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989657

registered interest
date	17/10/2018
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	Television Licences: Older People
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate she has made of the number of pensioners in receipt of free TV licences in each parliamentary constituency in Wales.
tabling member constituency	Vale of Clwyd
tabling member printed	Chris Ruane
uin	180653
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 22/10/2018 answer text <p>The department does not hold data on the number of households in receipt of a free television license broken down by Parliamentary constituency.</p><p> </p><p>The number of households in receipt of winter fuel payment (aged 75 and over) by Parliamentary constituency can be used as a proxy for television license (assuming those in receipt of winter fuel payment have a television) and can be found in the dataset ‘Households by Parliamentary constituency and age, Winter Fuel Payment, 2017 to 2018’ via the following link:</p><p> </p><p><a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/winter-fuel-payment-recipient-and-household-figures-2017-to-2018" target="_blank">https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/winter-fuel-payment-recipient-and-household-figures-2017-to-2018</a></p> answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman question first answered 22/10/2018 17:16:11 answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman previous answer version 80039 answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman
tabling member	534 label Biography information for Chris Ruane

973347

registered interest
date	13/09/2018
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	State Retirement Pensions: Females
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 efficacy of the Independent Case Examiner in investigating complaints from women affected by state pension age equalisation measures.
tabling member constituency	Edinburgh West
tabling member printed	Christine Jardine
uin	174839
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 11/10/2018 answer text <p>The approach of successive governments has been consistent. The Independent Case Examiner is independent. She is appointed under contract to adjudicate on escalated complaints about the DWP, and its contracted service providers, in cases where the complainant has exhausted the relevant internal complaints process and remains dissatisfied. If a complainant is dissatisfied with the outcome of an Independent Case Examiner investigation (or the service provided by the Independent Case Examiner) they can ask their Member of Parliament to escalate their complaint to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman</p><p>Ministers have no role in assessing the efficacy of the Independent Case Examiner in investigating complaints from women affected by State Pension age equalisation measures.</p><p> </p><p>The Independent Case Examiner resources are reviewed on an annual basis. Since October 2017, the Independent Case Examiner has experienced increased levels of referrals associated with legislative changes to State Pension age for women. The Independent Case Examiner responded by dedicating a team of three investigation case managers.</p><p> </p><p>The Independent Case Examiner aims to complete any investigation within 20 weeks of starting work on a case. The Independent Case Examiner reports related to legislative changes to State Pension age for women that have been concluded to date have been completed within an average of 9.75 weeks. To date, the Independent Case Examiner had not upheld any case specific complaints that the DWP failed to provide adequate and timely information relating to the increase in State Pension age. All final Independent Case Examiner reports explain how the complainant can escalate their complaint to the Parliamentary Ombudsman’s Office. The Parliamentary Health and Service Ombudsman make final decisions on complaints that have not been resolved by UK Government Departments. This was set up in 1967 under the then Labour Government.</p><p> </p><p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong> </strong></p> answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman grouped question UIN 174840 question first answered 11/10/2018 12:15:24 answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman previous answer version 77326 answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman
tabling member	4634 label Biography information for Christine Jardine

973350

registered interest
date	13/09/2018
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	State Retirement Pensions: Females
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 Independent Case Examiner's progress in dealing with complaints made by women affected by the state pension age equalisation measures.
tabling member constituency	Edinburgh West
tabling member printed	Christine Jardine
uin	174840
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 11/10/2018 answer text <p>The approach of successive governments has been consistent. The Independent Case Examiner is independent. She is appointed under contract to adjudicate on escalated complaints about the DWP, and its contracted service providers, in cases where the complainant has exhausted the relevant internal complaints process and remains dissatisfied. If a complainant is dissatisfied with the outcome of an Independent Case Examiner investigation (or the service provided by the Independent Case Examiner) they can ask their Member of Parliament to escalate their complaint to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman</p><p>Ministers have no role in assessing the efficacy of the Independent Case Examiner in investigating complaints from women affected by State Pension age equalisation measures.</p><p> </p><p>The Independent Case Examiner resources are reviewed on an annual basis. Since October 2017, the Independent Case Examiner has experienced increased levels of referrals associated with legislative changes to State Pension age for women. The Independent Case Examiner responded by dedicating a team of three investigation case managers.</p><p> </p><p>The Independent Case Examiner aims to complete any investigation within 20 weeks of starting work on a case. The Independent Case Examiner reports related to legislative changes to State Pension age for women that have been concluded to date have been completed within an average of 9.75 weeks. To date, the Independent Case Examiner had not upheld any case specific complaints that the DWP failed to provide adequate and timely information relating to the increase in State Pension age. All final Independent Case Examiner reports explain how the complainant can escalate their complaint to the Parliamentary Ombudsman’s Office. The Parliamentary Health and Service Ombudsman make final decisions on complaints that have not been resolved by UK Government Departments. This was set up in 1967 under the then Labour Government.</p><p> </p><p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong> </strong></p> answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman grouped question UIN 174839 question first answered 11/10/2018 12:15:24 answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman previous answer version 77327 answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman
tabling member	4634 label Biography information for Christine Jardine

