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Written Question
Carer's Allowance: Overpayments
Tuesday 23rd April 2024

Asked by: Jessica Morden (Labour - Newport East)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people received fines for overpayment of Carer's Allowance in (a) 2020, (b) 2021, (c) 2022, (d) 2023 and (e) as of 1 April 2024; and what was the total amount of these fines.

Answered by Paul Maynard - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)

Claimants have a responsibility to ensure they are entitled to benefits they claim and to inform the DWP of any changes in their circumstances that could impact their award.

Overpayments occur when an individual receives a payment they are not entitled to. The fines imposed by DWP for overpayments vary depending on the circumstances of the overpayment.

Administrative Penalties may be offered by the fraud investigator as an alternative to a prosecution in certain cases where there has been benefit fraud or attempted benefit fraud.

The table below provides the volume and value of Administrative Penalties accepted due to an overpayment of Carer’s Allowance, by financial year.

Financial Years

Volume of Administrative Penalties

Value

2020/21

64

£114.4k

2021/22

43

£80.2k

2022/23

43

£81.3k

2023/24

75

£140.8k

For cases of claimant error, a £50 Civil Penalty may be imposed by DWP where an individual incurs an overpayment as a result of failing to provide accurate information and have not taken reasonable steps to correct the error.

The table below provides the volume and value of Civil Penalties given due to an overpayment of Carer’s Allowance, by financial year.

Financial Years

Volume of Civil Penalties

Value

2020/21

14.9k

£0.747m

2021/22

26.3k

£1.309m

2022/23

24.8k

£1.241m

2023/24

30.1k

£1.506m

Note that our latest figures show there are approximately 1.4 million people claiming Carer’s Allowance.

The data provided for this response is for the volume of penalties, and it is important to note that individuals can receive more than one penalty.

Data been sourced from internal DWP management information, which is intended only to help the Department to manage its business. It is not intended for publication and has not been subject to the same quality assurance checks applied to our published official statistics. Our analysis has not captured a small but unknown number of penalties that are logged as debts in their own right on the debt MI system. Our understanding is that this approach is rarely used for Carer’s Allowance.

More information about DWP penalties policy can be found here: Penalties policy: in respect of social security fraud and error - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)


Written Question
Financial Assistance Scheme and Pension Protection Fund: Inflation
Tuesday 16th April 2024

Asked by: Jessica Morden (Labour - Newport 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 potential impact of levels of inflation on the real term valuation of pensions under the (a) Financial Assistance Scheme and (b) Pension Protection Fund.

Answered by Paul Maynard - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)

The information required to carry out such an assessment is not readily available and to obtain it would incur disproportionate costs. The Secretary of State has therefore made no such assessment at this time.


Written Question
Universal Credit: Carers
Monday 4th March 2024

Asked by: Jessica Morden (Labour - Newport East)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether he has made an assessment of the potential merits of making the Universal Credit claimant commitment for kinship carers equal to that for foster carers.

Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)

No such assessment has been made.


Written Question
Personal Independence Payment: Appeals
Thursday 18th January 2024

Asked by: Jessica Morden (Labour - Newport East)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate has been made of the average length of time between submission of a PIP mandatory reconsideration and the decision.

Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)

The monthly average clearance time of a Personal Independence Payment (PIP) Mandatory Reconsideration (MR) can be found in the latest PIP quarterly release: Personal Independence Payment statistics to October 2023 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).

In particular, the figures on MR average clearance times can be found in Table 4A in the Customer Journey Excel.


Written Question
Social Security Benefits: Dementia
Monday 27th February 2023

Asked by: Jessica Morden (Labour - Newport East)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of making dementia patients eligible to claim benefits under the special rules for end of life.

Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)

People with dementia, who are deemed by their clinicians to be at the end of their lives, may be eligible to claim benefits under the ‘Special Rules for End of Life’ (SREL).

Eligibility under SREL is not determined by medical condition, but rather based on clinical judgment about patients’ estimated prognosis. The department’s supporting clinical guidance advises clinicians to assess whether they would be surprised if their patient dies within the next 12 months if they are claiming UC or ESA, or 6 months if they are claiming Personal Independence Payment (PIP), Disability Living Allowance (DLA), or Attendance Allowance (AA).

The Government announced in July 2021 that it intended to replace the current six-month eligibility criteria with a 12-month end of life approach. The DWP implemented this change to Universal Credit and Employment Support Allowance regulations on 4th April 2022 and similar changes will also be made to Personal Independence Payment, Disability Living Allowance, and Attendance Allowance in April 2023.


