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, whether his Department has targets for ending child poverty.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We have set out a clear approach to tackling child poverty based on evidence about the important role of work, particularly where it is full-time, in substantially reducing the risk of child poverty.
The latest statistics show that in 2022/23, children living in workless households were over 6 times more likely to be in absolute poverty (after housing costs) than those where all adults work. This is why our focus is firmly on supporting parents into and to progress in work.
We have no plans to reintroduce an approach to tackling child poverty focused primarily on income-based targets. This can drive action that focuses primarily on moving the incomes for those ‘just in poverty’ just above a somewhat arbitrary ‘poverty line’ whilst doing nothing to help those on the very lowest incomes or to improve children’s outcomes.
The Department for Work and Pensions currently works across Government to support the most vulnerable households. Ministers and officials work with their counterparts in other departments and external stakeholders to better understand the multidimensional nature of poverty. This includes a cross-government senior officials’ group on poverty.
Asked by: Marsha De Cordova (Labour - Battersea)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to the Prime Minister’s speech on welfare of 19 April 2024, who the specialist work and health professionals are that will be responsible for issuing fit notes.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The trailblazers announced at Autumn Statement 2023 will be delivered in NHS Integrated Care Systems and fit notes will continue to be issued by the registered healthcare professionals working within the NHS who are specified in legislation – Doctors, Nurses, Pharmacists, Physiotherapists and Occupational Therapists.
Our ambition is to co-develop a new fit note process delivered through multi-disciplinary teams, bringing together the issuing of fit notes with health and work advice to support people who are at risk of falling out of work or who have already fallen out of work due to ill health.
Asked by: Paul Blomfield (Labour - Sheffield Central)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of classifying covid-19 as an occupational disease for healthcare workers; and whether his Department has had discussions with relevant professional bodies on that matter.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The DWP is advised by the Industrial Injuries Advisory Council (IIAC), an independent scientific body, on changes to the list of occupational diseases for which Industrial Injuries Disablement Benefit (IIDB) can be paid.
The Council considered the available scientific and epidemiological evidence around COVID-19 infection and published a Command Paper entitled, ‘COVID-19 and occupational impacts’ in November 2022 found here.
The Command Paper recommends that the list of prescribed occupational diseases for which IIDB can be paid should be expanded to include health and social care workers with five serious pathological complications following COVID-19 infection.
The Department is currently carrying out a detailed assessment of the report’s recommendations and will respond in due course.
Asked by: Alison McGovern (Labour - Wirral South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent assessment he has made with Cabinet colleagues of the potential impact of the Disability Confident scheme on the disability employment gap.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Disability Confident (DC) is one of a range of policies to support disabled people into work and to close the disability employment gap. It is difficult to isolate the direct impact of individual policies on the disability employment gap as numerous, interacting factors are at play, including overall labour market trends and changes to the composition of the disabled population, in addition to the effects of disability employment policies and programmes in themselves.
When an employer signs up to DC, they agree to commitments which encourage employers to think differently about disability and to take positive action to address issues disabled employees face in the workplace. There are currently over 19,000 DC members and they estimate 11.5 million employees in total working in their businesses.
In September 2023, the Department published findings from a survey with members of the DC scheme, conducted by an independent research agency[1]. The research explored the effect that signing up to the DC scheme had on members’ recruitment and retention attitudes towards disabled people.
The DWP and Cabinet officials regularly meet with Ministerial Disability Champions to drive this agenda across Government. The Champions’ role is to ensure disability inclusion is a priority in their Department’s work. They are helping to deliver our commitment to support disabled people in the UK through creating more opportunities, protecting their rights and ensuring they fully benefit from, and can contribute to, every aspect of our society.
[1] The survey was conducted in February to March 2022. In total 1,233 survey interviews were conducted with scheme members.
