Employment and Support Allowance (Blackpool South)

(Limited Text - Ministerial Extracts only)

Wednesday 5th September 2012 Westminster Hall

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mr Mark Hoban)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Blackpool South (Mr Marsden) on securing the debate. I sense that this might not be the last debate that I will have deal with on this matter. I assure him that we are committed to continuously improving the work capability assessment and appeals processes.

Many people with disabilities or health conditions want to work, which is why our reforms distinguish between those who are able to work, those who could work at some point with the right support, and those who cannot work due to health-related problems. The WCA is crucial in ensuring that those people are identified properly. We believe that the principles of the assessment are right, but the system we inherited from the previous Government contains flaws that undermine its effectiveness.

The hon. Gentleman is right: new Governments have an opportunity to make changes. We have made changes. We inherited a flawed system, which we are reforming to ensure that we get it right. We have moved swiftly to put things right, and have worked closely with a wide range of organisations to do so. We are trying to identify where claimants need additional support to prepare for work and ensure that they receive it as part of the ESA work-related activity group.

We have a statutory commitment to review the WCA for the first five years of its implementation. In June 2010, we appointed Professor Malcolm Harrington—a highly respected occupational physician—to undertake independent reviews of the assessment. He has completed two reviews and is currently undertaking the third. Those reviews set out a series of recommendations for improving the assessment. We fully endorsed the recommendations and are committed to making the changes as quickly as possible. For example, we have improved the standards and consistency of decision making through additional training of Atos employees and the better use of evidence. The hon. Gentleman made a point about communicating the findings of assessments to claimants. We have improved the way in which we do that, by providing personalised statements that summarise the key points of the assessment and by ensuring that we implement the customer charter. We have also changed the claims process better to support the claimant at each step of the process and ensure that they understand what is required of them.

We are confident that the improvements we are making to the assessment following the reviews will ensure that we increase the number of decisions that are right first time and improve the service provided to claimants. In addition, we are working with the relevant charities to build an evidence base for changes to the mental function and fluctuating condition descriptors—known as the evidence-based review.

[Mr Marsden]

Will the Minister give way?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Hoban]

The hon. Gentleman spoke for slightly longer than 15 minutes and raised issues that I want to cover in the time available.

We are consulting on changes to the cancer provisions. Individuals being treated for cancer should be placed in the support group. Professor Harrington recommended increasing the time taken to conduct WCAs, which we have accepted. It should improve the quality of decision-making. We seek to tackle and reduce the backlog that has been generated—indeed, clearance times have improved since January 2012.

The hon. Gentleman asked about training for Atos employees. All health-care professionals are registered with a professional body such as the General Medical Council or the Nursing and Midwifery Council, and must have at least three years post-qualification experience. All the health-care professionals are fully trained in disability assessment. They receive comprehensive training, ranging from eight days for a doctor to 24 days for a physiotherapist, before being approved by the Department’s chief medical adviser. Once approved, all health-care professionals are subject to ongoing quality checks through audit, which the Department itself validates. Approximately 20,000 such checks have taken place this year.

The hon. Gentleman suggested that DWP decision makers were decision makers in name only, and had to follow Atos guidance. Let me be clear: they are decision-makers, and they are able to look at the evidence supplied to them and to make the right decisions. They are empowered to divert from the conclusions that Atos reaches. I hope that that reassures him; it is a proper decision-making process, not a rubber-stamping exercise.

The hon. Gentleman raised the important issue of access to assessment centres. There are 123 permanent assessment locations and an additional 25 sites are used on a casual basis. I understand that 27 of those sites do not have ground-floor assessment rooms. Where Atos identifies individuals who have mobility problems, we try to ensure that such problems are accommodated and we will offer an alternative assessment centre. We are aware of the issue and Atos is working to resolve it.

The Courts and Tribunals Service received over 181,000 appeals in 2011-12. That is a reduction of 8% on the previous year, but I assure the hon. Gentleman that we are not complacent and have introduced various initiatives to reduce that figure further. We will maintain a firm focus on decision making and continue working with the Courts and Tribunals Service to ensure that processes are as efficient as possible where an appeal cannot be avoided. The Department makes millions of social security benefit decisions each year, the majority of which are not appealed.

To give an example, more than 1 million decisions on new employment and support allowance claims were made between October 2008 and May 2011 following the receipt of work capability assessments from Atos. Some 258,000 appeals were heard against decisions that the claimant was fit for work, and the tribunal upheld the DWP decision in 161,000 of those cases. That means that only 9% of the 1 million decisions made by the DWP in that period were overturned by the tribunal service, which speaks for itself in terms of our approach to ensuring that we get the best-quality evidence and make the best-quality assessments.

One reason why tribunals overturn decisions is that claimants sometimes present new evidence at the hearing. I would ask colleagues and others to encourage constituents to provide the DWP with such evidence as early as possible, because that would enable us to review and potentially revise earlier decisions, and to provide the claimant with the correct level of benefit sooner. We want claimants to provide evidence from their GP or consultant as early as possible, rather than wait for an appeal. We proactively seek evidence from GPs, but they sometimes do not respond to such requests, and medical professionals who are entrusted with the care of claimants also have responsibilities in that area.

We are trying to introduce, from 2013, a mandatory reconsideration process for social security benefits, which will be extended to remaining benefits, including ESA, at a later date. The new process will help to improve outcomes. It will allow the DWP to provide a full explanation of decisions with which claimants disagree, encourage claimants to identify and provide any additional evidence that may affect decisions and enable the DWP to review and, if appropriate, revise decisions. However, if claimants still disagree with the amount of benefit in payment, they can appeal to the tribunal. We are trying to beef up that reconsideration process to avoid the need for people to go to a tribunal, because we recognise the time that that takes. We are also trying to work closely with Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service to improve feedback from tribunals to understand better why decisions are overturned, which will help us to make further improvements to decision making.

I am conscious that time is running out. I hope that the hon. Gentleman recognises that we inherited quite a poor situation from the previous Government. The issues are difficult to resolve, but we are making progress, which is why we have asked Professor Harrington to undertake reviews—two are complete and he is now doing a third. Our approach is to make continuous improvements to the process to get the right outcomes for claimants, ensuring that those who can work receive the support that they need to get back into work and that those who are unable to work receive the support that they need through the welfare system. We are committed to making improvements. That is the path on which my predecessor set out and which I will continue to follow.