Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether people in receipt of disability living allowance who have received notification for reassessment for personal independence payments will cease to receive those payments if they (a) do not attend a reassessment over the (i) phone and (ii) on paper and (b) cannot attend a reassessment due to the inability of a carer to provide the necessary support due to social distancing measures introduced during the covid-19 outbreak.

A.

1. i) Claimants may have their claim disallowed if they fail to attend or participate in their telephony assessment, however we are taking a number of steps to ensure that no individuals are unfairly penalised. Claimants who fail to attend or participate in a telephony assessment will therefore be contacted in the first instance to establish the reason and rearrange the appointment where possible. This recognises that there may be situations where, due to circumstances outside their control (e.g. health conditions or disability) claimants may be unable to attend or participate.

1. ii) Healthcare Professionals will continue to make recommendations based on paper-based evidence where possible for those claimants who have already returned their PIP2 and have a scheduled assessment. Where this is not possible a telephony assessment may occur. They will be of a similar structure to that of face-to-face assessments and provide the Healthcare Professionals with an opportunity to gain further evidence from the claimant about how their health condition or disability affects their daily life and mobility needs. DLA to PIP reassessment claimants will not need to return a PIP2 at this time, form unless their needs have changed.

B. Where appropriate, it is possible for an appointee and/or companion to join a telephony assessment even if they are based in different locations.