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1151368

	registered interest
	date	22/10/2019
	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 assessment she has made of the adequacy of the six-month limit on the easement of work-related requirements for universal credit for bereavement of a partner or child.
	tabling member constituency	Weaver Vale
	tabling member printed	Mike Amesbury
	uin	3790
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 30/10/2019 answer text <p>When a Universal Credit (UC) claimant suffers a bereavement there are easements to work-related requirement which can be applied. These will be discussed and agreed, on an individual basis, with the claimant’s Work Coach or Case Manager. In some circumstances payment of UC, that would otherwise reduce or stop following a bereavement, can continue for a short time. This is called a ‘Bereavement run-on’, and may be applied when a partner or dependent child dies.</p><p> </p><p>The ‘Bereavement run-on’ results in UC continuing to be paid as if there had been no change of circumstances for the assessment period in which the death occurs and the following two assessment periods.</p> answering member constituency Colchester answering member printed Will Quince question first answered 30/10/2019 17:03:08 answering member 4423 label Biography information for Will Quince
	tabling member	4667 label Biography information for Mike Amesbury

1169091

	registered interest
	date	07/01/2020
	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, how many universal credit claimants have signed a waiver outlining any previous communication with a political representative regarding benefits before accessing appeals information since that policy was introduced.
	tabling member constituency	Weaver Vale
	tabling member printed	Mike Amesbury
	uin	1039
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 15/01/2020 answer text <p>At no point during a Universal Credit claim does the Department ask a person to sign a waiver. To safeguard the sensitive and personal data we hold about people’s Universal Credit claims, we ask representatives making enquiries on behalf of others to demonstrate that they have claimant consent. This is a simple process, which can be completed online or by telephone by the claimant, and has been in place since 2017.</p><p> </p><p>The Universal Credit system is structured around an online personal account which contains all the information relevant to the claim. This can include details about: bank accounts, savings, capital, medical history and family relationships, in addition to third parties including landlords and employers. Therefore, we need to ensure a high level of security and protection exists to combat unscrupulous individuals and organisations who try to access the information and seek to impersonate genuine representatives.</p><p> </p><p>The Department is continuing to work with Social Security Advisory Committee (SSAC) and third party organisations to understand how Universal Credit can support organisations who help our claimants. We are committed to having processes in place which effectively supports claimants to access our services, but which also protects information.</p> answering member constituency Colchester answering member printed Will Quince question first answered 15/01/2020 17:12:46 answering member 4423 label Biography information for Will Quince
	tabling member	4667 label Biography information for Mike Amesbury

1193643

	registered interest
	date	05/05/2020
	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	Discretionary Housing Payments: Coronavirus
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of removing the cap on discretionary housing payments to enable local authorities to provide support to households affected by covid-19.
	tabling member constituency	Weaver Vale
	tabling member printed	Mike Amesbury
	uin	44031
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 15/05/2020 answer text <p>We have already provided £180m in Discretionary Housing Payment(DHP) funding to Local Authorities to support vulnerable claimants with housing costs in the private and social rented sector in England and Wales for 2020/21. This includes an extra £40m as announced last year at the spending round.</p><p> </p><p>In addition to the central government contribution, Local Authorities in England and Wales are able to top up DHP funding up to a maximum of two and a half times this figure using their own funds.</p> answering member constituency Colchester answering member printed Will Quince question first answered 15/05/2020 13:25:50 answering member 4423 label Biography information for Will Quince
	tabling member	4667 label Biography information for Mike Amesbury

1229688

	registered interest
	date	28/08/2020
	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 assessment she has made for the implications of her policy of the Court of Appeal judgment handed down on 22 June 2020 on the Universal Credit system; and if she will make a statement.
	tabling member constituency	Weaver Vale
	tabling member printed	Mike Amesbury
	uin	82344
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 08/09/2020 answer text <p>The Court of Appeal judgment affects a small minority of claimants in very specific circumstances, those who receive two calendar monthly payments of earnings in one assessment period and lose out on the work allowance. We recognise the impact that having double earnings in an assessment period can have on individual claimants and their ability to manage their finances.</p><p> </p><p>While the court judgment does not require us to fix this issue by a particular date, we are currently working on ways to resolve this for claimants as soon as possible. We will keep the House updated as progress is made.</p> answering member constituency Colchester answering member printed Will Quince question first answered 08/09/2020 17:03:38 answering member 4423 label Biography information for Will Quince
	tabling member	4667 label Biography information for Mike Amesbury