935076

registered interest
date	05/07/2018
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	State Retirement Pensions: Females
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent estimate he has made of the average time it has taken for Department to resolve a complaint relating to the increase to women's state pension age.
tabling member constituency	Hemsworth
tabling member printed	Jon Trickett
uin	161103
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 11/07/2018 answer text <p>All government Departments have routine complaints procedures, this has been the case under successive governments.</p><p> </p><p>The Department has a two tier complaints process which considers formal complaints about our service. As outlined on Gov.uk, DWP complaints processes encourages customers in the first instance to raise their issues with the office they are dealing with, as a business as usual contact, so we put things right.</p><p> </p><p>If the customer remains unhappy with the response, they can escalate their concerns, which will be dealt with by the Complaints Resolution Team as part of the formal DWP complaints process. The complaint is independently investigated. Where cases cannot be resolved to the customer’s satisfaction, the customer can escalate their complaint to the Director General as part of the tier two complaint process.</p><p> </p><p>Escalated complaints represent the final business review and response to the complaint.</p><p>Once a complainant has exhausted the DWP complaint process they are signposted to the Independent Case Examiner’s (ICE) Office if they are dissatisfied with the final response to their complaint.</p><p> </p><p>Complaints received from women born in the 1950s and affected by changes in State Pension age are handled in line with the overall Departmental complaints process published on Gov.uk.</p><p> </p><p>The role of the Independent Case Examiner (ICE) is to consider case-specific complaints of maladministration (service failure). The vast majority of the complaints that are referred to ICE are complex and require the circumstances of each case to be considered on its merits. Prior to the WASPI campaign the ICE Office routinely accepted in the region of 1,100 and 1,200 complaints for examination each year. At the end of February 2018, the Office had accepted 1,907 WASPI complaints alone.</p><p> </p><p>In January 2017, the ICE Office took the decision to bring a lead case into investigation in order to familiarise itself with the issues underpinning the campaign. This investigation concluded in June 2017 – the ICE did not uphold the complaint. Whilst the Office has had no additional resource to deal with the WASPI campaign complaints, a dedicated team of investigation case managers was established (from within existing resources) in October 2017 to investigate this group of complaints. The ICE Office aim to complete investigation within 20 weeks of starting work on a case, the WASPI related ICE reports that had been concluded to date have been completed within an average of 9.75 weeks. To date, the ICE had not upheld any case specific complaints that DWP failed to provide adequate and timely information relating to the increase in their State Pension age. All final ICE reports explain how the complainant can escalate their complaint to the Parliamentary Ombudsman’s Office.</p><p> </p><p>There are no plans to dedicate additional resources to investigating this group of complaints, as to do so would disadvantage other groups of complainants whose cases are awaiting investigation.</p><p> </p><p>The Parliamentary Health and Service Ombudsman make final decisions on complaints that have not been resolved by UK Government Departments. This was set up in 1967 under the then Labour Government.</p><p> </p> answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman question first answered 11/07/2018 14:54:23 answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman previous answer version 68842 answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman
tabling member	410 label Biography information for Jon Trickett

838976

registered interest
date	08/02/2018
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	Carillion: Insolvency
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 oral contribution of the Minister for the Cabinet Office of 15 January 2018, on Carillion, if she will place the annual reports of the 14 pension schemes forming part of the Carillion Group in the Library.
tabling member constituency	Salford and Eccles
tabling member printed	Rebecca Long Bailey
uin	127537
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 21/02/2018 answer text <p>Government Ministers do not have access to the annual reports of the pension schemes forming part of the Carillion Group. This would be a matter for the pension schemes’ trustees.</p><p>The trustees of defined benefit schemes are required to let members know that the scheme’s annual report and accounts are available on request within seven months of the end of each scheme year. The report must include a copy of the audited accounts and auditor's statement, details of the trustees and how they are appointed and removed, an investment report, including how the investments have performed and the actuary's certification of the adequacy of the schedule of contributions.</p> answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman question first answered 21/02/2018 12:39:02 answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman previous answer version 42152 answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman
tabling member	4396 label Biography information for Rebecca Long Bailey

