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9 Oct 2006 : Column 6W—continued
Transgendered People
Lorely Burt: To ask the Minister for Women and Equality if she will take steps to extend the goods and services regulations to include transgendered people. [89856]
Meg Munn: The Government have made a commitment to prohibit discrimination on grounds of gender reassignment in the provision of goods and services by December 2007, in order to meet the transposition deadline for European Directive 2004/113/EC. We will implement the Directive through regulations under the European Communities Act 1972. The necessary work is under way and we will consult on our proposals around the turn of the year.
Work and Pensions
Attendance Allowance
Hywel Williams: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many doctors working on attendance allowance cases in Wales speak English and Welsh. [89921]
Mrs. McGuire: All Medical Services doctors speak English. There are four doctors who currently carry out disability living allowance and attendance allowance assessments in Wales who have advised Medical Services that they speak Welsh.
Benefit Claimants
Mr. Crabb: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how much is being spent in 2006-07 on the provision of professional counselling support to reduce the number of jobseeker’s allowance and incapacity benefit claimants. [89994]
Mr. Jim Murphy: The administration of Jobcentre Plus is a matter for the Chief Executive of Jobcentre Plus, Lesley Strathie. I have asked her to provide the hon. Member with the information requested.
The Secretary of State has asked me to reply to your question asking how much is being spent in 2006-07 on the provision of professional counselling support to reduce the number of jobseeker’s allowance and incapacity benefit claimants. This is something that falls within the responsibilities delegated to me as Chief Executive of Jobcentre Plus.
The information you requested is not available because Information on the costs of providing professional counselling support is not recorded separately. Budgets are prepared for each type of employment programme, some of which contain an element of professional counselling but expenditure cannot be extracted in a meaningful way.
Benefits
Justine Greening: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (1) what his most recent estimate is of the take-up rate for (a) incapacity benefit, (b) disability living allowance, (c) attendance allowance, (d) bereavement benefits, (e) carer's allowance, (f) maternity allowance and (g) severe disablement allowance; [92107]
(2) what recent estimates he has made of the take-up rate of (a) industrial injuries disablement benefit, (b) reduced earnings allowance and (c) retirement allowance. [92110]
Mrs. McGuire: The information is not available.
Mr. Ruffley: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions pursuant to his answer of 30 January 2006, Official Report, column 252W, on benefits, if he will provide the figures collected by his Department since January. [90465]
Mrs. McGuire: As at February 2006, there were 48,960 incapacity benefit and severe disablement allowance claimants whose primary diagnosis was alcoholism, and 48,530 incapacity benefit and severe disablement allowance claimants whose primary diagnosis was drug abuse.
For the first six months of 2006 (January to June), 44.54 per cent. of incapacity benefit and severe disablement allowance claims received were refused. Claims refused are all those claims where no monetary amount of incapacity benefit or severe disablement allowance was awarded. Many of these claims will be national insurance contribution-only cases; other benefits may be awarded.
Chris McCafferty: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what assessment he has made of the information provided to cancer patients regarding financial and other benefit entitlement when they are diagnosed. [91569]
Mrs. McGuire: The Department goes to considerable lengths to publicise benefit information through a variety of channels and is always open to new ideas for improving the delivery of benefit information to all its potential customers.
Entitlement to disability living allowance or attendance allowance is not based on a particular diagnosis, but on the basis of an individual's care or mobility needs arising out of an illness or disability.
The Disability and Carers Service has, therefore, been working closely with the Department of Health and representatives of Macmillan Cancer Support to
identify ways of signposting benefit advice at an early stage to people with any long term health conditions (including people diagnosed with cancer). The Department of Health is developing an “Information Prescription” which will not only give details of where people can go to find out more about their condition, treatment and services but will also inform patients with long-term conditions where to go for advice and information about the benefits they may be entitled to.
Mr. Love: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many tenants living in (a) social housing and (b) the private rented sector (PRS) in (i) Edmonton, (ii) Enfield borough and (iii) Greater London are in receipt of housing benefit; how many in the PRS are in receipt of (A) single room rent and (B) local reference rent in each case; what the average shortfall of each is compared with actual average rent paid in each case; and if he will make a statement. [90286]
Mr. Plaskitt: The information is not available in the format requested. A breakdown of housing benefit claimants by tenure type is not available below regional level. Information on average shortfalls due to rent restrictions is not available.
