Asked by: Bridget Phillipson (Labour - Houghton and Sunderland South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate her Department has made of the (a) proportion and (b) number of children living in poverty in each year since 2010.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
National statistics on the proportion and number of children in relative and absolute low incomes, before and after housing costs, since 1995, are published annually in the “Households Below Average Income” publication. This can be found using the following link: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/692047/children-hbai-timeseries-1994-95-2016-17-tables.ods
Asked by: Bridget Phillipson (Labour - Houghton and Sunderland South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether her Department plans to use the data it will hold on family circumstances through universal credit to provide more tailored support to parents in England on the types of childcare available to them.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
Universal Credit provides an unprecedented level of personalised support, which is tailored and managed through Work Coaches. Unlike the legacy system Universal Credit Work Coaches know each person’s case and have more tools than ever before to help people prepare for work and get a job.
The Universal Credit childcare costs policy aligns with the wider government childcare offer, which includes free childcare hours and tax free childcare. We are removing barriers to work by ensuring the childcare offers available eases the financial burden for parents.
In Universal Credit, we test and adapt the service as we go along, to ensure support is tailored accordingly for each individual, including parents. We have recently undertaken a series of nation roadshows for operational colleagues to promote both the childcare costs offer under Universal Credit and the wider government’s childcare offer. We continue to work with other government departments to ensure parents have the information they need to make the best childcare choice for their family.
Asked by: Bridget Phillipson (Labour - Houghton and Sunderland South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to the report entitled A Bright Start, published by Save the Children and the Centre of Social Justice in November 2018, if she will make it her policy to raise the childcare element of universal credit from 85 per cent to 100 per cent of eligible costs to support families on low incomes.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
The UC childcare policy aligns with the wider government childcare offer, which includes free childcare hours and tax free childcare. This offer means that reasonable childcare costs should not form a barrier to work.
The Government recognises that high childcare costs can affect parents’ decisions to take up paid work or increase their working hours. To overcome this barrier to employment we increased the level of support for childcare costs within Universal Credit from 70 per cent to 85 per cent.
This means that working families claiming Universal Credit can reclaim up to 85 per cent of their eligible childcare costs each month up to a limit of £646.35 for one child and £1,108.04 for two or more children.
Where upfront childcare costs or deposits may prevent a claimant from starting work, jobcentres have been instructed to use the Flexible Support Fund to support the transition into work. When parents have good reason for late reporting of their childcare costs, the Department is piloting a more flexible approach to enable parents to be reimbursed at a later point.
Asked by: Bridget Phillipson (Labour - Houghton and Sunderland South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether she plans to provide low-income families with financial support for childcare when that childcare is paid for.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
Universal Credit is more generous in terms of childcare costs with an increased level of support for childcare costs: from 70 per cent in legacy benefits to 85 per cent within Universal Credit.
We recognise that the upfront cost of childcare may cause some claimants financial difficulty. Consequently, the Secretary of State announced in her speech of 11 January 2019, that where the initial month’s childcare costs may prevent a claimant from starting work, jobcentres have been instructed to use the Flexible Support Fund to help smooth this transition. Furthermore, when parents have good reason for not reporting their childcare costs immediately, the Department will be more flexible to enable parents to be reimbursed at a later point.
The Government now provides more support than ever before to help parents with the costs of childcare, including providing 15 hours a week of free childcare in England for all 3 and 4 year olds and disadvantaged 2 year olds, and doubling free childcare available for working parents of 3 and 4 year olds to 30 hours a week.
Asked by: Bridget Phillipson (Labour - Houghton and Sunderland South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether she has made an assessment of the effect of universal credit on people's ability to pay upfront childcare costs without incurring debt.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
Universal Credit is more generous in terms of childcare costs with an increased level of support for childcare costs: from 70 per cent in legacy benefits to 85 per cent within Universal Credit.
We recognise that the upfront cost of childcare may cause some claimants financial difficulty. Consequently, the Secretary of State announced in her speech of 11 January 2019, that where the initial month’s childcare costs may prevent a claimant from starting work, jobcentres have been instructed to use the Flexible Support Fund to help smooth this transition. Furthermore, when parents have good reason for not reporting their childcare costs immediately, the Department will be more flexible to enable parents to be reimbursed at a later point.
The Government now provides more support than ever before to help parents with the costs of childcare, including providing 15 hours a week of free childcare in England for all 3 and 4 year olds and disadvantaged 2 year olds, and doubling free childcare available for working parents of 3 and 4 year olds to 30 hours a week.
Asked by: Bridget Phillipson (Labour - Houghton and Sunderland South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps her Department is taking to increase (a) awareness and (b) uptake of financial support available to parents for childcare costs, especially among low-income families.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
As was recently announced by the Secretary of State in her speech on 11 January 2019, where the initial month’s childcare costs may prevent a claimant from starting work, Jobcentres have been instructed to use the Flexible Support Fund to help smooth this transition.
The Department is working to ensure that frontline staff are aware of, and promote, the additional financial support available to eligible claimants to help them with their childcare costs. Instructions on the use of the Flexible Support Fund have already been issued to operational staff across the country and further notices will be issued as processes are refined and updated.
Asked by: Bridget Phillipson (Labour - Houghton and Sunderland South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many and what proportion of contracts between her Department and charities include a gagging clause; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
These clauses do not prevent the contracting bodies from making statements critical of government policy or politicians, and certainly do not prevent whistle-blowing (as this would be unlawful). They are designed to protect government, to ensure that contractors adhere to good working practices and do not engage in activities that will bring the Authority into disrepute or otherwise harm the confidence of the public in Government.
Asked by: Bridget Phillipson (Labour - Houghton and Sunderland South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment her Department has made of the reasons for any late payments of universal credit in the last 12 months.
Answered by Lord Sharma
We published statistics on payment timeliness for new claims on 9 July 2018, available at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/length-of-payment-delays-for-new-claims-to-universal-credit.
Analysis of claims to Universal Credit that were due a first payment in April 2018 and received their Universal Credit entitlement late showed:
• More than a third had not completed their Claimant Commitment or verified their identity on time.
• Half had another form of verification outstanding, for example completing the Habitual Residence Test, verifying capital or submitting self-employed earnings.
• In other cases, the claim was assessed as having zero entitlement on the payment due date, however information received later meant that the calculation of entitlement was subsequently revised.
For claimants that received part payment of their Universal Credit entitlement on time, the most common reasons for full payment not being made on time were late verification of housing costs and late verification of details of children on the claim.
Asked by: Bridget Phillipson (Labour - Houghton and Sunderland South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to pages 8-11 of the report entitled Rough Justice, published by the Child Poverty Action Group in August 2018, what assessment she has made of the appropriateness of monthly assessments for the Work Allowance element of Universal Credit in circumstances in which a claimant receives their Universal Credit payment on the last working day of each month and receives their monthly pay from their employer twice within a single assessment period.
Answered by Lord Sharma
Universal Credit (UC) seeks to take earnings into account in a way that is fair and transparent. The amount of UC paid reflects, as closely as possible, the actual circumstances of a household each monthly assessment period, including any earnings reported by the employer during that assessment period, regardless of when they were paid or which month they relate to. Monthly reporting allows UC to be adjusted on a monthly basis, which ensures that if a claimant's income falls, that they will not have to wait several months for a rise in their UC award.