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1007058

	registered interest
	date	14/11/2018
	answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
	answering dept id	29
	answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
	answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
	hansard heading	Employment Schemes: Young People
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 11 September to Question 171273, what plans she has to publish data on the outcomes for people receiving support through the Youth Obligation.
	tabling member constituency	East Ham
	tabling member printed	Stephen Timms
	uin	191251
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 21/11/2018 answer text <p>The Department monitors requests we receive for new statistics and will consider whether we can produce and release analysis that will helpfully inform public debate.</p><p> </p><p>The Department is looking at this issue and considering what statistics could be produced.</p> answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma question first answered 21/11/2018 16:31:49 answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma previous answer version 85855 answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma
	tabling member	163 label Biography information for Sir Stephen Timms

1027739

	registered interest
	date	18/12/2018
	answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
	answering dept id	29
	answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
	answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
	hansard heading	Universal Credit: Disability
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many home visits officials her Department have made to assist disabled people in applying for universal credit in the last 12 months.
	tabling member constituency	East Ham
	tabling member printed	Stephen Timms
	uin	203219
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 10/01/2019 answer text <p>The information requested is not centrally collated and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost. Overall however, between April 2017 and March 2018, 290,000 cleared home visit referrals were made across all the Department’s service lines.</p><p /> answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma question first answered 10/01/2019 16:33:07 answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma previous answer version 94109 answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma
	tabling member	163 label Biography information for Sir Stephen Timms

1027741

	registered interest
	date	18/12/2018
	answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
	answering dept id	29
	answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
	answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
	hansard heading	Universal Credit: Disability
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment her Department has made of the effect of imposing sanctions on disabled claimants of universal credit on (a) the subsequent time they spend in receipt of benefit and (b) the likelihood of those claimants subsequently entering and remaining in employment.
	tabling member constituency	East Ham
	tabling member printed	Stephen Timms
	uin	203221
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 20/03/2019 answer text <p>The Department has not made an assessment of the effect of imposing sanctions on disabled Universal Credit claimants. In our response to the Work and Pensions Select Committee Report on Benefit Sanctions (Nineteenth Report of Session 2017-19), the Department committed to evaluating the effectiveness of reforms to welfare conditionality and sanctions. The Department will focus its evaluation on whether the sanctions regime within Universal Credit is effective at supporting claimants to search for work.</p><p> </p><p>Sanctions are only used in a small percentage of cases, and that is when people fail to meet their agreed commitments without good reason. Latest data, published on 19 February 2019 in the Benefit Sanction Statistics, shows that in November 2018, 2.8% of people subject to conditionality on Universal Credit had a deduction taken from their benefit award as a result of a sanction.</p><p> </p><p>When considering whether a sanction is appropriate, a Decision Maker will take all the claimant’s individual circumstances, including any health conditions or disabilities and any evidence of good cause, into account before deciding whether a sanction is warranted.</p> answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma question first answered 20/03/2019 14:28:39 answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma previous answer version 94108 answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma
	tabling member	163 label Biography information for Sir Stephen Timms

1028730

	registered interest
	date	19/12/2018
	answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
	answering dept id	29
	answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
	answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
	hansard heading	Universal Credit
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what percentage of earnings data provided to her Department from HMRC Real Time Information PAYE data and used in live claims to calculate Universal Credit awards contains a BACS hash.
	tabling member constituency	East Ham
	tabling member printed	Stephen Timms
	uin	203765
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 10/01/2019 answer text <p>The Department does not hold the information requested. The BACS hash is not passed to the Department from HMRC. The Department assist HMRC with Real Time Information disputes, and a manual intervention can be made to correct the Universal Credit award when validated against a claimant’s pay slips.</p> answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma grouped question UIN 203766 question first answered 10/01/2019 16:05:13 answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma previous answer version 94114 answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma
	tabling member	163 label Biography information for Sir Stephen Timms

1028731

	registered interest
	date	19/12/2018
	answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
	answering dept id	29
	answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
	answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
	hansard heading	Universal Credit
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 29 November 2018 to Question 195460, what proportion of RTI earnings data her Department corrects each month using the RTI BACS hash validation value made available for that purpose by HMRC.
	tabling member constituency	East Ham
	tabling member printed	Stephen Timms
	uin	203766
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 10/01/2019 answer text <p>The Department does not hold the information requested. The BACS hash is not passed to the Department from HMRC. The Department assist HMRC with Real Time Information disputes, and a manual intervention can be made to correct the Universal Credit award when validated against a claimant’s pay slips.</p> answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma grouped question UIN 203765 question first answered 10/01/2019 16:05:13 answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma previous answer version 94117 answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma
	tabling member	163 label Biography information for Sir Stephen Timms