Written Question
Personal Independence Payment: Dementia
Wednesday 22nd February 2023

Asked by: Jessica Morden (Labour - Newport East)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will make an assessment of the potential impact of personal independence payment reassessments on the (a) physical and (b) mental wellbeing of dementia patients.

Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)

Entitlement to Personal Independence Payment (PIP) is assessed on the basis of the needs arising from a health condition or disability, rather than the health condition or disability itself. Award rates and their durations are set on an individual basis, based on the claimant’s needs and the likelihood of those needs changing. Award reviews allow for the correct rate of PIP to remain in payment, including where needs have increased as a consequence of a congenital, degenerative, or progressive condition.

We recognise that attending a PIP assessment can be a stressful experience, which is why we do not carry out face-to-face assessments where there is enough existing evidence to determine benefit entitlement, whether on a new claim or on review. Where there is sufficient evidence on which to make an assessment, the claimant will be assessed on a paper basis. Where a telephone, video, or face-to-face assessment is required, companions are encouraged to attend and can play an active role, which can be particularly helpful for claimants with mental, cognitive, or intellectual impairments who may not be able to provide an accurate account of their condition due to a lack of understanding or unrealistic expectations of their ability.

We announced in the Shaping Future Support: Health and Disability Green Paper, that we will test a new Severe Disability Group (SDG) so that those with severe and lifelong conditions can benefit from a simplified process to access PIP, ESA and UC without needing to go through a face-to-face assessment, or frequent reassessments. We will consider the test results once complete to influence thinking on the next stages of this work.


Written Question
Department for Work and Pensions: Written Questions
Thursday 19th January 2023

Asked by: Jessica Morden (Labour - Newport East)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what proportion of (a) ordinary and (b) named-day written questions their Department answered on time in 2022.

Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)

The latest official statistics produced by the Table Office are as follows and show that DWP answered the following Parliamentary Questions on time:

Jan 2022 – Apr 2022:

Named Day PQs – 83%

Ordinary Written PQs – 86.9%

May 2022 – Jul 2022:

Named Day PQs – 90.8%

Ordinary Written PQs – 93.5%

Statistics for September to the December recess are currently being compiled.


Written Question
Department for Work and Pensions: Complaints
Wednesday 7th December 2022

Asked by: Jessica Morden (Labour - Newport East)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many complaints submitted to the DWP Independent Case Examiner are awaiting allocation to an Investigation Case Manager as of 2 December 2022; what the average wait time was for complaints to be allocated to an Independent Case Manager in the latest period for which data is available; and what steps his Department is taking to reduce Independent Case Examiner waiting times.

Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)

Post-Covid, ICE has seen an increased number of referrals accompanied by an increase in the number of cases it has accepted. In the year April 2021 to March 2022, there was a 17% increase in the number of complaints being referred to ICE and a 68% increase in the number of complaints being accepted for examination, compared to the previous reporting year.

Currently, there are 1249 cases awaiting allocation to an ICE investigator.

The rate at which complaints can be allocated to an investigator is dependent on multiple factors, including the volume and complexity of complaints received, as well as available investigative resource.

The average time taken, as at 5 December, from complaint receipt to allocation to an investigator (based on all current live cases being investigated) is 53 weeks (67 weeks for CMS cases, 50 weeks for DWP cases, 44 weeks for Provider cases).

The ICE office is continuously reviewing its own processes and operating model to improve productivity and is piloting a new way of allocating cases according to their nature and complexity as part of the initial complaint review.

The office has recruited 11 more investigators since April with a further 6 due to start in January 2023.


Written Question
Pension Credit: Take-up
Monday 14th November 2022

Asked by: Jessica Morden (Labour - Newport East)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what proportion of eligible people were claiming Pension Credit in (a) 2018, (b) 2019, (c) 2020, (d) 2021 and (e) 2022.

Answered by Laura Trott - Chief Secretary to the Treasury

Estimates for Pension Credit take-up in a financial year are only available at the Great Britain level and are available in the “Income-related benefits: estimates of take-up” publication which can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/income-related-benefits-estimates-of-take-up-financial-year-2019-to-2020


Written Question
Pension Credit: Wales
Monday 14th November 2022

Asked by: Jessica Morden (Labour - Newport East)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many and what proportion of eligible people are claiming Pension Credit in (a) Newport East constituency and (b) Wales.

Answered by Laura Trott - Chief Secretary to the Treasury

Estimates for Pension Credit take-up are only available at the Great Britain level. They are included in the publication: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/income-related-benefits-estimates-of-take-up-financial-year-2019-to-2020