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Written Question
State Retirement Pensions
Thursday 2nd December 2021

Asked by: Jonathan Reynolds (Labour (Co-op) - Stalybridge and Hyde)

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 effect of the recent Thanksgiving holiday in the United States on the ability of pensioners abroad to receive their weekly state pension.

Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)

We wish all Americans a happy Thanksgiving.

Payments to British citizens living overseas in countries other than the United States were not impacted by the recent Thanksgiving Holiday.

Payment dates will only be impacted where they land on a Bank Holiday in the country of residence and in this instance payment is made on the next available working day.


Written Question
State Retirement Pensions: British Nationals Abroad
Thursday 2nd December 2021

Asked by: Jonathan Reynolds (Labour (Co-op) - Stalybridge and Hyde)

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 appropriateness of exclusively using an American company to process payments of the state pension to British citizens living overseas which leaves claimants without payment in weeks of American state holidays.

Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)

DWP utilise services provided by the pan-government Money Transmission Services (Lot 3) contract, owned by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) to make payment to entitled customers who reside abroad. The contract was awarded in 2015 following procurement in compliance with Public Contract Regulations.

Citibank is a global provider of international payments and provides a reliable and secure payment route for DWP customers in over 200 countries.

Claimant payments are only affected by bank holidays in the country of residence and the payment is available for the customer on that country’s next working day.

Payments to British citizens living overseas are not impacted by American state holidays.


Written Question
Child Maintenance Service: Staff
Thursday 2nd December 2021

Asked by: Jonathan Reynolds (Labour (Co-op) - Stalybridge and Hyde)

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 adequacy of the current level of staffing of the Child Maintenance Service.

Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)

The number of people working within the Child Maintenance Service is reviewed regularly to ensure we have sufficient resources to answer customer calls and progress cases. Since 2020, we have recruited 790 people into the Child Maintenance Service on temporary contracts, this has been to backfill against resource lost to Universal Credit and other primary benefits. We have a very robust demand model and will continue to review the volumes of work against that model to ensure that we adjust staffing levels as required.


Written Question
Restart Scheme
Thursday 2nd December 2021

Asked by: Jonathan Reynolds (Labour (Co-op) - Stalybridge and Hyde)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people are currently receiving support from the Restart scheme.

Answered by Mims Davies - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)

As of Sunday 14 November 2021, 70,155 people are recorded as having started on the Restart programme since it began in July 2021.

Please note that the management information above has not been subjected to the usual standard of quality assurance associated with Official Statistics, but is provided in the interests of transparency.


Written Question
Job Entry Targeted Support
Thursday 2nd December 2021

Asked by: Jonathan Reynolds (Labour (Co-op) - Stalybridge and Hyde)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many and what proportion of people who were receiving support from the Job Entry Support Scheme have been subsequently referred to the Restart scheme.

Answered by Mims Davies - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)

Information on the number of Restart participants who previously received support from the Job Entry Targeted Support (JETS) programme is not readily available. Notes regarding which programmes a claimant has taken part in may be noted on the Universal Credit system, however aggregating data on those who have participated in multiple programmes would incur disproportionate costs.


Written Question
Restart Scheme
Thursday 2nd December 2021

Asked by: Jonathan Reynolds (Labour (Co-op) - Stalybridge and Hyde)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people have successfully moved into employment after a referral to the Restart scheme.

Answered by Mims Davies - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)

The information requested is currently unavailable. Detailed statistics on Restart, including moves into employment, are currently under development.


Written Question
State Retirement Pensions
Thursday 2nd December 2021

Asked by: Jonathan Reynolds (Labour (Co-op) - Stalybridge and Hyde)

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 12 month limit for back-payments to those couples affected by the underpayment of their state pension where the wife of a man who turned 65 before 17 March 2008 did not initially make a claim for their basic pension.

Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)

Prior to 17 March 2008 a married woman who reached State Pension age could qualify for a Category BL basic State Pension based on her husband’s National Insurance contributions once he had reached State Pension age and claimed his State Pension, if she had insufficient National Insurance contributions herself to qualify for a basic State Pension.

Under section 1(1) of the Social Security Administration Act 1992, no one could be entitled to category BL without first having made a claim for it.

