information requests in each year since 2005.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
The Government publishes statistics on the operation of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 within central government, including on timeliness. These can be found at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/government-foi-statistics
Asked by: Stephen Timms (Labour - East Ham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many Freedom of Information requests were (a) submitted to, (b) acceded to and (c) refused by his Department in each of the last five years.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
Information on Freedom of Information performance for the last five years for all Government Departments, including DWP, is routinely published on GOV.UK.
These reports are published quarterly and annually and include the number of requests received, acceded to and refused.
They are published at:
https://www.gov.uk/search?q=freedom+of+information+statistics+&tab=government-results
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many applications were made for short-term benefit advance and hardship payments in the last 12 months; and what proportion of such applications were successful.
Answered by Priti Patel
Please see table below for Short Term Benefit Advance (STBA) applications and those which have been successful;
October 2014 – September 2015 | |
STBA Applications Received | 228,039 |
STBA Primary Benefits Paid | 52,517 |
STBA Decisions Made | 110,000 |
STBA Awarded | 87,534 |
% STBA Awarded against Decisions Made | 79.6% |
The figures in the above table cannot be added/subtracted together due to each stage of the process incurring a time lag.
Definitions
For context we have also supplied the number of claims which have not been
submitted for decision due to primary benefit being paid and STBA decisions made.
The data provided is for Employment and Support Allowance, Incapacity Benefits, Jobseeker’s Allowance and Income Support.
DWP intends to publish figures on the number of hardship applications and awards separately.
Source
STBA Applications Received & Primary Benefits Paid - Management Information System Programme (MISP). This collation is based on clerical counts submitted by the Centres and is Internal MI which has been agreed for use in publications of Parliamentary questions and Freedom of Information requests.
STBA Awarded - Benefit Expenditure Business Information system.