Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many claims for the Social Fund Funeral Expenses Payment Scheme her Department (a) received and (b) accepted in (i) the West Midlands and (ii) England in 2016-17.

Table 1 below gives the number of applications received and number of awards for Funeral Expenses Payments in England and in the West Midlands government office region in 2016/17.

Table 1: applications received and awards for Funeral Expense Payments in England and West Midlands, 2016/17

Source: Policy, Budget and Management Information System

Notes:

• The number of applications and awards are rounded to the nearest 100.
• The applications figures are based on applications received by DWP, not applications processed. Some applications may have been withdrawn before a decision was made.
• The award figures include awards made after review, reconsideration or appeal following an initial refusal.
• These figures do not include applications which were processed clerically and have not been entered on to the Social Fund Computer System.
• The number of awards made in each year is not equal to the number of people who made applications or received awards in that year. An individual may make multiple applications in a given time period.