Asked by: Jack Lopresti (Conservative - Filton and Bradley Stoke)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what plans her Department has to introduce a mechanism into universal credit to allow claimants to move their review date, in order to avoid fluctuations in their benefit payments when there is no change in wages.
Answered by Will Quince
Assessment periods allow for UC awards to be adjusted on a monthly basis, ensuring that if a claimant’s income changes, they do not have to wait several months for a corresponding change in their UC award.
Earnings are taken into account in the assessment period they are received and in this way the UC paid to claimants reflects, as closely as possible, the actual circumstances of a household during each monthly assessment period.
The Department has been working closely with HM Revenues and Customs (HMRC) since UC went live in 2013 to support and inform employers who report payroll earnings, to emphasise the importance of timely reporting via the Real Time Information (RTI) system.
HMRC have updated their guidance to reiterate to employers the importance of reporting payroll accurately and the impact of reporting payments late.
Employers should already record on HMRC’s RTI system the date a salary is scheduled to be paid, rather than the date it is paid, where it is earlier due to a weekend, bank holiday or at Christmas.
Asked by: Jack Lopresti (Conservative - Filton and Bradley Stoke)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what levels of apprenticeships are offered by her Department; and how many apprenticeship starts there were at each level in each of the last three years.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The Civil Service has pledged an unprecedented increase in apprenticeships. Our ambition is to deliver 30,000 apprenticeships by 2020.
The level of apprenticeships refers to the educational level and range from level 2 (intermediate) through to level 7(degree).
| 2015/16 | 2016/17 | 2017/18 |
Level 2 | 247 | 668 | 200 |
Level 3 | 334 | 2577 | 928 |
Level 4 | 168 | 218 | 30 |
Level 5 | 2 | 0 | 90 |
Level 6 | 0 | 0 | 61 |
Total | 751 | 3,463 | 1,309 |
Asked by: Jack Lopresti (Conservative - Filton and Bradley Stoke)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how much land (a) her Department, (b) its agencies and (c) its non-departmental public bodies owns in (i) England and (ii) the South West; and how much of that land has been identified as being surplus to requirements.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The Department does not own any land. Agencies of the Department do not own any land. The Department’s only non-departmental public body to own any land is HSE. HSE’s land holding in England is 2,245,585 metres2 of which none is in the South West and none has been identified as surplus.
Asked by: Jack Lopresti (Conservative - Filton and Bradley Stoke)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what contingency plans her Department has made to support employees of GKN made redundant as a result of the takeover of that company by Melrose; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
To date, we have not been notified of any GKN employees being made redundant as a consequence of a takeover by Melrose.
If this should occur, they will be entitled to support through the Rapid Response Service and Jobcentre Plus Districts stand ready to deploy this as soon as it is required.
An outline of the service is below:
DWP offer a Rapid Response Service (RRS). This is a redundancy service designed to give support and advice to employers and their employees when under threat of redundancy. It is co-ordinated nationally by the National Employer and Partnership Team (NEPT) and is managed by Jobcentre Plus. Delivery partners include The National Careers Service, HMRC, Money Advice Service, local training providers, employers, and the skills bodies.
The range of support available from JCP and partners may include:
Asked by: Jack Lopresti (Conservative - Filton and Bradley Stoke)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what progress he has made on ensuring his Department processes applications for disability living allowance from young people with diabetes consistently.
Answered by Mark Harper - Secretary of State for Transport
In October 2009 DWP launched detailed guidance on childhood diabetes to support staff and improve consistency of decision making in this condition. This guidance was peer reviewed by expert clinicians prior to publication and is available online. DWP has been working with Diabetes UK and an external expert to update this guidance. Departmental case managers take all information supplied into account when considering the duration of care and mobility needs and base any decision on the particular circumstances of the young person with diabetes.