Personal Independence Payment: Visual Impairment
(asked on 24th February 2020) - View Source
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many and what proportion of (a) new claimants of personal independence payment (PIP) and (b) new claimants of PIP identifying as having a primary condition of (i) sight loss and (ii) a visual impairment did not receive an award during their initial PIP assessment but received an award at (A) mandatory reconsideration and (B) tribunal in the UK since 2018.
Initial decisions following a Personal Independence Payment (PIP) assessment for Great Britain since 1st January 2018 up to 30th June 2019 are as shown in the table below. Figures are based on decisions where the primary health condition was classed as Visual Disease. This data is for new claims only; it excludes Disability Living Allowance (DLA) claims that have been reassessed for PIP.
Initial decisions following a PIP assessment – new claims – initial decisions made 1st January 2018 to 30th June 2019
| Visual Disease | All | ||
| Totals | % | Totals | % |
Initial decisions following PIP assessment | 5,230 |
| 531,000 |
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Awarded | 3,010 | 58% | 297,170 | 56% |
Disallowed | 2,220 | 42% | 233,830 | 44% |
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Of those disallowed at initial decision |
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Award changed at Mandatory Reconsideration (MR) | 100 | 5% | 12,360 | 5% |
Award unchanged at MR, appeal lapsed | 40 | 2% | 3,840 | 2% |
Award unchanged at MR, decision overturned at tribunal hearing | 100 | 4% | 10,580 | 5% |
Notes:
Data has been rounded to the nearest 10.
Percentages have been rounded to the nearest percent.
Data is for new claims only – it does not include DLA reassessment claims.
Great Britain only.
Data is based on primary disabling condition as recorded on the PIP computer systems. Claimants may often have multiple disabling conditions but only the primary condition is reflected in these statistics. It is not possible to break down the condition of “visual disease” into sight loss or visual impairment from the data.
A lapsed appeal is where DWP changed the decision in the customer’s favour after an appeal was lodged but before it was heard at tribunal.
Claimants who have received benefit decisions more recently may not yet have had time to complete the claimant journey and progress to appeal.
The Northern Irish Assembly has devolved responsibility for social security benefits. The responsibility for statistics in Northern Ireland lies with the Department for Communities: http://www.communities-ni.gov.uk