Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, What steps she is taking to improve access to face-to-face Jobcentre services in rural areas.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The majority of our current service provided by Jobcentres is through face-to-face appointments through a network of more than 630 jobcentres, spread across England, Scotland and Wales.
As part of the new Jobs and Careers Service, we are testing changes to Jobcentre Plus, including alternative delivery of our services. This includes Jobcentre Vans which are testing new ways of supporting people, providing advice and support for all customers, not just those claiming benefits. Vans are currently being tested in three communities in both rural (Northeast Scotland and North and Mid Wales) and urban settings (Bolton, Greater Manchester), delivering some Jobcentre services via locations within the community, selected to best meet customer needs.
As part of our test and learn approach to create the new Jobs and Careers Service, we will incorporate the learnings from these tests into the design of the new service and will continue to work closely with key partners to deliver solutions based on local needs.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
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 employment support services for over-50s in the North East.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
DWP currently offers employment support for eligible customers of all ages, through the network of Jobcentres across the UK, and through contracted employment programmes. We provide tailored support for those older jobseekers affected by low confidence, menopause, health and disability or caring pressures, and out of date skills or qualifications. Through Midlife MOTs, delivered in Jobcentres across the UK, and online, we support older people to assess their health, finances and skills.
The Government is reforming Jobcentre Plus and creating a new jobs and careers service that will enable everyone, including the over-50s, to access support to find good, meaningful work, and support to help them progress in their careers. This includes an enhanced focus on skills and careers advice.
As part of the national jobcentre work, in the North East, Employer and Partnership Teams work with a range of employers and partners to enhance the skills and employment support available locally for customers.
Economic Inactivity Trailblazer areas have received a share of £80 million of funding in 2025/26 to design and test new interventions to support economically inactive people into the labour market. Across their interventions, the North East Combined Authority Economic Inactivity Trailblazer aims to support over a 1000 residents, including specific testing to support people over the age of 50.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what support her Department provides to employers in Stockton West constituency to increase disability confidence in recruitment.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Nationally, in our Get Britain Working White Paper, published November 2024, we committed support for employers to recruit, retain, and develop staff. As part of that, the Secretaries of State for Work and Pensions and Business and Trade have asked Sir Charlie Mayfield to lead ‘Keep Britain Working’, an independent review to consider how best to support and enable employers to recruit and retain more people with health conditions and disabilities, promote healthy workplaces, and support more people to stay in or return to work from periods of sickness absence. Sir Charlie Mayfield will deliver a final report with recommendations in the autumn.
In addition, in January this year, we launched an expert academic panel to advise us on boosting neurodiversity awareness and inclusion at work. The panel will consider the reasons why neurodivergent people have poor experiences in the workplace, and a low overall employment rate, making their recommendations later this autumn.
The Disability Confident (DC) Scheme encourages employers to create disability inclusive workplaces and to support disabled people to get work and get on in work. It provides employers with the knowledge, skills, and confidence they need to attract, recruit, retain and develop disabled people in the workplace and to take positive action to address the issues disabled employees face.
At my request, officials have been discussing with stakeholders options for making the DC scheme criteria more robust. The Government is working towards announcing next steps for improving the scheme later this autumn.
DWP also has a digital information service for employers, (www.support-with-employee-health-and-disability.dwp.gov.uk), which provides tailored guidance to businesses to support employees to remain in work. This includes guidance on health disclosures and having conversations about health, plus guidance on legal obligations, including statutory sick pay and making reasonable adjustments.
Access to Work aims to support the recruitment and retention of disabled people into employment. It is a personalised discretionary grant that provides support with workplace adjustments beyond an employer’s obligation as outlined in the Equality Act 2010.
As part of our Plan for Change, and as set out in the Pathways to Work Green Paper published in March, we are consulting on the future of Access to Work and how to improve the programme to help more disabled people into work and support employers ensuring value for money for taxpayers. We will review all aspects of Access to Work after evaluating the findings of the Pathways to Work consultation.
In the area of Stockton DWP talks to employers about the diverse range of customers available for work, which includes those with a disability. The benefits of being a DC employer is promoted, including referencing Stockton Borough Council as a DC leader. Employers are signposted to the DC website and follow up conversations are held to offer support in becoming a DC employer. DWP has also contacted employers who have received an award for being dementia friendly to consider being DC.
To support jobseekers who have disabilities DWP actively seeks placements with DC employers to aid them in their journey back into work. Work is about to start with Sainsburys, which is a DC employer, on recruitment for a new store in the area and will involve supporting customers with disabilities to consider and apply for roles.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what support her Department provides to help single parents in Teesside access (a) training and (b) employment.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Government is committed to reducing child poverty. Evidence suggests that if parents work, including second earners and lone parents, this substantially reduces the risk of child poverty; and that growing up in poverty is a strong predictor of children’s education and future earnings.
Parents claiming Universal Credit have support from Work Coaches, who provide individual, tailored help to all customers across the country. This includes supporting the development of skills needed to look for and obtain sustained employment and advice to parents on childcare support. There is also funding available through the Flexible Support Fund to remove immediate barriers to employment, including support for upfront childcare costs, travel costs, work wear, tools and equipment.
The number of hours a parent who has childcare responsibilities is expected to work or search for work can be reduced to allow the parent to combine work and care.
We are also considering how we can improve our support to help parents into work as part of our Child Poverty Strategy.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent estimate she has made of the length of Personal Independence Payment processing times in Stockton-on-Tees.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We are committed to ensuring that people can access financial support through PIP in a timely manner and always aim to make an award decision as quickly as possible, taking into account the need to review all available evidence
For PIP new claims the current average clearance time is approximately 14 weeks, which includes the period allowed for customers to complete and return their questionnaire.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
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 effectiveness of Universal Credit in supporting working families.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
As promised in our election manifesto, we are currently reviewing Universal Credit, including its support for working families, to ensure it makes work pay and tackles poverty.