1037783

	registered interest
	date	08/01/2019
	answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
	answering dept id	29
	answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
	answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
	hansard heading	Universal Credit: Disqualification
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the number of hardship payment awards to sanctioned claimants of universal credit was in each conditionality category for (a) live and (b) full service claimants in each month since August 2015.
	tabling member constituency	East Ham
	tabling member printed	Stephen Timms
	uin	206209
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 20/03/2019 answer text <p>The information requested by each conditionality group is not readily available for Universal Credit Full and Live Service claimants and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.</p><p>Sanctions are only used in a small percentage of cases, and that is when people fail to meet their agreed commitments without good reason. When considering whether a sanction is appropriate, a Decision Maker will take all the claimant’s individual circumstances, including any health conditions or disabilities and any evidence of good reason, into account before deciding whether a sanction is warranted.</p><p>However, the information that is readily available is displayed in the table below. This shows the number of Universal Credit Full Service sanction decisions which were followed by a Recoverable Hardship Payment during 2017 and 2018.</p><p> </p><table><tbody><tr><td><p>Sanction decision month</p></td><td><p>Number of UC Full Service sanction decisions which were followed by a Recoverable Hardship Payment<sup>1</sup></p></td><td><p>Number of people on Universal Credit<sup>2</sup></p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Jan-17</p></td><td><p>100</p></td><td><p>437,751</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Feb-17</p></td><td><p>0</p></td><td><p>458,742</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Mar-17</p></td><td><p>0</p></td><td><p>481,592</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Apr-17</p></td><td><p>100</p></td><td><p>504,748</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>May-17</p></td><td><p>400</p></td><td><p>513,481</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Jun-17</p></td><td><p>300</p></td><td><p>527,535</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Jul-17</p></td><td><p>300</p></td><td><p>551,088</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Aug-17</p></td><td><p>400</p></td><td><p>574,802</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Sep-17</p></td><td><p>300</p></td><td><p>601,921</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Oct-17</p></td><td><p>400</p></td><td><p>623,565</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Nov-17</p></td><td><p>300</p></td><td><p>650,145</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Dec-17</p></td><td><p>200</p></td><td><p>692,039</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Jan-18</p></td><td><p>600</p></td><td><p>717,523</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Feb-18</p></td><td><p>500</p></td><td><p>762,909</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Mar-18</p></td><td><p>500</p></td><td><p>801,401</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Apr-18</p></td><td><p>700</p></td><td><p>856,280</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>May-18</p></td><td><p>400</p></td><td><p>902,317</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Jun-18</p></td><td><p>1100</p></td><td><p>961,643</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Jul-18</p></td><td><p>2200</p></td><td><p>1,019,181</p></td></tr><tr><td><p>Aug-18</p></td><td><p>2400</p></td><td><p>1,093,073</p></td></tr></tbody></table><p> </p><p>Notes:</p><p> </p><ol><li>The information provided in the provided table is based on preliminary analysis of internal management information and may be subject to future revision. Figures have been rounded to the nearest 100. Subsequently, figures in the table that are 0 are less than 50.</li><li>The number of people on Universal Credit is published on Stat-Xplore. (<a href="https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk/webapi/jsf/login.xhtml" target="_blank">stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk</a>)</li></ol><p> </p> answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma question first answered 20/03/2019 14:09:07 answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma previous answer version 94873 answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma
	tabling member	163 label Biography information for Sir Stephen Timms

1082327

	registered interest
	date	05/03/2019
	answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
	answering dept id	29
	answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
	answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
	hansard heading	Universal Credit
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, in what circumstances deductions are made from a claimant's universal credit payment in order to contribute to her Department's administration costs; and if she will make a statement.
	tabling member constituency	East Ham
	tabling member printed	Stephen Timms
	uin	228540
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 26/03/2019 answer text <p>The Department does not take deductions from a claimant’s Universal Credit award with the sole intent of contributing to the Department’s administrative costs.</p><p> </p><p>For example, where payments of child maintenance are made via the Child Maintenance Service, rather than directly between clients, a 20% collection fee is incurred by the paying parent. This applies to deductions from benefit, including Universal Credit, in the same way as any other collection method.</p><p> </p><p>Similarly, in cases of benefit fraud an administrative penalty can be recovered as a deduction. These penalties are offered as an alternative to prosecution, are not imposed by the Department and can be declined by claimants.</p> answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma question first answered 26/03/2019 16:24:24 answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma previous answer version 106853 answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma
	tabling member	163 label Biography information for Sir Stephen Timms