1239452

	registered interest
	date	30/09/2020
	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: Coronavirus
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many times the universal credit service has been unavailable since 23 March 2020; and for what reasons that service was unavailable on each of those occasions.
	tabling member constituency	Weaver Vale
	tabling member printed	Mike Amesbury
	uin	97714
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 08/10/2020 answer text <p>There have been over 3 million Universal Credit claims made since mid-March; six times the volume that the Department would typically receive. Despite that surge, the system is standing up to the challenge and demonstrating that resilience and scalability are integral parts its design, whilst maintaining high levels of payment timeliness.</p><p>There have been no unplanned outages of the Universal Credit online service since March 2020.</p><p /><p /> answering member constituency Colchester answering member printed Will Quince grouped question UIN 97715 question first answered 08/10/2020 14:43:43 answering member 4423 label Biography information for Will Quince
	tabling member	4667 label Biography information for Mike Amesbury

1239453

	registered interest
	date	30/09/2020
	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: Coronavirus
	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 capacity of the universal credit service to cope with demand for new online claims in the period since 23 March 2020; and what steps her Department is taking to minimise periods of unavailability of that service.
	tabling member constituency	Weaver Vale
	tabling member printed	Mike Amesbury
	uin	97715
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 08/10/2020 answer text <p>There have been over 3 million Universal Credit claims made since mid-March; six times the volume that the Department would typically receive. Despite that surge, the system is standing up to the challenge and demonstrating that resilience and scalability are integral parts its design, whilst maintaining high levels of payment timeliness.</p><p>There have been no unplanned outages of the Universal Credit online service since March 2020.</p><p /><p /> answering member constituency Colchester answering member printed Will Quince grouped question UIN 97714 question first answered 08/10/2020 14:43:43 answering member 4423 label Biography information for Will Quince
	tabling member	4667 label Biography information for Mike Amesbury

1251906

	registered interest
	date	13/11/2020
	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	Redundancy: Coronavirus
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what assessment his Department has made of the need to provide financial support for employees made redundant before 23 September 2020 who cannot be furloughed and are not entitled to any statutory redundancy payment.
	tabling member constituency	Weaver Vale
	tabling member printed	Mike Amesbury
	uin	92004
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 23/11/2020 answer text <p>Universal Credit is in place to support claimants in difficult circumstances. The Government introduced a package of temporary welfare measures worth around £9.3 billion this year to help with the financial consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. This included the £20 weekly increase to the Universal Credit Standard Allowance rates as a temporary measure for the 20/21 tax year.</p><p>Our long-term ambition is to level up across the country and continue to tackle poverty through our reformed welfare system that works with the labour market to encourage people to move into and progress in work wherever possible.</p><p> </p><p>Our £30bn Plan for Jobs is the first step on the ladder to achieving this and will support economic recovery through new schemes including Kickstart and Job Entry Targeted Support.</p> answering member constituency Colchester answering member printed Will Quince question first answered 23/11/2020 16:31:07 answering member 4423 label Biography information for Will Quince
	tabling member	4667 label Biography information for Mike Amesbury

1251910

	registered interest
	date	13/11/2020
	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: Coronavirus
	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 need to remove the five-week wait for universal credit for employees made redundant prior to 23 September 2020 and who are not eligible for statutory redundancy pay.
	tabling member constituency	Weaver Vale
	tabling member printed	Mike Amesbury
	uin	92005
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 23/11/2020 answer text <p>Nobody in need has to wait for a payment under Universal Credit (UC). UC New Claim Advances allow eligible claimants to receive up to 100% of their estimated Universal Credit payment upfront within a few days. Claimants will receive their annual award over 13 payments during their first year, instead of 12. They are paid quickly and can be applied for online or over the phone. These upfront payments can be spread across two years instead of one from October 2021, as announced in the 2020 Budget.</p><p><strong> </strong></p> answering member constituency Colchester answering member printed Will Quince question first answered 23/11/2020 16:08:41 answering member 4423 label Biography information for Will Quince
	tabling member	4667 label Biography information for Mike Amesbury

