Personal Independence Payment: Appeals
(asked on 24th May 2018) - View Source
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what estimate he has made of the average waiting time for personal independence payments appeals at tribunal in (a) Caernarfon County Court and Family Court, (b) Prestatyn Justice Centre, (c) Chester Magistrates' Court, (d) Chester Civil and Family Justice Centre and (e) Welshpool County Court and Family Court.
The information requested is set out in the tables below.
HMCTS VENUES | . Average time (weeks) receipts HMCTS to Outcome1 Personal Independence Payment Appeals2 | |||
April - June (Quarter 1) 2017_2018 3 | July- September (Quarter 2) 2017_2018 3 | October to December (Quarter 3) 2017_2018 3 | April to December (Quarter 1-3 ) 2017_2018 3,4 | |
Caernarfon | 21 | 37 | 40 | 37 |
Chester5 | 19 | 23 | 27 | 22 |
Prestatyn | 33 | 37 | 48 | 39 |
Welshpool | 21 | 25 | 31 | 26 |
HMCTS VENUES | Outstanding load of all SSCS appeals as at 31st December 2017 3,4 |
Caernarfon | 258 |
Chester | 944 |
Chester Magistrates' Court | 23 |
Prestatyn | 658 |
Welshpool | 46 |
1 Includes cases cleared with and without a tribunal hearing.
2 Personal Independence Payment (New Claim Appeals) which replaces Disability Living Allowance was introduced on 8 April 2013, also includes Personal Independence Clams (Reassessments).
3 Provisional data
4 The latest period for which data are available
5 Chester venue is Chester Civil Justice Centre. For the period April-December (Quarter 1-3) 2017_2018 there were no PIP clearances for appeals listed for Chester Magistrates Court.
Although care is taken when processing and analysing the data, the details are subject to inaccuracies inherent in any large-scale case management system and are the best data that is available.
The data may differ slightly to that of the published stats as theses data were run on a different date.
Clearance times, and caseload, are dependent on several factors, such as hearing capacity at the venue closest to the appellant, or the local availability of Tribunal panel members. Other factors might include the availability of the appellant or their representative, or the provision of further evidence. Additionally, a decision on the appeal may be reached after a hearing has been adjourned (which may be directed by the judge for a variety of reasons, such as to seek further evidence), or after a hearing has been postponed (again, for a variety of reasons, often at the request of the appellant). An appeal may also have been referred back to the First-tier Tribunal by the Upper Tribunal for disposal.
HMCTS has been working with the Tribunal’s judiciary both to appoint additional judges and panel members and take forward initiatives with potential to increase the capacity and performance of the Tribunal. These include reviewing current listing practices to increase the number of cases being listed on a Tribunal session, and introducing case management “triage” sessions, with the aim of reducing the time taken for appeals to reach final determination. All these measures will increase the capacity of the Tribunal with the aim of reducing waiting times for appellants.