1082329

	registered interest
	date	05/03/2019
	answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
	answering dept id	29
	answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
	answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
	hansard heading	Universal Credit
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, in what circumstances a universal credit claimant will be advised by a work coach to close his or her current application and make a new application; and if she will make a statement.
	tabling member constituency	East Ham
	tabling member printed	Stephen Timms
	uin	228541
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 21/03/2019 answer text <p>Comprehensive guidance is available to all staff and is very clear when a claim should be closed. A claim may close for various reasons including an increase in income.</p><p> </p><p>Universal Credit is an in and out of work benefit to encourage claimants to move into employment and increase their earnings.</p><p> </p><p>Re-claims provides a simple route back onto Universal Credit for claimants who have a short break in entitlement, for example, entering temporary work. Re-claims will allow most claimants who return to Universal Credit within six assessment periods of their previous award ending, to retain their previous Universal Credit assessment period and payment dates, as long as they continue to meet the basic conditions of entitlement.</p> answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma question first answered 21/03/2019 10:53:11 answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma previous answer version 106854 answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma
	tabling member	163 label Biography information for Sir Stephen Timms

1082534

	registered interest
	date	06/03/2019
	answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
	answering dept id	29
	answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
	answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
	hansard heading	Universal Credit
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, in the most recent month for which data is available, in what proportion of universal credit assessments for working claimants was income data taken from (a) RTI data provided by HMRC and (b) claimants' payslips.
	tabling member constituency	East Ham
	tabling member printed	Stephen Timms
	uin	229075
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 13/05/2019 answer text <p>The information requested is not held by the Department. Adjustments to payments owing to RTI and self-reported earnings cannot always be separated from other adjustments to a payment, such as a repayment of advances.</p><p> </p><p>From the information that is readily available for Universal Credit Full Service, in January 2019, over 1 million households had payments processed, and of these around 380,000 had an adjustment.</p><p> </p><p>Of the 380,000 payments processed that had an adjustment:</p><p> </p><ul><li>88% of the records had earnings information from HMRC’s Real-Time Earnings system.</li><li>2% of the records had Self-Reported Earnings - cases where there were no available real time information feeds. Some of this information would have come from payslips, however it is not possible to break this data down further.</li><li>less than 0.5% of the records had both Real-Time and Self-Reported Earnings information; and</li><li>9% of the records had earnings from other sources such as self employed earnings and other income, which cannot readily be separated.</li></ul><p> </p><p>Notes:</p><ul><li>Figures are rounded to the nearest 1,000.</li><li>Percentages are rounded to the nearest %.</li></ul> answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma question first answered 13/05/2019 17:11:54 answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma previous answer version 106867 answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma
	tabling member	163 label Biography information for Sir Stephen Timms

1126537

	registered interest
	date	14/05/2019
	answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
	answering dept id	29
	answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
	answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
	hansard heading	Universal Credit
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what response her Department makes when notified by a local authority of an error in a resident’s universal credit calculation.
	tabling member constituency	East Ham
	tabling member printed	Stephen Timms
	uin	254086
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 03/06/2019 answer text <p>It is not clear whether the questions relate to the Local Authority as the provider of housing or as the administrator of Housing Benefit and Council Tax. This answer therefore responds on both counts.</p><p> </p><p><strong>Local Authority as landlord:</strong></p><p> </p><p>The Local Authority use the ‘Landlord Portal’ to provide details of a claimant’s rent and tenancy details. When the information provided does not match what the claimant has given, the claimant will then be able to accept or reject the information uploaded by the Local Authority by logging into their Universal Credit account.</p><p> </p><p>If the claimant accepts the information provided by the Local Authority no further action is required. If the Local Authority has provided information that is rejected by the claimant, the claimant is advised to make contact to resolve this. This could require a subsequent housing declaration to be provided. The ‘Landlord Portal’ has a summary screen that allows the Local Authority to confirm or change the information they are about to provide before it has been submitted.</p><p> </p><p>This process applies whenever there is a rent change, including annual uprating of rent. The Landlord Portal is the streamlined communication tool which allows the Local Authority to disclose the rent thus highlighting errors in the claimants Universal Credit.</p><p> </p><p><strong>Local Authority as administrator of Housing Benefit and Council Tax:</strong></p><p> </p><p>Once a claim to Universal Credit has been made, the Local Authority will receive a notification if the claimant is in receipt of Housing Benefit. This will inform the Local Authority of the claim to Universal Credit so they can take the action to close the Housing Benefit claim where needed. The Local Authority will inform Universal Credit of the action they have taken and if there is any payment to be offset within the first assessment period.</p><p> </p><p>Additionally, during the Universal Credit claim process, the claimant will be asked if their name is on the council tax bill. If the claimant answers ‘yes’, they are asked if they have applied for a reduction in their council tax. If the claimant answers that they have applied or will apply for a Council Tax Reduction, their details will be shared with the Local Authority. This is a one-way communication which allows for the Local Authority to take the appropriate action regarding an application for a Council Tax Reduction.</p> answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma grouped question UIN 254088 question first answered 03/06/2019 13:09:40 answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma previous answer version 119078 answering member constituency Reading West answering member printed Alok Sharma answering member 4014 label Biography information for Sir Alok Sharma
	tabling member	163 label Biography information for Sir Stephen Timms