Asked by: Alison McGovern (Labour - Wirral South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether he is taking steps to ensure that his Department's (a) policy and (b) guidance is (i) trauma-informed and (ii) co-produced with lived-experience experts.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The DWP is committed to being a more Trauma Informed organisation. We have a dedicated programme which will integrate the six key pillars of the approach as defined by the Office for Health Improvements and Disparities (December, 2022) which are safety, trustworthiness, choice, empowerment, collaboration and cultural consideration. Our programme looks at these six pillars within the contexts of application to our colleagues, our customers, our culture, and the context of our interaction- whether that is a physical, telephony, digital or postal interaction. We are learning from best practice demonstrated by organisations such as NHS Education Scotland, Work Services Australia and the Wales ACES Hub to shape the future prioritisation of this work.
The integration programme is in its early phases, and we appreciate that it will take time to realise the benefits of changes we implement. We are learning from the continued progress of leaders in the field including programmes such as the Scottish National Trauma Transformation Programme. We recognise that an important aspect of many programmes is policies and procedures and intend to replicate this focus within our own work whilst recognising that the programme does not seek to change what the department does, instead we are impacting how we do this, which will extend to supporting our policy development.
We recognise that any truly trauma informed system is shaped by lived experience experts and we fundamentally believe in the co-production of this programme. This is why we have an extensive network of diverse internal and external stakeholders who are engaged in shaping the programme through ongoing forums and insight activity. We are also currently collaborating with the University of Salford on research which explores how trauma informed the department is through conversations with customers, colleagues and external stakeholders. The outcome of this research will help to shape the future priorities of the programme. Finally, we are currently exploring how we establish our own co-production forums for the programme taking advice from expert stakeholders to ensure we create a safe, empowering space for lived experience experts to whilst establishing trust in the ongoing aims and progress of the programme.
Asked by: Alison McGovern (Labour - Wirral South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many Carer’s Allowance overpayments have been referred to HM Courts and Tribunals Service since February 2022.
Answered by Paul Maynard - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
Since February 2022, there have been 119 cases accepted for prosecution for benefit fraud that were so serious they met the threshold for prosecution by The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) where Carer’s Allowance was the primary overpayment.
Note that this this figure only represents those cases accepted by CPS and does not indicate prosecution outcome. Data is for the period 1/2/2022 to 17/4/2024.
The data has been sourced from internal DWP management information, which is intended only to help the Department to manage its business. It is not intended for publication and has not been subject to the same quality assurance checks applied to our published official statistics.
Asked by: Angela Eagle (Labour - Wallasey)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how much and what proportion of fraud and error was (a) prevented upfront and (b) detected after the event in the latest period for which data is available.
Answered by Paul Maynard - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
Our estimate is that the Department prevented up front £17.1bn of fraud and error and detected £0.6bn after the event in the financial year 2022/23.
Further details can be found in the Annual Report and Accounts 2022/23, link below.
Annual Report and Accounts 2022-23 for the year ended 31 March 2023 (publishing.service.gov.uk)
DWP will update these figures in the Annual Report and Accounts for financial year 23/24, expected to be published in Summer 2024.
Asked by: Angela Eagle (Labour - Wallasey)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to the report by the National Audit Office entitled Department for Work and Pensions Accounts 2022-23, published on 6 July 2023, whether his Department has taken recent steps to amend the methodology it uses to estimate the financial impact of its counter-fraud activities.
Answered by Paul Maynard - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
We review the methodology as part of publishing our annual accounts each year and will report on any agreed changes in the Annual Report and Account 2023/24 expected to be published in Summer 2024, following discussion with National Audit Office.
Asked by: Alison McGovern (Labour - Wirral South)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many Carer’s Allowance cases were flagged as potentially in need of investigation by the VEPs system in the 2023-24 financial year; and of these, how many (a) were and (b) were not investigated.
Answered by Paul Maynard - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
The information requested is not readily available and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Angela Eagle (Labour - Wallasey)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent estimate he has made of the financial impact of his Department's counter-fraud activities in the 2023-24 financial year.
Answered by Paul Maynard - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
DWP will publish details of the Department’s counter-fraud activities in the Annual Report and Accounts for financial year 23/24, expected to be published in Summer 2024.