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20 Feb 2007 : Column 613W—continued


Departments: Freedom of Information

Anne Main: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions on how many occasions special advisers have been consulted in replying to Freedom of Information requests to his Department; and what his Department’s policy is on the role of special advisers in the answering of Freedom of Information requests. [119844]

Mrs. McGuire: No records are kept in the number of times special advisers have been consulted on FOI requests.

Responses to Freedom of Information requests are the responsibility of the official who has direct access to the information sought or who deals with the policy in question. In a small proportion of cases, Ministers may be consulted on departmental responses and special advisers will be copied in to those submissions.

Departments: Gender Equality

Lorely Burt: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what steps his Department is taking to implement the gender equality duty due to come into force on 6 April. [120619]


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Mrs. McGuire: My Department has assessed its functions and policies for their impact on gender equality. Each business in the Department has published a gender equality scheme, committing to objectives and action plans for addressing any areas of concern and for ensuring that we meet the requirements of the gender equality duty. Our gender equality schemes were published in December 2006.

In preparation for the duty, all staff are receiving equality training on this and all other equality requirements, and there has been widespread communication about the new duty. There will be further communication about the new duty as it comes into force in April.

Departments: Handbooks

Mr. Philip Hammond: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions if he will place in the Library a copy of his Department's staff handbook. [120302]

Mrs. McGuire: The Department for Work and Pensions does not produce a staff handbook as all the relevant information is held electronically on a departmental intranet to which all staff have access.

Departments: Ministerial Policy Advisers

Mr. Philip Hammond: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what notices of external employment have been given by special advisers in his Department in the last two years. [120314]

Mrs. McGuire: The rules for civil servants, including special advisers, who wish to take up other employment in addition to their civil service duties are set out in Section 4.3 of the Civil Service Management Code. Such information is not normally made public. There are no plans to create a public register of interests for special advisers.

Disability Premiums

Mr. Philip Hammond: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what estimate he has made of the total amount in disability premiums underpaid to income support claimants in each of the last five years. [118815]

Mrs. McGuire: No such estimate has been made; the necessary information is not available.

Disabled People: Internet Access

Mr. Philip Hammond: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what steps his Department has taken to promote improved internet access for disabled people. [118777]

Mrs. McGuire: The Department for Trade and Industry has overall responsibility for digital inclusion.

This Department has responsibility for disability discrimination policy. Under the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA), a disabled person may be able to take legal action if they are unable to access goods or services because of their impairment. DWP has taken action to raise awareness of the DDA, most recently through the “Adjusting for Better Business” campaign, which ran from December 2005 to November 2006.

DWP is also the sponsoring body for the Disability Rights Commission (DRC). The DRC published the
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findings of its formal investigation into the issues that disabled people face when using websites in 2004. In March 2006, the Minister for Disabled People spoke at the launch of PAS (Publicly Available Specification) 78, developed by the British Standards Institution (BSI) and the DRC. PAS78 is a set of guidelines on how to make websites more user-friendly for disabled people.

DWP is committed to improving the accessibility of its own websites. All its sites are working towards complying with the World Wide Web Consortium’s Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (W3C WCAG) at level AA, in line with Cabinet Office guidance. Guidelines have been developed for site managers, and a testing and improvement programme is now in place. In a recent audit, 45 per cent. of DWP’s information sites passed automated checks for level AA.

All of DWP’s information for disabled people is now published through Directgov’s Disabled People section, which helps to ensure that disabled people with a wide variety of impairments are able to find and access
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information easily. This section of the site is promoted through a variety of means, including search-engine marketing activities, links with many other disability-related organisations and attendance at relevant events and exhibitions. Directgov complies with WAI level AA.

Disabled: Children

Danny Alexander: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many parents with children with disabilities there are in each income decile. [118645]

Mrs. McGuire [holding answer 5 February 2007]: Detailed information regarding low income for Great Britain is available in “Households Below Average Income 1994/95-2004/05”.

The data are not robust enough to split such a relatively small sub-group of individuals into income deciles. However, we are able to provide information by income quintile and this is shown in the following table.

Parents with disabled children in each income quintile in 2004-05, Great Britain
Number (Million)
Bottom quintile Second quintile Middle quintile Fourth quintile Top quintile Total

Before Housing Costs

0.25

0.28

0.23

0.16

0.08

1.0

After Housing Costs

0.25

0.28

0.25

0.14

0.07

1.0

Note:
Totals may not sum due to rounding.
Source:
Family Resources Survey 2004-05.

Health and Safety Executive

Mr. Clifton-Brown: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions whether any Health and Safety Executive posts are planned to be lost in (a) 2006-07 and (b) 2007-08. [110992]

Mrs. McGuire: The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) will need to reduce the number of posts by 250-350 by 31 March 2008 to keep within current financial budgets. The exact number will depend upon the rate and grade of staff who leave HSE over this period.

Health, Work and Wellbeing Strategy

Mr. Laurence Robertson: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what action the Government have taken to take forward the Health, Work and Wellbeing strategy. [118705]

Mrs. McGuire: The Health, Work and Wellbeing strategy has been gaining momentum. The main focus to date has been on engaging stakeholders and spreading the strategy's key messages; developing partnership work between Government Departments; and co-ordinating work taking place across government.

