Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether her Department uses Office for National Statistics estimates of personal well-being when formulating policy; and what policies her Department has introduced to improve national well-being in the last 12 months.

The services provided by the Department make a positive difference to citizens’ well-being. The Department does this by helping more people into work, providing a simplified benefits system that is easier to access for those who need it most, delivering support to disabled people and providing security in later life.

The Department has used similar measures to the ONS personal well-being estimates, such as data from the Understanding Society survey which influenced the Improving Lives: Helping Workless Families policy paper. This paper published a number of indicators, including poor parental mental health, which measures the proportion of children living with at least one parent reporting symptoms of anxiety and/or depression. DWP has subsequently introduced the Reducing Parental Conflict Programme to address and measure parental conflict, as evidence shows poor relationships between parents can damage children’s outcomes, including their well-being.

In addition, within the programme of trials being delivered by the joint DWP/DHSC Work and Health Unit, well-being outcomes are being collected alongside employment and health outcomes to appraise the success of the trials and influence future policy development.