Asked by: Laura Pidcock (Labour - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many home consultations were (a) requested, (b) granted and (c) refused for work capability assessments for universal credit claimants in the last 12 months.
Answered by Sarah Newton
Information is not held on the number of home Work Capability Assessments (a) requested or (c) refused for Universal Credit claimants in the last 12 months.
However, I can confirm that over 1,000 home Work Capability Assessments for Universal Credit claimants were (b) granted in the last 12 months.
Asked by: Laura Pidcock (Labour - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to the oral contribution of the Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Family support, housing and child maintenance to the Work and Pensions Select Committee on 21 November 2018, what progress has been made on introducing implicit consent in universal credit for organisations offering support to claimants.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
We have had a number of workshops with stakeholders during which consent has been discussed. As we said in our response to the Social Security Advisory Committee, we will do further work on explicit consent. This activity will include working with claimants and their representatives to ensure the process works effectively for vulnerable claimants to access the service. We expect to complete this in the autumn.
Asked by: Laura Pidcock (Labour - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 19 November 2018 to Question 190938, whether (a) for a closed universal credit claim there is read-only access to the payment statements as well as the journal and (b) there is read-only access to all closed previous universal credit claims even after a new claim has been opened.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
In the event of a closed claim, claimants can still see their previous journal entries and payment statements in a read-only format.
If a claimant opens a new claim, this read-only access will no longer be accessible to the claimant. However, if a claimant, who has had a previous claim closed, needs to access their previous statements or their journal, a case manager can access them on their behalf and provide them with any information they might require.
Asked by: Laura Pidcock (Labour - North West Durham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what consultation his Department has undertaken on the level and appropriateness of parking fines on issued in NHS hospital car parks.
Answered by Stephen Hammond
The Department has not consulted on the appropriateness of parking fines issued in National Health Service hospital car parks.
The level and appropriateness of car parking charges at NHS sites is the responsibility of the local NHS trust. As set out in the NHS Car Parking Principles we have always made clear that staff, patients and their families should not have to deal with the stress of complex and unfair charges. These were based on discussions with interested parties including NHS trusts and patients’ organisations.
Asked by: Laura Pidcock (Labour - North West Durham)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment he has made of the accessibility of online visa applications.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
UK Visas and Immigration are rolling out a new application platform across all application routes. The new application forms have been built to comply with the Government Digital Service standard, which in turn ensures compliance with wider standards on usability and accessibility.
Extensive testing has taken place with real users of the service, observing how they interact with the forms and adapting the design and questions in accordance with feedback from those testing sessions. In addition, we offer Assisted Digital support for customers who have difficulty completing online immigration applications, for example, if they do not have the appropriate access, skills or confidence to complete an online application without assistance.
Support is provided over the phone or face-to-face in locations across the UK, in a library or other voluntary sector centre or by a home visit from a tutor. This service has been available since September 2017 to customers who are based in the UK and has recently been extended to include the EU Settlement Scheme.
Asked by: Laura Pidcock (Labour - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what estimate he has made of the number of people benefit from the free TV licence for over-75s in (a) North West Durham, (b) North East of England and (c) the UK.
Answered by Margot James
We do not hold this information. The BBC is responsible for the collection and enforcement of the licence fee.
Asked by: Laura Pidcock (Labour - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether her Department has to amend the Universal Credit (Managed Migration) Regulations 2018 after the conclusion of the 2019 test pilot.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
On 14 January 2019, we withdrew the draft Universal Credit (Managed Migration) Regulations 2018, and laid two new sets of regulations. The draft Universal Credit (Managed Migration Pilot and Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2019 will allow the Department to begin the managed migration pilot phase. This pilot phase is to ensure that our systems and processes are working well. We have committed to reporting on our findings from the pilot before bringing forward legislation to continue with managed migration.
The regulations for the pilot phase are subject to Parliamentary approval and will be debated and voted on in due course.
Asked by: Laura Pidcock (Labour - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to Autumn Budget 2018, whether the Department has plans to bring forward the two week run-on of legacy benefits for the universal credit managed migration pilot.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
In the 2018 Autumn Budget, we committed to allowing DWP income-related legacy benefits to continue for two-weeks after a claim has been made to Universal Credit from July 2020. This measure will give around 1.1 million households a one-off gain of approximately £200 between 2020/21 and 2023/24.
The Department has committed to supporting all claimants who are moved on to Universal Credit as part of the managed migration process. The draft regulations, currently before Parliament, will deliver on our commitment to provide transitional protection to those who are managed migrated onto Universal Credit without a change in their circumstances. The Department already offers a range of support to claimants who migrate to Universal Credit, such as advances worth up to 100 per cent of their indicative award. Claimants may also be eligible for the two-week Universal Credit Transitional Housing Payment.
The Department will be introducing a Discretionary Hardship Payment to support those claimants who will be managed migrated as part of the pilot phase. The power for Discretionary Hardship Payments is broad and could be used to pay the equivalent of the two-week legacy run on to the 10,000 claimants who will be moved to Universal Credit as part of the piloting phase and who are in hardship on account of the absence of the run on. We will also have the discretion to make payments if any other issues related to managed migration have resulted in hardship.
Asked by: Laura Pidcock (Labour - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to her oral answer of 7 January 2019 to Question 908384, Official Report, column 3, if she will published the updated guidance on real-time support for universal credit.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
We have worked with HMRC and employers to ensure that they are aware of the actions they need to take to reflect an employee’s earnings. Guidance was issued to employers by HMRC in December on Real Time Information reporting obligations for payments made early over the festive period.
The Department’s Universal Credit guidance for staff on earnings and the actions to take is regularly reviewed. Universal Credit guidance is published in the House of Commons Library and the Department is committed to refreshing this at regular intervals.
Asked by: Laura Pidcock (Labour - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps she plans to take to ensure that the 10,000 people selected for the universal credit managed migration test phase will not be worse off as a result of participation in that test phase.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
On 11 January 2019, Written Statement HCWS1243 confirmed our plans for a pilot phase for the managed migration of 10,000 claimants from legacy benefits onto Universal Credit.
The Department will proceed with care and attention to ensure that every single claimant moved accesses Universal Credit smoothly and receives the support they need during the transition. The draft regulations, which are currently before Parliament, contain provision to provide transitional protection to those who are moved through managed migration onto Universal Credit without a change in circumstances. This will ensure that these claimants receive the same level of entitlement to Universal Credit as they were entitled to on legacy benefits.
The aim of the pilot is to ensure that claimants on all legacy benefits, with a range of differing characteristics are successfully migrated to Universal Credit. The Department is currently working closely with a wide and diverse range of stakeholders to design the managed migration process and we are considering our approach to the pilot, including which groups or individuals we might begin to migrate first.