Asked by: Eilidh Whiteford (Scottish National Party - Banff and Buchan)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps the Health and Safety Executive is taking to ensure there is timely reduction in the backlog of safety-critical maintenance in the offshore oil and gas industry.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
The responsibility for any backlog in safety-critical maintenance in the offshore oil and gas industry lies with the operators of the offshore installations. The Health and Safety Executive is in dialogue with OGUK, the principal industry representative body, regarding how best industry can track, report and improve upon its performance in this area.
The Health and Safety Executive has a programme of inspections of offshore installations. Examination of the standards of maintenance is a key part of the inspection programme and inspectors are empowered to require improvements where standards fall below legal requirements.
Asked by: Eilidh Whiteford (Scottish National Party - Banff and Buchan)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment his Department has made of the effect on women with a mental function problem of the different assessment recommended for them in its Work Capability Assessment handbook on risk of self-harm, suicide or other risk.
Answered by Priti Patel
The Department took its obligations under the Equality Act 2010 into account when making changes to the WCA handbook and recognises it has an on-going equality duty under the Act and is committed to complying with this duty.
Asked by: Eilidh Whiteford (Scottish National Party - Banff and Buchan)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what proportion of people sanctioned since 2012 have not gained employment and are no longer in receipt of the relevant benefit following the sanction period.
Answered by Priti Patel
The information requested is not readily available and could only be provided at disproportionate cost.
The information that is available, on the number of sanction referrals and adverse sanction decisions, in respect of Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) and Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA), is published and available at:
https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk/:
Guidance on how to extract the information required can be found at:
https://sw.stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk/webapi/online-help/Getting-Started---SuperWEB2.html
Asked by: Eilidh Whiteford (Scottish National Party - Banff and Buchan)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people in receipt of (a) employment and support allowance and (b) job seeker's allowance have been sanctioned since 2012; and how many such claimants (i) remained on the relevant benefit, (ii) gained employment and (iii) dropped off the system following the sanction period.
Answered by Priti Patel
The information requested is not readily available and could only be provided at disproportionate cost.
The information that is available, on the number of sanction referrals and adverse sanction decisions, in respect of Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) and Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA), is published and available at:
https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk/:
Guidance on how to extract the information required can be found at:
https://sw.stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk/webapi/online-help/Getting-Started---SuperWEB2.html
Asked by: Eilidh Whiteford (Scottish National Party - Banff and Buchan)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people receive employment and support allowance in the work-related activity group on grounds of mental or behavioural disorders.
Answered by Priti Patel
The information available is in the table below:
As at May 2015 | Work Related Activity Group |
Caseload (Thousands) | |
Mental and Behavioural Disorders | 240.64 |
Notes:
The extract is as at May 2015 which is the latest data available.
Source:
DWP Tabulation Tool http://tabulation-tool.dwp.gov.uk/100pc/tabtool.html
Asked by: Eilidh Whiteford (Scottish National Party - Banff and Buchan)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether he plans to publish statistics on sanctions imposed under the universal credit scheme during the course of its implementation.
Answered by Priti Patel
The Department published its strategy for releasing official statistics on Universal Credit in September 2013. As outlined in the strategy, officials are quality assuring data for Universal Credit and formulating a definitive list of what statistics will be provided in the future.
These statistics will be published in accordance with the relevant protocols in the Code of Practice for Official Statistics.
Asked by: Eilidh Whiteford (Scottish National Party - Banff and Buchan)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what proportion of (a) jobseeker's allowance and (b) employment and support allowance claims were subject to a sanction (i) pre-challenge and (ii) post-challenge in 2013-14.
Answered by Priti Patel
The information requested is not readily available and could only be provided at disproportionate cost.
The latest Jobseeker’s Allowance and Employment and Support Allowance sanctions statistics can be found at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/jobseekers-allowance-sanctions
Asked by: Eilidh Whiteford (Scottish National Party - Banff and Buchan)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if his Department will automatically exempt people (a) who are homeless, (b) with mental ill health and (c) in other at-risk groups from benefit sanctions.
Answered by Priti Patel
The sanctions process encourages benefit claimants to do everything they can to find work. Evidence shows that they have a positive impact on behaviour – over 70% JSA & over 60% ESA claimants say that sanctions make it more likely they will follow the rules.
Jobseekers are only asked to meet reasonable requirements, taking into account their circumstances and capability, including mental health conditions, disability housing status and caring responsibilities. These requirements are clearly explained and agreed by jobseekers with their Work Coach and set out in their Claimant Commitment.
As we already have a number of flexibilities in place, we will not be automatically exempting people who are homeless, who have mental health issues, or other vulnerable groups from benefit sanctions.
Asked by: Eilidh Whiteford (Scottish National Party - Banff and Buchan)
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 reasons for which the jobseeker's allowance claimant rate is falling faster than the unemployment rate; and what estimate he has made of the proportion of people eligible to claim jobseeker's allowance in 2013-14 who did not do so.
Answered by Priti Patel
It is not appropriate to consider Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA) in isolation because the roll out of Universal Credit (UC) means growing numbers now claim UC rather than JSA.
The Office for National Statistics publishes claimant count figures that combine JSA and those claiming UC who are not in work. This does not show the claimant rate falling faster than the unemployment rate. In fact over the past quarter the claimant rate has remained flat while the unemployment rate has fallen 0.3 percentage points.
Estimates of the take-up of income-related benefits in 2013-14 have already been published and are available at the following link:
Asked by: Eilidh Whiteford (Scottish National Party - Banff and Buchan)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what proportion of people in the social housing sector in Scotland will be affected by changes to the levels of housing benefit; and what the cost of such changes will be to the average household in Scotland.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
This policy was introduced because in some areas, increases in social rents have outstripped the increase in private rents.
The policy to cap social sector rents at the relevant Local Housing Allowance rate for the area from April 2018 only applies to a new tenancy or a tenancy that is renewed after April 2016. As such it isn’t possible to accurately estimate the proportion of those in receipt of Housing Benefit in the social sector that will be affected by this policy, as it relies on the choice of those taking out new tenancies.
The Discretionary Housing Payment scheme will be available to Local Authorities to protect the vulnerable.