Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps his Department is taking to reduce waiting times to speak to the Disability Service Centre.
Answered by Tom Pursglove
We have increased Case Worker resource and consequently wait times on the PIP enquiry line have significantly improved in recent weeks.
It is not possible to increase performance further until the resource position improves further, because we have to deploy Case Workers on processing as well as telephony, to meet demand in both areas of work, which are equally important.
DWP is continually developing new technological capability aimed at providing better information, tailored to customer needs, at the point of call. Going forward, this approach will also help to reduce waiting times for customers.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps he will take to ensure that those who need (a) refreshable braille displays and (b) other additional hardware to use computers are able to use computers in jobcentres to look for work.
Answered by Guy Opperman
The Department provides computers for customer use in Jobcentres which have assistive technology such as screen readers and screen magnification built into them. Customers are able to access a wide range of services which can support their needs such as braille and large print documents being made available upon request.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps his Department is taking to (a) enforce historical arrears for Child Support Maintenance payments where a non-resident parent has not paid for many years and b) assess the use of appeals by non-resident parents as a means of avoiding payment collections.
Answered by Mims Davies - Shadow Minister (Women)
Child Maintenance Service has a number of different enforcement methods that can be considered when attempting to secure compliance. The use of each method depends on the Paying Parent’s circumstances as well as any potential impact on the welfare of the child(ren).
Child Maintenance Service are prioritising our older non-paying caseload with ring fenced resource and using all available enforcement methods: Deduction from Earnings orders, deductions from bank accounts, Bailiff, charging order and order for sale. (Tables 7.1 and 7.2 of the published statistics shown below lists the enforcement actions taken and the volumes of sanctions)
If a customer believes we have made an error with the calculation of the amount of child maintenance due, they can ask the Service to review the decision under the mandatory reconsideration process within 32 days of the date on our notification letter. (Table 10 of the published statistics) This allows CMS to look again at the decision without going through the appeals process.
If a customer is unhappy with the outcome of the mandatory reconsideration, they can formally appeal to HM Courts and Tribunals Service (Table 11 of the published statistics). When an appeal is outstanding with HM Courts and Tribunals Service, Child Maintenance Service expect that the paying parent should pay the full amount of child maintenance pending the outcome of the appeal. If they decide to withhold payments, the Service will consider taking enforcement action, although they will also look at the circumstances before they pursue payment.
Child Maintenance Service statistics: data to December 2022 (experimental) - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether his Department has plans to extend the eligibility criteria for the Cost of Living payment to include people who are self-employed on low incomes and receive a nil Universal Credit award.
Answered by Mims Davies - Shadow Minister (Women)
The Government recognises the importance of self-employment to the economy, and believes it is right that, once people are in work, they should become more financially independent and less reliant on benefits. The Minimum Income Floor encourages self-employed UC claimants to progress in work and increase their earnings through developing their business. It also limits state support for those who persistently declare very low self-employed earnings - a situation which is unsustainable and unfair on the taxpayer, and a poor outcome for claimants.
We have kept the eligibility rules for the Cost of Living Payments as simple as possible to deliver them promptly and accurately.
The cost of living payment for eligible means-tested benefit claimants will however be delivered in three separate payments over 2023/24. This reduces the chance of someone missing out altogether as those who do not qualify for one of the payments due to their changing circumstances, may qualify for another one of the payments.
For those who require additional support the Government is providing £1 billion of funding, including Barnett impact, to enable a further extension to the Household Support Fund in England. In England, this will run from 1 April 2023 to 31 March 2024, backed by £842m. Local Authorities use the Fund to help households with the cost of essentials, and they are expected to help households in the most need, particularly those who may not be eligible for the other support the government has recently made available. The guidance can be found here: 1 April 2023 to 31 March 2024: Household Support Fund guidance for county councils and unitary authorities in England - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
It will be for the devolved administrations to decide how to allocate their additional Barnett funding.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps his Department is taking to support people with learning difficulties in Nottingham East constituency who are seeking paid employment.
Answered by Tom Pursglove
The Government is committed to supporting claimants with learning difficulties in Nottingham, and across the country, move closer to the labour market or into work.
Learning disabled and autistic young people on their transition to employment can benefit from supported internships, which are aimed at young people with a learning disability or autism who have an Education, Health, and Care (EHC) plan. Supported internships usually last for 12 months and provide support from a specialist job coach. Whilst the Department for Education lead on this in England, the Department for Work and Pensions provides support through Access to Work where needed.
Additional Work Coach support for health journey claimants is a new Work Coach led support offer, which aims to help more disabled people and claimants with a health condition into, and towards, work. Our Disability Employment Advisers (DEAs) deliver direct support to claimants who require additional work-related support and advice above our core Work Coach offer. DEAs continue to support all Work Coaches to deliver tailored, personalised support to all claimants with a disability or health condition.