The law provides backdating for a maximum period of up to 12 months from when a claim is made. That remains the position today. There are no plans to change this.


Written Question
Social Security Benefits: EU Nationals
Thursday 25th November 2021

Asked by: Jonathan Reynolds (Labour (Co-op) - Stalybridge and Hyde)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether the EU citizens with Settled Status who were recently informed in error that they would lose their benefits have been contacted by her Department and given assurances about their entitlement.

Answered by David Rutley - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)

Following the end of the grace period on 30 June 2021, EU, EEA and Swiss citizens have been required to have a valid UK immigration status in order to access non-contributory benefits, such as Universal Credit.

As part of our extensive efforts to contact all those believed to be without status, people naturalised as British citizens, Irish citizens or with an existing valid immigration status may have received letters asking them to apply to the EU Settlement Scheme (EUSS). The letters urged people with an immigration status to contact DWP to confirm their status and no action was taken with respect to their benefit payments as a consequence of receiving these letters.

We have since updated our data lists to ensure people with an existing immigration status do not receive further correspondence. No action will be taken to suspend or terminate the benefits of people with a valid immigration status.

Individuals wishing to evidence their eligibility for benefits should contact DWP and/or HMRC as appropriate to their individual circumstances.

When considering whether or not to suspend a claim, DWP officials will seek information on the customer’s immigration status held by the Home Office and contact the customer themselves to determine whether or not an individual holds a valid immigration status, or has applied to the EUSS. These steps are repeated at the termination stage, to ensure that no claims are closed for individuals who hold a valid immigration status.


Written Question
Universal Credit
Thursday 18th November 2021

Asked by: Jonathan Reynolds (Labour (Co-op) - Stalybridge and Hyde)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 9 November 2021 to Question 68249 on Universal Credit, what proportion of the £67.8 million deducted from universal credit claims as a result of Government debt in May 2021 was as a consequence of (a) non-fraud Tax Credit Overpayment, (b) non-fraud DWP Benefit Overpayment and (c) non-fraud Housing Benefit Overpayment.

Answered by David Rutley - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)

For Universal Credit claims with a payment due during May 2021, £67,800,000 was deducted to repay Government debt, of which:

(a) 56% (£37,700,000 ) for Tax Credit Overpayment (non-fraud)

(b) 30% (£20,500,000) for DWP Benefit Overpayment (non-fraud)

(c) 5% (3,500,000) for Housing Benefit Overpayment (non-fraud)

As a Department, we carefully balance our duty to the taxpayer to recover overpayments, with our support for claimants. Processes are in place to ensure deductions are manageable, and in April we further reduced the cap on deductions from Universal Credit awards.

Customers can contact DWP if they are experiencing financial hardship in order to discuss a reduction in their rate of repayment, or a temporary suspension, depending on their financial circumstances.

Fraud and error in the benefit system is rare, with 95% of benefits worth more than £200bn paid correctly and just 0.4% of benefits being overpaid due to DWP error.

Notes

1) Figures are provisional and subject to retrospective change as later data becomes available.

2) Amount deducted rounded to the nearest 100,000 and percentage rounded to the nearest percent.

3) Government debt includes: DWP Benefit Overpayment (fraud and non-fraud), Tax Credit Overpayment (fraud and non-fraud), Housing Benefit Overpayment (fraud and non-fraud), Social Fund Loan, Recoverable Hardship Payment, Administrative Penalty, Civil Penalty, Eligible Loan Deductions, Integration Loan.


Written Question
Universal Credit: Disability
Friday 12th November 2021

Asked by: Jonathan Reynolds (Labour (Co-op) - Stalybridge and Hyde)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 20 July 2021 to Question 33906 on Universal Credit: Disability, whether any assessment was subsequently made of the impact of removing the uplift to the standard allowance in Universal Credit on the financial security of disabled claimants.

Answered by Chloe Smith

As the uplift was introduced as a temporary measure, no such assessment has been made.

The Chancellor announced a six-month extension to the temporary £20 per week uplift at the Budget on 3 March to support households affected by the economic shock of Covid-19. Universal Credit has provided a vital safety net for six million people during the pandemic, and the temporary uplift was part of a COVID support package worth a total of £407 billion in 2020-21 and 2021-22.