Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many assessments for Personal Independence Payment were carried out by Capita by telephone in 2025.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Capita delivers Personal Independence Payment (PIP) assessments on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) in the Midlands and Wales, and on behalf of the Department for Communities (DfC) in Northern Ireland.
Information relating to the Midlands and Wales is not currently published by DWP; however, we intend to include this data in a future statistical release.
If your query concerns Northern Ireland, responsibility for this information rests with the DfC. This data is not held by DWP.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many assessments for Personal Independence Payment were carried out by Capita in person in 2025.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Capita delivers Personal Independence Payment (PIP) assessments on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) in the Midlands and Wales, and on behalf of the Department for Communities (DfC) in Northern Ireland.
Information relating to the Midlands and Wales is not currently published by DWP; however, we intend to include this data in a future statistical release.
If your query concerns Northern Ireland, responsibility for this information rests with the DfC. This data is not held by DWP.
Asked by: Mohammad Yasin (Labour - Bedford)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of UK–EU social security coordination rules in protecting the pension rights of people who have worked in the UK and Greece.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The UK’s comprehensive social security relationship with the EU Member States, including State Pensions, is governed by the Withdrawal Agreement and the Trade and Cooperation Agreement.
These agreements provide the necessary level of social security protection and continuity of State Pension provision for those moving between the UK and the EU Member States, including Greece.
Asked by: Mohammad Yasin (Labour - Bedford)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether he has made an assessment of the potential merits of a bilateral reciprocal social security agreement with Greece.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The UK’s comprehensive social security relationship with the EU Member States, including State Pensions, is governed by the Withdrawal Agreement and the Trade and Cooperation Agreement.
These agreements provide the necessary level of social security protection and continuity of State Pension provision for those moving between the UK and the EU Member States, including Greece.
Asked by: Helen Whately (Conservative - Faversham and Mid Kent)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many non-UK nationals have received Pension Credit for the following financial years a) 2024/25 b) 2025/2026, and what was the total value of Pension Credit paid to those non-UK nationals in each of those financial years.
Answered by Torsten Bell - Parliamentary Secretary (HM Treasury)
The requested statistics are not held by the Department.
Entitlement to Pension Credit depends on a person’s residence or immigration status, including the requirement to have the right to reside and to be able to be treated as factually habitually resident in Great Britain. Foreign nationals must also have an immigration status that gives access to public funds, which most will not have until they have lived in the UK for at least 5 years.
Asked by: Neil O'Brien (Conservative - Harborough, Oadby and Wigston)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether the operation of the household benefit cap relies on manual administration; and how many people in his Department work on its administration.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The benefit cap is calculated automatically as part of the UC calculation on the UC administrative system and no manual processing is involved. A small number of households (340, as of August 2025) are capped via Housing Benefit (HB). The calculations relating to these capping decisions are completed by 1.6 FTE staff in post (SIP) within the department.
Asked by: Graeme Downie (Labour - Dunfermline and Dollar)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether proof of a ADHD diagnosis is required for its impact on daily life to be included in a PIP assessment.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Personal Independence Payment (PIP) is designed to help with the extra costs that arise from long-term health conditions or disabilities. Entitlement is determined by the functional impact a person’s condition has on their daily living and mobility activities. The assessment looks at an individual’s ability to carry out a series of key everyday activities which are fundamental to living an independent life. This approach applies to all conditions.
Health professionals delivering assessments receive comprehensive training in disability analysis including specific training on health conditions and how to identify their impact on claimants’ ability to carry out the activities in the assessment.
PIP case managers consider information provided by claimants on claim forms, along with any other supporting evidence, further medical evidence that we receive from treating health professionals, and advice from our contracted assessment providers.
Asked by: Graeme Downie (Labour - Dunfermline and Dollar)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what evidence of a ADHD diagnosis on the impact on daily life is required for PIP assessments.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Personal Independence Payment (PIP) is designed to help with the extra costs that arise from long-term health conditions or disabilities. Entitlement is determined by the functional impact a person’s condition has on their daily living and mobility activities. The assessment looks at an individual’s ability to carry out a series of key everyday activities which are fundamental to living an independent life. This approach applies to all conditions.
Health professionals delivering assessments receive comprehensive training in disability analysis including specific training on health conditions and how to identify their impact on claimants’ ability to carry out the activities in the assessment.
PIP case managers consider information provided by claimants on claim forms, along with any other supporting evidence, further medical evidence that we receive from treating health professionals, and advice from our contracted assessment providers.
Asked by: Graeme Downie (Labour - Dunfermline and Dollar)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether the effects of ADHD on daily life are included in PIP assessments.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Personal Independence Payment (PIP) is designed to help with the extra costs that arise from long-term health conditions or disabilities. Entitlement is determined by the functional impact a person’s condition has on their daily living and mobility activities. The assessment looks at an individual’s ability to carry out a series of key everyday activities which are fundamental to living an independent life. This approach applies to all conditions.
Health professionals delivering assessments receive comprehensive training in disability analysis including specific training on health conditions and how to identify their impact on claimants’ ability to carry out the activities in the assessment.
PIP case managers consider information provided by claimants on claim forms, along with any other supporting evidence, further medical evidence that we receive from treating health professionals, and advice from our contracted assessment providers.
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the average end-to-end clearance time for a Universal Credit Work Capability Assessment was in each month since January 2025 for (a) new and (b) existing claimants.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The department regularly publishes Universal Credit Work Capability Assessment statistics and the development of clearance times is detailed in the release strategy for those statistics. Further details on the future publication of clearance times will be published in the DWP Statistical Work Programme in due course.