Universal Credit is designed so that people who can, are able to secure and progress in work, and to provide a vital safety net for those who cannot work. The Universal Credit Bill has now passed all remaining stages and will receive Royal Assent this month. This bill legislates for the first sustained above inflation rise in the basic rate of Universal Credit since it was introduced. This increase will be for new and existing customers and will benefit millions of households.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps she is taking to improve take-up of Pension Credit in areas where rates of claim are low.
Answered by Torsten Bell - Parliamentary Secretary (HM Treasury)
The Government is committed to ensuring that all pensioners receive the support to which they are entitled. That is why since autumn 2024 we have been running the biggest ever Pension Credit take-up campaign. The latest Pension Credit applications and awards statistics show that DWP received over 320,000 Pension Credit claims between July 2024 and July 2025 – with nearly 60,000 extra awards compared to the same period the previous year. The statistics also show more households getting Pension Credit than at any time since November 2021.
Maximising the take-up of Pension Credit is a priority with new promotional activity due to start this month and DWP linking up with partners and stakeholders to promote Pension Credit as widely as possible.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what proportion of pensioners (a) have no private (i) pension and (ii) savings and (b) rely solely on the state pension.
Answered by Torsten Bell - Parliamentary Secretary (HM Treasury)
In financial year ending 2024, 30% of UK pensioners received no private pension income. This includes income from occupational pension income and personal pension income.
In financial year ending 2024, 10% of UK pensioners had no savings.
In financial year ending 2024, the percentage of UK pensioners receiving just the State Pension as their income was estimated to be 5%.
Sources: Pensioners’ Incomes (PI) series 2023/24; Households below average income (HBAI) statistics 2023/24.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps she is taking to support carers who are in part-time work.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Government keeps all aspects of Carer’s Allowance under review to see if it is meeting its objectives. It is not means-tested but is subject to a weekly earnings limit. This was increased by a record amount in April 2025, which will benefit at least 60,000 unpaid carers between 2025/26 and 2029/30. The Government is also considering the possibility of introducing an earnings taper in the longer term.
Many carers who are receiving Carer’s Allowance and doing some work will also be receiving Universal Credit. For those receiving Universal Credit, the 55% taper rate and any applicable work allowance will help to ensure that people are better off in work.
Supporting carers who want to work alongside managing their caring responsibilities is an important element of our plans to modernise the world of work, ensuring that there are good jobs for carers, and a skilled workforce for employers.
The Carer’s Leave Act 2023, taken forward by the Department for Business and Trade, gave employees a right to time off to care for someone who is disabled or has a long-term health condition for the first time. We are reviewing implementation of Carer’s Leave and looking at where any improvements may be needed. This will include, but is not limited to, examining the benefits of paid leave, while being mindful of the impacts on businesses.
The Employment Rights Bill includes provisions which will support all employees to achieve a better work life balance, including changes that will make it more likely that flexible working requests are accepted. This stands to make a particular difference to people combining work with unpaid care.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what support is available to help people with long-term health conditions return to work in high-deprivation areas.
Answered by Alison McGovern - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
Good work is generally good for health and wellbeing, so we want everyone to get work and get on in work, whoever they are and wherever they live. Backed by £240 million investment, the Get Britain Working White Paper launched last November will drive forward approaches to tackling economic inactivity and work toward the long-term ambition of an 80% employment rate.
To achieve an 80% employment rate, it is key that we have an employment support system that is tailored to local labour markets, with high quality vacancies available in all areas of the country matched by employment and skills support tailored for the needs of the local population in each area
Disabled people and people with health conditions are a diverse group so access to the right work and health support, in the right place, at the right time, is key. We therefore have a range of specialist initiatives to support individuals to stay in work and get back into work, including those that join up employment and health systems.
Measures include support from Work Coaches and Disability Employment Advisers in Jobcentres and Access to Work grants, as well as joining up health and employment support around the individual through Employment Advisors in NHS Talking Therapies, Individual Placement and Support in Primary Care and WorkWell.
It is also recognised that employers play an important role in addressing health and disability. To build on this, the DWP and DHSC Joint Work & Health Directorate (JWHD) is facilitating “Keep Britain Working”, an independent review of the role of UK employers in reducing health-related inactivity and to promote healthy and inclusive workplaces. The lead reviewer, Sir Charlie Mayfield, is expected to bring forward recommendations in Autumn 2025.
In our March Green Paper, we set-out our Pathways to Work Guarantee, backed by £1 billion a year of new, additional funding by 2030 and a total of £2.2 billion by over four years. Our £2.2 billion Pathways to Work investment brings our total investment in employment support for disabled people and those with health conditions to £3.8 billion over this Parliament. We will build towards a guaranteed offer of personalised work, health and skills support for all disabled people and those with health conditions on out of work benefits.
In addition, the Department for Work and Pensions and the Department of Health and Social Care worked together on the 10 Year Health Plan. The Plan will break down barriers to opportunity by delivering the holistic support that people need to access and thrive in employment by ensuring a better health service for everyone, regardless of condition or service area. The Plan sets out the vision for what good joined-up care looks like for people with a combination of health and care needs, including for disabled people. Furthermore, it outlines how the neighbourhood health service will join up support from across the work, health and skills systems to help address the multiple complex challenges that often stop people finding and staying in work.