Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the average time is between a complainant (a) submitting an enquiry and (b) receiving a conclusive response relating to women affected by measures taken to equalise the state pension age; whether that average waiting time meets her Department’s target response time for such enquiries; and what the trend in such response times has been in each of the last three years.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Under successive governments, departments have set up complaints procedures.
The Department has a two tier complaints process which considers formal complaints about our service. As outlined on Gov.uk, DWP complaints processes encourages customers in the first instance to raise their issues with the office they are dealing with, as a business as usual contact, so we put things right.
If the customer remains unhappy with the response, they can escalate their concerns, which will be dealt with by the Complaints Resolution Team as part of the formal DWP complaints process. The complaint is independently investigated. Where cases cannot be resolved to the customer’s satisfaction, the customer can escalate their complaint to the Director General as part of the tier two complaint process.
Escalated complaints represent the final business review and response to the complaint.
Once a complainant has exhausted the DWP complaint process they are signposted to the Independent Case Examiner’s (ICE) Office if they are dissatisfied with the final response to their complaint.
Complaints received from women born in the 1950s and affected by changes in State Pension age are handled in line with the overall Departmental complaints process published on Gov.uk.
The role of the Independent Case Examiner (ICE) is to consider case-specific complaints of maladministration (service failure). The vast majority of the complaints that are referred to ICE are complex and require the circumstances of each case to be considered on its merits. Prior to the WASPI campaign the ICE Office routinely accepted in the region of 1,100 and 1,200 complaints for examination each year. At the end of February 2018, the Office had accepted 1,907 WASPI complaints alone.
In January 2017, the ICE Office took the decision to bring a lead case into investigation in order to familiarise itself with the issues underpinning the campaign. This investigation concluded in June 2017 – the ICE did not uphold the complaint. Whilst the Office has had no additional resource to deal with the WASPI campaign complaints, a dedicated team of investigation case managers was established (from within existing resources) in October 2017 to investigate this group of complaints. The ICE Office aim to complete investigation within 20 weeks of starting work on a case, the WASPI related ICE reports that had been concluded to date have been completed within an average of 9.75 weeks. To date, the ICE had not upheld any case specific complaints that DWP failed to provide adequate and timely information relating to the increase in their State Pension age. All final ICE reports explain how the complainant can escalate their complaint to the Parliamentary Ombudsman’s Office.
There are no plans to dedicate additional resources to investigating this group of complaints, as to do so would disadvantage other groups of complainants whose cases are awaiting investigation.
The Parliamentary Health and Service Ombudsman make final decisions on complaints that have not been resolved by UK Government Departments. This was set up in 1967 under the then Labour Government.
Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 8 February 2018 to Question 126646, what steps she is taking to ensure that staff at Child Maintenance Options and not just staff at the Child Maintenance Service are trained to give specific information about Variations in terms of the Maintenance Calculation Regulations 2012.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The role of Child Maintenance Options is not to provide advice, but to provide impartial information to support parents in making the most appropriate maintenance arrangement for their circumstances.
Child Maintenance Options agents complete a comprehensive training programme and have supporting guidance available to ensure they provide complete and unbiased information to customers, including information about how a child maintenance calculation is worked out and what information is taken into account.
Child Maintenance Options agents are trained to identify circumstances where a variation to the child maintenance calculation may be considered. If any such circumstances are discussed during the Child Maintenance Options conversation, the agent will tell the customer to raise it with the Child Maintenance Service when they make their application and to ask for a variation to be considered.
The nature of the variation is specific to each individual customer, and representations are required from both parties (Receiving and Paying Parent). Therefore, specific details are best dealt with at the point where the variation is applied.
Child Maintenance Service caseworkers who take applications to the statutory scheme are trained on the detail of the variations system so, in cases where a declaration is made the variation can be applied appropriately.
As part of the Compliance and Arrears Strategy the department is reviewing its approach to variations. Appropriate additional training and guidance for Child Maintenance Options and Child Maintenance Service staff, and additional material to raise customer awareness of the variation process, will be considered as a result.
Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of extending the 12-month time period within which a child maintenance agreement within a consent order cannot be overruled by the Child Maintenance Service.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The right of application to the statutory scheme of child maintenance by either parent where a consent order is 12 months or more old ensures that maintenance arrangements best reflect parents’ current circumstances. This aligns with the Child Maintenance Service’s annual review of the paying parent’s liability based on their latest available income figure. We have no plans to change the 12 month time period.
Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps she is taking to ensure the provision of adequate training on the variations system for Child Maintenance Options staff to advise members of the public.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
Child Maintenance Options provide impartial information to support parents in making the most appropriate maintenance arrangement for their circumstances.
Child Maintenance Options agents complete a comprehensive training programme and have supporting guidance available to ensure they provide complete and unbiased information to customers, including information about how a child maintenance calculation is worked out and what information is taken into account.
Child Maintenance Service caseworkers who take applications to the statutory scheme are trained on the detail of the variations system so, in cases where a declaration is made, the variation can be applied appropriately.
As part of the Compliance and Arrears Strategy the department is reviewing its approach to variations. Appropriate additional training and guidance will be considered as a result.
Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
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 effect on claimants of having their personal independence payments suspended while awaiting an appeal to the Upper Tribunal requested by his Department.
Answered by Sarah Newton
The payment of a tribunal’s award of Personal Independence Payment will only be suspended where the Secretary of State considers that a tribunal’s decision is wrong in law and that conclusion needs to be tested before the Upper Tribunal. Whilst it must be right not to implement the tribunal’s award during this period, if a claimant can show that this will cause them hardship then any suspension imposed can be lifted and payment made.
Whilst no assessment has been made of this policy, this is a long-standing process which has ensured that benefit is paid only when provided for in law.
Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps his Department is taking to promote entrepreneurship in disadvantaged communities in Scotland.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
New Enterprise Allowance is available nationally and has so far supported over 8,600 business startups in Scotland. Support for disadvantaged communities in Scotland is a devolved responsibility.