The most recent available information for case loads in the London GOR by tenure type, average benefit amounts, and details of those subject to single room rent (SRR) or local reference rent (LRR) are in the tables.
| Housing benefit (HB) recipients by tenure type and average weekly amount of HB: London GOR, May 2004 | ||
| Tenure | Case load | Average weekly amount (£) |
| Housing benefit (HB) private tenants( 1) whose weekly amount of HB is less than their weekly eligible rent by whether they are subject to the Local Reference Rent (LRR) Scheme or the Single Room Rent (SRR) Scheme: London GOR, May 2004 | ||
| HB private tenants | Of which, have weekly amount HB less than their weekly eligible rent( 2) | |
| (1) Private tenants exclude Registered Social Landlords (RSL). (2) Weekly eligible rent is after any non-dependant deductions. Notes: 1. Figures are rounded to the nearest thousand and amounts to the nearest penny. 2. Figures are based on a 1 per cent. sample and are therefore subject to a degree of sampling variation. 3. HB figures exclude any Extended Payment cases. 4. The data refer to benefit units, which may be a single person or a couple. 5 “—” denotes nil/negligible. 6. HB may be less than eligible rent due to reasons other than rent restrictions. | ||
Mr. Sheerman: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what guidance has been given to the Rent Service on controlling expenditure of housing benefit. [92349]
Mr. Plaskitt: The Department for Work and Pensions does not provide guidance to the Rent Service on controlling expenditure of housing benefit. The Rent Service independently considers appropriate evidence and decides the appropriate eligible rent.
Mr. Evans: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what estimate has been made of the (a) financial effects and (b) the effect on the numbers claiming of giving those on incapacity benefit access to physiotherapy. [89888]
Mrs. McGuire: The information requested is not available.
Mr. Ruffley: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions pursuant to his answer of 20 March 2006, Official Report, column 130-31W, to the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Mr. Gerrard), on incapacity benefit, if he will provide the figures collected by his Department since March. [90191]
Mrs. McGuire: The information is not available in the format requested. The most recent available information is in the following table.
| Proportion of new incapacity benefit claimants ending their claim within six months | ||
| Percentage | ||
| Quarter | Pathways to Work pilot areas | Other areas |
| Notes: 1. Current benefits data do not allow six month off-flow analysis after September 2005 2. Figures do not include a proportion of short-term incapacity benefit claims, which flow on and off between scan dates; the off-flows presented will be lower than actual rates, but trends over time will be consistent. Source: DWP—National Benefits Database. | ||
Mr. Boswell: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many people are claiming incapacity benefit, broken down by quinquennial age bands. [91697]
Mrs. McGuire: The information is in the table.
Mr. Ruffley: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what estimate he has made of (a) the percentage of those entitled to claim (i) housing benefit, (ii) income support and (iii) council tax benefit, (iv) pension credit who did not do so and (b) the amount that went unclaimed in each case in each of the last five years; and what estimate he has made of the amount and percentage that went unclaimed in respect of income-related benefits in (1) 1997-98 and (2) the latest year for which information is available. [90475]
Mr. Plaskitt: I refer the hon. Member to the written answer I gave my right hon. Friend the member for North Tyneside (Mr. Byers) on 3 March 2006, Official Report, column 1034W.
Child Support Agency
Jo Swinson: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what percentage of cases concerning a change in circumstances submitted to the Child Support Agency took longer than (a) seven months, (b) 10 months and (c) 18 months to process in the last five years. [89983]
Mr. Plaskitt: The information requested is not available.
Jo Swinson: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions in how many cases payments were made by the Child Support Agency to a parent claiming support when the child was not habitually resident with them in East Dunbartonshire in each year since 2000. [89984]
Mr. Plaskitt: The information requested is not available.
Mr. Philip Hammond: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions if he will estimate the percentage of non-resident parents registered with the Child Support Agency who have a passport. [90197]
Mr. Plaskitt: The information requested is not available.
Mr. Philip Hammond: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many telephone calls to the Child Support Agency (a) were received, (b) received an engaged tone and (c) were disconnected during the interactive response process for the period April 2002 to June 2006 for (i) all calls and (ii) calls relating to then cases being processed on the CS2 computer system. [90201]
Mr. Plaskitt: The administration of the Child Support Agency is a matter for the chief executive. He will write to the hon. Member with the information requested.
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