People in particular disadvantaged groups can continue to benefit from support through the increased Flexible Support Fund and early priority access to the Work and Health Programme. In addition, the Intensive Personalised Employment Support provision provides highly personalised packages of employment support for disabled people who want to work, but have complex needs or barriers and require specialist support to achieve sustained employment. Many disabled people can benefit from Access to Work, which is a demand-led discretionary grant scheme that provides funding for the extra disability-related costs people have when starting work, or maintaining employment. It can also support disabled people on an apprenticeship, traineeship, or Supported Internship.
We are working with employers to encourage them to become Disability Confident. The Disability Confident scheme encourages employers to take positive action to address the issues disabled employees face and improve their ability to recruit and retain disabled people.
Within Nottingham, our DEA’s can also refer claimants who require additional support to local initiatives, such as the Nottingham City Council’s Ways into Work Supported Employment Service, and the Well for Work programme, which helps people who are unemployed and facing health, language, or financial barriers to improve their wellbeing and find work.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps his department is taking to reduce waiting times for Personal Independent Payment following an unsuccessful Mandatory Reconsideration.
Answered by Tom Pursglove
Following an unsuccessful Mandatory Reconsideration, a claimant may appeal to the first-tier tribunal.
The Department for Work and Pensions and His Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS) have been working together to reduce delays in appeals being processed and heard.
For its part, the DWP has: (i) recruited additional appeals staff; and (ii) reviewed its approach to drafting appeal responses, which has improved productivity. We recognise the importance of getting appeals processed and back to HMCTS without delay. At the same time, HMCTS is developing a new digital system with a view to enabling faster processing of appeals and thereby offering a better service to appellants.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
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 ensure that Local Housing Allowance rates increase in line with rents in Nottingham East constituency.
Answered by Mims Davies - Shadow Minister (Women)
The Secretary of State reviews Local Housing Allowance rates annually.
In April 2020 Local Housing Allowance (LHA) rates were increased to the 30th percentile of local rents. This investment of nearly £1 billion provided 1.5 million claimants with an average £600 more housing support in 2020/21 than they would otherwise have received.
LHA rates have been maintained at their increased levels since then, so that everyone who benefitted from the increase will continue to do so.
For those who require additional support with housing costs, Discretionary Housing Payments (DHP) are available from local authorities. Since 2011 we have provided almost £1.5 billion in DHPs.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many work coaches who specialise in working with women leaving prison are currently employed by her Department.
Answered by David Rutley
DWP continues to contribute to cross-government work to improve support for female offenders through the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) led Female Offender strategy and the Female Concordat. We provide a range of support to help ex-offenders re-establish themselves back in the community and into work. DWP’s offer is gender neutral, covering both male and female offenders, tailored to their specific individual needs. We are therefore unable to provide the number of work coaches who specialise in working with women prison leavers.
Around 200 Work Coaches are based in prisons across Great Britain, provide benefit advice before release, including booking an appointment at the local jobcentre on or soon after the day of release for those who intend to make a Universal Credit claim. There is also a dedicated National Prison Leaver telephone claim line for those who are unable to claim online.
As part of our commitment in the recently published Prisons White Paper, this year DWP and MoJ will work together to test different approaches to preparing Universal Credit claims and claimant commitments before release in 15 prisons, including female prisons, with a view to rolling out across the prison estate by 2024.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what support her Department provides to women leaving prison on signing up for universal credit.
Answered by David Rutley
DWP continues to contribute to cross-government work to improve support for female offenders through the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) led Female Offender strategy and the Female Concordat. We provide a range of support to help ex-offenders re-establish themselves back in the community and into work. DWP’s offer is gender neutral, covering both male and female offenders, tailored to their specific individual needs. We are therefore unable to provide the number of work coaches who specialise in working with women prison leavers.
Around 200 Work Coaches are based in prisons across Great Britain, provide benefit advice before release, including booking an appointment at the local jobcentre on or soon after the day of release for those who intend to make a Universal Credit claim. There is also a dedicated National Prison Leaver telephone claim line for those who are unable to claim online.
As part of our commitment in the recently published Prisons White Paper, this year DWP and MoJ will work together to test different approaches to preparing Universal Credit claims and claimant commitments before release in 15 prisons, including female prisons, with a view to rolling out across the prison estate by 2024.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if her Department will make an assessment of the impact of the five week wait for universal credit on the wellbeing of (a) women from marginalised backgrounds leaving prison and (b) all women leaving prison.
Answered by David Rutley
When claimants are paid Universal Credit is determined by the date of entitlement.
Where there is an immediate need for financial support, Universal Credit advances can be paid on the same day the claim is made, up to 100% of the estimated Universal Credit award during their first assessment period. This advance can then be repaid over a period of 24 months.
Advances are paid quickly, and prison leavers can apply for them online or by using the dedicated National Universal Credit phone line which gives quick access to the benefit system for those unable to claim online.