Notable achievements in the past year include the appointment of Professor Dame Carol Black as the first National Director for Health and Work; the formation of a National Stakeholder Council, to advise and guide Ministers on appropriate action to deliver this agenda; and the publication of an evidence review, tasked with answering the question: ‘Is work good for your health and well-being?’ (Waddell and Burton, 2006).

Examples of initiatives being taken forward as part of the strategy are Improving Access to Psychological Therapies which aims to respond to patients’ preferences for ‘talking therapies’ and Workplace Health Connect which is a free and confidential occupational health service for smaller businesses.

Further information about the actions taken so far by the strategy will be published shortly in an update on progress.

Incapacity Benefit

Ben Chapman: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions if he will take steps to reduce the (a) time spent and (b) cost of making a personal capability assessment to determine continuing entitlement to incapacity benefit. [119443]

Mrs. McGuire: Doctors spend as long as is required to carry out an appropriate personal capability assessment. Some types of disabling conditions will take longer than others to assess depending on the nature of the individual’s physical and/or mental disabilities.

Medical services, including personal capability reports, are provided under contract to the DWP. This contract was awarded following a competitive tendering exercise and the Department is satisfied that the costs agreed under this contract continue to represent best value for money.

As with all our processes, the PCA process is kept under review, to ensure it best meets requirements.

Ben Chapman: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what recent assessment his Department has made of the efficiency of process for
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conducting a personal capability assessment to determine continuing entitlement to incapacity benefit. [119452]

Mrs. McGuire: The timing of a personal capability assessment (PCA) to review a customer’s entitlement to incapacity benefit is decided on the basis of medical advice. The PCA would be held at a time when it would be reasonable to expect that a customer’s condition may have changed.

Regardless of whether a customer’s condition will change, everyone’s entitlement to incapacity benefit will be reviewed at least once every three years.

As with all our processes, the PCA process is kept under review, to ensure it best meets requirements.

Industrial Health and Safety: Suffolk

Mr. Spring: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many people in Suffolk were charged with offences under health and safety legislation enforced by the Health and Safety Executive in each of the last five years. [119532]

Mrs. McGuire: The available information is in the following table.

Number
Prosecution cases Offences prosecuted (individual breaches) Offences convicted

2001-02

24

43

41

2002-03

17

27

23

2003-04

14

24

15

2004-05

12

29

25

2005-06(1)

3

3

3

(1) Provisional.
Notes:
1. The annual basis is the planning year from 1 April to 31 March, and based on date of hearing.
2. The number of cases refers to a prosecution against a single defendant. Cases may include a number of offences prosecuted, which are individual breaches of health and safety legislation laid before the court.
3. Figures cover Suffolk incorporating the following local authorities: Babergh, Forest Heath, Ipswich (borough of), Mid Suffolk, St. Edmundsbury, Suffolk Coastal and Waveney.

Jobseeker’s Allowance: Bristol

Kerry McCarthy: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what percentage of the resident working-age population in each ward in Bristol East constituency is in receipt of jobseeker's allowance. [120483]

Mr. Plaskitt: The information is not available in the format requested. The available information is in the following table.


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Jobseeker's Allowance claimants in the Bristol East parliamentary constituency, by ward: May 2006
Ward name Total claimants

Brislington East

135

Brislington West

95

Easton

360

Eastville

210

Lawrence Hill

795

St George East

145

St George West

195

Stockwood

85

Knowle(1)

135

(1) Knowle ward does not fall wholly within the Bristol East parliamentary constituency. Notes: 1. Figures supplied have been rounded to the nearest five to protect the confidentiality of claimants. 2 Figures exclude a very small number of cases that are held clerically. 3 2003 ward boundaries are used. Source: 100 per cent DWP Work and Pensions Longitudinal Study (WPLS)

National Insurance Numbers

Mr. Laws: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what estimate he has made of the number of national insurance numbers which were used for fraudulent purposes in each of the last five years. [102139]

Mr. Plaskitt: We have robust checks in place to prevent national insurance numbers being used fraudulently and to protect the benefit systems against identity fraud.

Where a national insurance number has been identified as having been used for fraudulent purposes, a mark is put on the national insurance number account. If any activity occurs on the account, a report is issued to the National Identity Fraud Unit (NIFU) within three days advising what activity has taken place.

If NIFU are advised of a NINO being used by another person, the account is classed as vulnerable and is flagged as having a NIFU interest. If there is any benefit activity on that account, NIFU receive a report within three days of the activity. A report of suspected fraud is completed and this is sent to the Fraud Investigation Service Operational Intelligence Unit pertinent to the area within the UK. A decision will then be taken as to the appropriate type of investigation to be carried out. This can potentially lead to prosecution of the individual involved.

The available information regarding the number of marked accounts is in the table.

Number of marked accounts

2003-04

2,341

2004-05

1,087

2005-06

2,521

All

5,949


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