1287174

	registered interest
	date	19/02/2021
	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 assessment her Department has made of the potential effect of including discretionary and hardship payments as income for the purposes of universal credit on people in receipt of that payment.
	tabling member constituency	Weaver Vale
	tabling member printed	Mike Amesbury
	uin	155368
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 01/03/2021 answer text <p>No assessment has been made.</p> answering member constituency Colchester answering member printed Will Quince question first answered 01/03/2021 15:52:11 answering member 4423 label Biography information for Will Quince
	tabling member	4667 label Biography information for Mike Amesbury

1345235

	registered interest
	date	08/07/2021
	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	Social Security Benefits: Overpayments
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how much her Department recovered from overpayments that were as a result of her Department's and not the claimant's error in each month in the most recent period for which figures are available; and what the average amount of overpayment due to her Department's error was recovered from each such claimant.
	tabling member constituency	Weaver Vale
	tabling member printed	Mike Amesbury
	uin	29888
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 19/07/2021 answer text <p>In the last month for which figures are available DWP paid out almost £3.5bn in Universal Credit and it should be noted that fraud and error in the benefits system remains low, with 95% of benefits, worth more than £200bn. paid correctly in 2020/21. Official Error overpayments remained at 0.4% of benefit expenditure last year, with UC Official Error Overpayments falling from 1.3% to 0.9%.</p><p> </p><p>Deductions from UC are now capped at 25% (as of April 2021) having previously been 30%. Where requested deductions exceed the 25% maximum, or there is insufficient UC in payment for all deductions to be made, a priority order is applied, which determines the order in which items should be deducted. ‘Last resort’ deductions, such as rent or fuel costs, are at the top of the priority order, ensuring that claimant welfare is prioritised, followed by social obligation deductions, such as fines and child maintenance, and finally benefit debt, such as Social Fund loans and benefit overpayments.</p><p> </p><p>Anyone with overpayment deductions who does experience financial hardship is encouraged to contact the Department’s Debt Management unit. Where a person cannot afford the proposed rate of these deductions, a lower amount can be negotiated.</p><p> </p><p>Deductions in respect of UC Official Error debt for the last 6 months are shown below:</p><p> </p><table><tbody><tr><td><p><strong>Month</strong></p></td><td><p><strong>Value of in month recovery where debt category is official error</strong></p></td><td><p><strong>Average recovery per Customer in Month</strong></p></td></tr><tr><td><p><strong>Jan-21</strong></p></td><td><p>£12,470,549</p></td><td><p>£67.47</p></td></tr><tr><td><p><strong>Feb-21</strong></p></td><td><p>£14,464,840</p></td><td><p>£67.15</p></td></tr><tr><td><p><strong>Mar-21</strong></p></td><td><p>£16,444,768</p></td><td><p>£70.11</p></td></tr><tr><td><p><strong>Apr-21</strong></p></td><td><p>£16,524,866</p></td><td><p>£69.95</p></td></tr><tr><td><p><strong>May-21</strong></p></td><td><p>£13,563,717</p></td><td><p>£65.02</p></td></tr><tr><td><p><strong>Jun-21</strong></p></td><td><p>£14,584,640</p></td><td><p>£63.44</p></td></tr></tbody></table><p> </p><p>* The data shown in the above table is taken from operational data systems, and is not intended for publication. Therefore, the data itself is not quality assured to the standard of published Official Statistics and National Statistics.</p><p> </p> answering member constituency Colchester answering member printed Will Quince question first answered 19/07/2021 15:38:13 answering member 4423 label Biography information for Will Quince
	tabling member	4667 label Biography information for Mike Amesbury