816738

registered interest
date	05/01/2018
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	State Retirement Pensions: Females
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether all women born in the 1950s affected by the change in state pension age have now been informed by letter of such changes.
tabling member constituency	Portsmouth South
tabling member printed	Stephen Morgan
uin	121165
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 11/01/2018 answer text <p>The Government sent letters to women affected by the 1995 Act changes between April 2009 and March 2011 using the address details held by HMRC at that time.</p><p>The timetable for equalising State Pension age for women and men to 65 and the subsequent increase to 66 was accelerated by the Pensions Act 2011 following sharp increases in life expectancy projections. A concession was made prior to the passing of the 2011 Act which reduced the maximum delay that anyone would experience in claiming their State Pension, relative to the previous timetable, to 18 months compared to the original proposal. Following the Pensions Act 2011 the Government wrote to all those directly affected to inform them of the changes to their State Pension age between January 2012 and November 2013.</p><p> </p><p><strong>Background to direct mail outs: </strong></p><ul><li><strong>Apr 09 – Mar11:</strong> All those affected by the 1995 Act changes alone (those born between 6 April 1950 and 5 April 1953) were sent letters informing them of the change to their State Pension age. Letters went to approximately 1.2 million women between 2009 and 2011.</li></ul><p> </p><ul><li><strong>Jan 12 – Nov 13: </strong>All those affected by the 2011 Act changes (those born between 6 April 1953 and 5 April 1960) were sent letters informing them of the change to their State Pension age. This involved mailing more than 5 million letters <del class="ministerial">with an accompanying leaflet</del> to those affected, between January 2012 and November 2013.</li><li><ins class="ministerial">Both lots of letters had appropriate supporting information.</ins></li></ul> answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman question first answered 11/01/2018 10:42:39 question first ministerially corrected 18/12/2018 17:16:05 answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman previous answer version 33458 answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman
tabling member	4653 label Biography information for Stephen Morgan

746123

registered interest
date	28/06/2017
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	State Retirement Pensions: Females
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent estimate he has made of the number of women in (a) Coventry North East constituency, (b) Coventry local authority area, (c) the West Midlands and (d) England who will be affected by changes to the state pension age for women born in the 1950s.
tabling member constituency	Coventry North East
tabling member printed	Colleen Fletcher
uin	1557
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 03/07/2017 answer text <p>Women born between 6 April 1950 and 5 April 1953 were affected by State Pension age equalisation under the Pensions Act 1995.</p><p> </p><p>The Pensions Act 2011 accelerated the equalisation of State Pension age, and included transitional arrangements limiting State Pension age delays, affecting women born between 6 April 1953 and 5 December 1953. It also brought forward the increase in State Pension age from 65 to 66 which affected women born between 6 December 1953 and 5 April 1960.</p><p> </p><p>Information on the numbers affected by constituent country, parliamentary constituency or local authority is not held by the Department for Work and Pensions. However, the most recent population breakdowns for England and its parliamentary constituencies by age can be found here:</p><p><a href="https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/populationandmigration/populationestimates/datasets/parliamentaryconstituencymidyearpopulationestimates" target="_blank">https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/populationandmigration/populationestimates/datasets/parliamentaryconstituencymidyearpopulationestimates</a></p><p> </p><p>Population breakdowns by local authority, region and country can be found here:</p><p><a href="https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/populationandmigration/populationestimates/datasets/populationestimatesforukenglandandwalesscotlandandnorthernireland" target="_blank">https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/populationandmigration/populationestimates/datasets/populationestimatesforukenglandandwalesscotlandandnorthernireland</a></p><p> </p><p>The House of Commons library have produced a paper estimating the number of women affected by the Pensions Act 2011 (those born between 6 April 1953 and 5 <del class="ministerial">December 1953</del><ins class="ministerial"> April 1960</ins>) by constituency, which can be found here:</p><p><a href="http://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CBP-7405/CBP-07405constituencyestimates.xlsx" target="_blank">http://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CBP-7405/CBP-07405constituencyestimates.xlsx</a></p> answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman question first answered 03/07/2017 14:01:01 question first ministerially corrected 05/07/2017 08:38:48 answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman previous answer version 1264 answering member constituency Hexham answering member printed Guy Opperman answering member 4142 label Biography information for Guy Opperman
tabling member	4378 label Biography information for Colleen Fletcher