Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and East Dulwich)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what (a) assessment he has made of the effect of the covid-19 outbreak on employment opportunities for people with learning disabilities and (b) recent steps his Department has taken to ensure that people with learning disabilities can still access employment opportunities during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
DWP has a range of initiatives to support disabled people, including people with learning disabilities, to stay in and enter work. These include the Work and Health Programme, one-to-one support and training through the Intensive Personalised Employment Support programme, Access to Work, Disability Confident and support in partnership with the health system, including Employment Advice in NHS Improving Access to Psychological Therapy services. In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, we have provided specialist employment support remotely, and made programmes easier to access.
Disability Employment Advisers support DWP colleagues by developing their skills to understand the interaction between individuals, their health and disability and employment, to help them to provide more personalised support, tailored to each claimant’s individual needs. They proactively share knowledge and information with work coaches about health and disability, national and local provision, services, training and employment opportunities.
Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and East Dulwich)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if she will make an assessment of the adequacy of statutory sick pay in covering individual weekly living expenses; and if she will increase the value of that pay to the European average during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
The current Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) rate is the legal minimum rate that an employer must pay to an employee; many employers have their own occupational health schemes. Our welfare system is not directly comparable with other European countries. The SSP system is designed to balance support for the individual with the costs to the employer and, as such, there are no plans to make this change. The Government has been clear in its commitment to support those affected in these difficult times and we have made a number of changes to the welfare system in the past fortnight to ensure people are supported in doing this. These changes include:
Together, these measures represent an injection of over £6.5 billion into the welfare system.
Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and East Dulwich)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the combined total value was of sums sought from insurers by way of NHS recoupment by the Compensation Recovery Unit for the last two complete financial years under both the Road Traffic (NHS Charges) Act 1999 and the Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Act 2003.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
The table below details the sums sought by DWP Compensation Recovery Unit (CRU) in relation to settled compensation claims from insurers by way of NHS recoupment for the last two complete financial years under the specified Acts.
Financial Year | NHS Monies Sought |
2017/18 | £200,386,425 |
2016/17 | £205,728,286 |
Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and East Dulwich)
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 the effect of universal credit on the financial circumstances of long-term resident EEA Nationals who no longer have worker status.
Answered by Lord Sharma
We have not made such an assessment but we continue to monitor our policies.
Within the 2016 EEA Immigration Regulations and 2013 Universal Credit Regulations, an EEA citizen who is no longer a worker or a self-employed person can retain the status of a worker whilst involuntarily unemployed. EEA citizens who are exercising a qualified right to reside, such as ‘retained worker’ status are eligible to access Universal Credit.
A link to the regulations are below:
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2016/1052/made
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukdsi/2013/9780111531938/regulation/9
Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and East Dulwich)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the total sum recovered via the Compensation Recovery Unit was by way of NHS recoupment under (a) the Road Traffic (NHS Charges) Act 1999, (b) the Health and Personal Social Services Act (Northern Ireland) 2001, (c) the Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Act 2003 and (d) the Recovery of Health Services NHS Charges (Northern Ireland) Order 2006 in the (i) 2016-17 and (ii) 2017-18.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
The DWP Compensation Recovery Unit (CRU) does not routinely hold data on the value of NHS recoveries broken down to the level of detail requested. We can however, provide the combined total value of recoveries achieved by way of NHS recoupment for the last two complete financial years under both the Road Traffic (NHS Charges) Act 1999 and the Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Act 2003:
Financial Year | Recoveries Achieved |
2017/18 | £199,331,172 |
2016/17 | £199,779,044 |
The DWP Compensation Recovery Unit (CRU) does not hold data on the total sum recovered via the Health and Personal Social Services Act (Northern Ireland) 2001 or the Recovery of Health Services NHS Charges (Northern Ireland) Order 2006. The Northern Ireland Social Security Agency (NISSA) operates primarily to deliver the above legislation and may be able to provide the information requested.