Asked by: David Linden (Scottish National Party - Glasgow East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the midlife MOT review announced in the Spring Budget 2023 on improving the uptake of Pension Wise guidance.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The new digital Mid-Life MOT tool is designed to help people understand what their employment choices mean for planning for later life.
We will be working with employers and pension providers to make the most of this new tool for everyone.
Asked by: David Linden (Scottish National Party - Glasgow East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether his Department uses automated decision making.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department does use automated decision making in some services and processes, which allows us to improve accuracy, speed up delivery and free up colleagues’ time so they can support the people who need it most. Review or appeal options are built in to all DWP benefit processes, even where this is not specifically required by data protection laws.
The Department is always careful to process data lawfully, proportionately, and ethically with safeguards for the protection of individuals. DWP does not use Artificial Intelligence for automated decision making.
DWP’s Personal Information Charter explains how and why we use personal information and citizen’s rights and responsibilities.
Asked by: David Linden (Scottish National Party - Glasgow East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, when he plans to respond to email correspondence of 22 February, 22 March and 5 April 2023 from the hon. Member for Glasgow East, reference MC2023/14561.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
A reply to the correspondence from the hon. Member was sent on 21 April.
Asked by: David Linden (Scottish National Party - Glasgow East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to his Department's prior information notice of 5 April on Additional Healthcare Capacity, reference 2023/S 000-009884, fow what reason additional capacity is required.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
This contract replaces an existing contract, which is coming to an end.
The Health Transformation Programme is developing a new Health Assessment Service through our Health Transformation Area. This is a controlled safe environment where we can develop the service at small scale, exploring ideas from claimants, stakeholders and DWP staff. The healthcare professionals who deliver WCA and PIP assessments within the Health Transformation Area, are directly employed by the DWP.
The new contract provides additional healthcare professionals, providing us with the flexibility to supplement the capacity as required to ensure we can continue to provide a stable service to meet the needs of claimants and to continue to test and build the new service.
Asked by: David Linden (Scottish National Party - Glasgow East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to paragraph 4.148 of the Spring Budget 2023, HC1183, if he will publish the error rate data which informed this policy decision.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
There are no plans to automate the decision making or the application of the sanction’s regime, which will continue to be undertaken by Work Coaches and Decision Makers.
However, feedback from Work Coaches tells us that to create the original referral form for claimants that missed mandatory appointments is very slow and requires them to manually input all the required information. Any data input incorrectly would invalidate the referral meaning any associated decision could not be progressed. So, we are automating the creation of this form. The referral form will then be reviewed by the Work Coach and submitted to the Decision Maker to take the ultimate decision, in the normal way.
We continually use a range of evidence to make improvements in our processes and in turn save taxpayers money.
Asked by: David Linden (Scottish National Party - Glasgow East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what discussions were held with the (a) Canadian Government and (b) Canadian High Commission in the UK on UK pensioners in Canada who had their pensions stopped in 2022 because of problems with life certificate forms.
Answered by Laura Trott - Chief Secretary to the Treasury
The Department for Work and Pensions confirmed in writing to the Canadian High Commission in London on 24 August 2022 that measures had been implemented to enable the clearing of life certificates by telephone and that pensioners who had been impacted were encouraged to contact the International Pension Centre. It was confirmed that suspended payments would be backdated and that the Department had extended the period in which Canadian customers could return life certificates because of issues with the Canadian Postal System.
Asked by: David Linden (Scottish National Party - Glasgow East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many UK pensioners living overseas received a letter from his Department stating that their pensions had been stopped because of failing to return a completed life certificate form.
Answered by Laura Trott - Chief Secretary to the Treasury
This information is only available at disproportionate cost to The Department for Work & Pensions as the Department does not have a business requirement for this information to be retained.
Asked by: David Linden (Scottish National Party - Glasgow East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to paragraph 4.146 of the Spring Budget 2023, HC1183, if he will publish the data which informed the policy decision to remove the couples Administrative Earnings Threshold.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Data is already in the public domain about the In-Work Progression Randomised Control Trial (RCT), which found that more intensive support delivered by Jobcentre Work Coaches helped claimants to increase their earnings. See link Universal Credit: in-work progression randomised control trial - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
It demonstrated the importance of the relationship between the claimant and their Work Coach, with more regular engagement more likely to result in positive steps being taken to progress.
Asked by: David Linden (Scottish National Party - Glasgow East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to paragraph 4.146 of the Spring Budget 2023, HC1183, if he will publish the data which informed the policy decision to increase the Administrative Earnings Threshold to the equivalent of 18 hours at National Living Wage.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Data is already in the public domain about the In-Work Progression Randomised Control Trial (RCT), which found that more intensive support delivered by Jobcentre Work Coaches helped claimants to increase their earnings. See link Universal Credit: in-work progression randomised control trial - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
It demonstrated the importance of the relationship between the claimant and their Work Coach, with more regular engagement more likely to result in positive steps being taken to progress.
Asked by: David Linden (Scottish National Party - Glasgow East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to paragraph 4.147 of the Spring Budget 2023, HC1183, published on 15 March 2023, whether an equality impact assessment of the proposed change to the work search requirements placed on Universal Credit claimants that are lead carers of children aged 1-12 has been carried out.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
We have carried out Equality Impact Assessments for the proposed changes to the requirements for lead carers of children aged 1 to 12 years.