Asked by: Lewis Cocking (Conservative - Broxbourne)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 14 November 2024 to Question 88403 on Social Security Benefits: Foreign Nationals and with reference to the Universal Credit statistics, 29 April 2013 to 12 June 2025, published on 15 July 2025, what progress his Department has made on producing Immigration and Nationality statistics for (a) Universal Credit and b) other benefits.
Answered by Andrew Western - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
Since first publishing the Universal Credit statistics by immigration status and nationality group on 15 July 2025, the Department has published regular updates, with the latest, published on 11 November 2025, covering statistics to October 2025.
The Department checks immigration status when assessing eligibility for benefits, but this information is not collated centrally across all benefit lines and hence is not readily available.
Asked by: Lewis Cocking (Conservative - Broxbourne)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how much was spent on benefit payments to foreign nationals in the 2024-2025 financial year.
Answered by Andrew Western - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
The information requested is not readily available and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Lewis Cocking (Conservative - Broxbourne)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what his Department's policy is on Job Centres advertising vacancies relating to the implementation and administration of Sharia Law.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Find A Job is a free platform to help jobseekers find vacancies with employers from various sectors. Employers are verified as legitimate and all jobs they advertise must comply with our terms and conditions: https://findajob.dwp.gov.uk/terms-and-conditions-employer.html.
Asked by: Lewis Cocking (Conservative - Broxbourne)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how much she spent on providing (a) translation and (b) interpretation services for benefit claimants in the last year.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The spend in the period of January 2024 – December 2024:
a) Translation: £882,118
b) Interpreting: £6,774,336
Asked by: Lewis Cocking (Conservative - Broxbourne)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps her Department is taking to support young people into work.
Answered by Andrew Western - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
DWP provides 16-24-year-olds with labour market support through an extensive range of interventions at a national and local level.
As part of the plan to Get Britain Working we will launch a Youth Guarantee for all young people aged 18-21 in England to ensure that they can access training opportunities, an apprenticeship or help to find work.
Eight Youth Guarantee Trailblazers to test and learn before further roll out of the Youth Guarantee have launched in April.
Asked by: Lewis Cocking (Conservative - Broxbourne)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to the press release entitled Biggest employment reforms in a generation unveiled to Get Britain Working again, published on 26 November 2024, what steps her Department is taking to implement the youth guarantee.
Answered by Alison McGovern - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
Our plan to get Britain working includes a new Youth Guarantee for all young people aged 18-21 in England to ensure that they can access quality training opportunities, an apprenticeship or help to find work.
The Department for Work and Pensions and the Department for Education are working closely with the eight Mayoral Strategic Authorities in England who will begin delivering the Youth Guarantee Trailblazers announced in the Get Britain Working White Paper from Spring 2025.
To tackle the rising number of young people who are not participating in education, employment or training, these Trailblazers will test how new local leadership, accountability structures and existing provision can be integrated into a cohesive education, training and employment support for young people. More broadly, we will work closely with mayoral authorities on a range of wider initiatives such as developing national and local partnerships to support the Youth Guarantee.
The Trailblazers will run for 12 months, and we will use the learning to inform the future design and development of the Youth Guarantee as it rolls-out across the rest of England. Additionally, Department for Education are also developing new foundation apprenticeships to give more young people a foot in the door at the start of their working lives whilst supporting the pipeline of new talent that employers will need to drive economic growth.
The Department for Work and Pensions are also working to develop proposals for reform to the system of health and disability benefits and will set them out in a Green Paper in the Spring. The Government is committed to putting the views and voices of disabled people at the heart of all that we do, so we will consult on these proposals with disabled people and representative organisations.
Asked by: Lewis Cocking (Conservative - Broxbourne)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate she has made of the number of people that will be affected by the decision to means-test winter fuel payments in Broxbourne constituency.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
It is estimated that around 16,600 pensioners in Broxbourne Constituency (2024 boundaries) will be affected by the decision to amend the eligibility criteria for the Winter Fuel Payment. This is based on February 2024 Pension Credit statistics which are available via DWP Stat-Xplore and the Winter FuelPayment statistics for winter 2023 to 2024 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
This estimation is calculated by subtracting the number of people claiming Pension Credit in Broxbourne constituency from the number of Winter Fuel Payment recipients in Broxbourne constituency. It is possible to use the Pension Credit statistics, to give a minimum estimate of the number who may be eligible for Winter Fuel Payments. Therefore, the above estimation is essentially the number of Winter Fuel Payment recipients who are not claiming Pension Credit pre-policy change, as an estimate of those who will no longer receive the Winter Fuel Payment.
Please note that the above estimation would not take into account any potential increase in Pension Credit take-up that we might see as a result of the Government’s Pension Credit Awareness Campaign. We do not have data on those additional Pension Credit claims by Parliamentary constituencies.
The published Pension Credit figures refer to households, so the number of individuals in respect of whom Pension Credit is paid will be higher (i.e. taking account of households where a claimant has a partner and/or dependents.)
In addition, while Pension Credit claimants constitute the majority of those that will be eligible for the Winter Fuel Payment, pensioners who claim other qualifying means-tested benefits will also be eligible for the Winter Fuel Payment. It is not, however, possible to include those on other qualifying means-tested benefits in these figures.