Asked by: Nigel Evans (Conservative - Ribble Valley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether she is discussing reciprocal social security agreements with her Slovakian counterpart in the event that the UK leaves the EU without a deal.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
The United Kingdom is seeking to protect the social security coordination and reciprocal healthcare rights of UK nationals in the EU by reaching reciprocal arrangements with the EU or Member States to maintain existing rights for a transitional period until 31 December 2020 in a no deal scenario.
Asked by: Nigel Evans (Conservative - Ribble Valley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether she is discussing reciprocal social security agreements with her Irish counterpart in the event that the UK leaves the EU without a deal.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
The UK and Ireland have signed a reciprocal agreement which will protect the social security rights of UK and Irish nationals living and/or working in each other’s state when the UK leaves the EU. The agreement can be viewed at: http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2019/622/pdfs/uksi_20190622_en.pdf
Asked by: Nigel Evans (Conservative - Ribble Valley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 15 April 2019 to Question 242790 on State Retirement Pensions: Reciprocal Arrangements, which non-EU countries have made requests for reciprocal social security agreements with the UK since 1992.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Requests for social security agreements may be raised in formal and informal meetings and correspondence at both ministerial and official level. The Department for Work and Pensions does not, as a matter of routine, maintain records of such requests.
Asked by: Nigel Evans (Conservative - Ribble Valley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people were unemployed in Ribble Valley in (a) 2016, (b) 2017 and (c) 2018.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
Official Statistics, published by the Office for National Statistics and based on the Annual Population Survey, do not provide reliable estimates at this geography, due to the sample size being too small.
However, using the Labour Force Survey, the Office for National Statistics estimate the level of unemployment in the North West was 143,000 in the quarter to December 2018. The data shows:
Asked by: Nigel Evans (Conservative - Ribble Valley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the employment rate in the Ribble Valley constituency was in each year since 2016.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
Using the Annual Population Survey, the Office for National Statistics estimate constituency level employment rates at a 95% confidence level between a lower and upper bound. As can be seen in the table below, a reliable trend cannot be identified at this geography, due to the sample size being too small.
Asked by: Nigel Evans (Conservative - Ribble Valley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent assessment she has made of whether the benefits system is providing adequate financial support for young cancer patients and their families.
Answered by Sarah Newton
Children and young people with serious or critical illnesses such as cancer are able to apply for Disability Living Allowance (DLA) if they are aged under 16 (or Personal Independence Payment (PIP) if aged 16 and above).
DLA and PIP are both tax free allowances designed to contribute to the extra costs incurred as a result of long-term health conditions and/or disabilities. Children and young people in receipt of DLA or PIP can receive up to £145.35 a week. Entitlement to DLA and PIP depends on the effects that severe disability has on a person’s life and not on a particular disability or diagnosis. This is because people living with the same illnesses or disabilities may not necessarily have the same care or mobility needs.
Special considerations are made for children and adults who are terminally ill. Our arrangements recognise the particular difficulties faced by people who have only a short time to live. Claims are ‘fast-tracked’ and given immediate priority in the system and will be actioned as soon as they are received which is usually on the same day. The highest rate of the care component of DLA and enhanced rate of daily living component of PIP are awarded without a qualifying period. Legislation defines a person as terminally ill if ‘he suffers from a progressive disease and his death can reasonably be expected within six months’.
People over the age of 16 who are unable to work due to an illness or disability can claim Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) which has both a contributory strand accessible via a National Insurance contribution test and an income-related strand accessible via an income test. For cancer sufferers, a light touch evidence gathering process exists, to help determine eligibility. There is also a presumption that claimants receiving or recovering from cancer treatment will be placed in the Support Group which could entitle them to up to £110.75 per week, subject to suitable evidence from a healthcare professional such as a GP or oncologist.
Carers may also be able to qualify for Carer’s Allowance, which is currently £64.60 a week if they meet the eligibility criteria.
Asked by: Nigel Evans (Conservative - Ribble Valley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many outstanding cases the Child Support Agency have relating to the tracing of a non-resident parent.
Answered by Priti Patel
The information requested is not readily available and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Nigel Evans (Conservative - Ribble Valley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what plans the Child Support Agency has to work more closely with the police in order to pursue the debt of non-resident parents.
Answered by Priti Patel
There are no plans to work with the police in order to try and pursue the debt of non-resident parents.
We have at our disposal a range of strong enforcement powers, intended to ensure all parents fulfil their financial responsibilities towards their children. We are using all of the powers available to us where it is appropriate to do so. These powers include deducting maintenance directly from earnings, sharing information about non-compliance with credit reference agencies, instructing bailiffs to collect arrears or seize goods, forcing the sale of property, commitment to prison and disqualification from driving.
Asked by: Nigel Evans (Conservative - Ribble Valley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, in how many cases the Child Support Agency has been successful in pursuing the debt of a non-resident parent in the last five years.
Answered by Priti Patel
The Government set up a new Child Maintenance scheme in 2012 to address historic failings in the 1993 and 2003 schemes. The Child Support Agency stopped accepting new applications in 2013. The operational priority of the statutory service is to collect money for children who will benefit from regular ongoing maintenance payments today, rather than prioritising the pursuit of historic arrears in cases where the children have now grown up.
The number of CSA cases paying towards an arrears liability is given in the table below.
Quarter ending: | Number of Cases with an Arrears Liability | Paying Towards Arrears | % Paying Towards Arrears |
Mar-12 | 1,188,200 | 275,700 | 23.2% |
Mar-13 | 1,240,200 | 289,700 | 23.4% |
Mar-14 | 1,274,200 | 283,100 | 22.2% |
Mar-15 | 1,232,000 | 242,900 | 19.7% |
This and further information is available in Table 10 of the latest Quarterly Summary of Statistics which can be accessed online at:
Notes:
1) Data not available prior to March 2012
2) Figures are rounded to the nearest 100.
3) A case is counted as paying towards arrears if they had an outstanding arrears balance at the end of the previous quarter and no liability to pay regular maintenance over the current quarter but money is being received via the collection service, or if the full regular liability has been satisfied in the quarter and additional payments have been received.
Asked by: Nigel Evans (Conservative - Ribble Valley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what proportion of cases of complaints about gas safety are investigated by the HSE.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
Over five years 2010/2011 – 2014/15 the Health and Safety Executive has investigated 12,000 of 12,100 gas safety cases.