Appendix
The Government welcomes the Committee's
Third Report of Session 2013-14 which considered the performance
of the Department for Work and Pensions in 2012-13. The Department
is currently undertaking an extensive programme of change. Across
these flagship welfare reforms, our approach is one of careful
and controlled delivery, prioritising a safe and secure roll-out.
Through testing and learning as we go,
we are also ensuring that implementation and delivery of the reforms
is carefully measured; in turn, allowing us to evaluate each process,
minimise error and optimise value for money.
We are continuing to monitor the impact
of the welfare reforms on benefit claimants through consultation
and impact assessments and by maintaining transparency. Claimants
are kept fully informed as and when they are affected by welfare
changes.
We are making real progress in transforming
how the Department supports individuals and families, helping
to put public spending on a more sustainable footing at the same
time. This means targeting resources more effectively to ensure
that the system is fair to the British taxpayer and improving
the efficiency within the Department itself—all the while,
ensuring we continue to help people in genuine need of support.
1. Benefits up-rating
Studies have shown
that people on low incomes spend a higher proportion of income
on rent, heating and food, which are often subject to higher inflation
rates than general expenditure. The average annual rate of inflation
that the poorest people face may therefore be significantly higher
than that incurred by wealthier people. This may mean that people
on benefits are likely to be hard hit by a 1% limit on benefit
up-rating. We recommend that the Government monitor the impact
of this reform on benefit claimants, particularly as many of them
may also be affected by other reforms, including those to housing
benefit, the introduction of the benefit cap, and changes in entitlement
to disability benefits. (Paragraph
13)
The Government has monitored, and will
continue to monitor, the impact of the difficult but necessary
decision to increase most working age benefits and statutory payments
by 1% for 2013-14, 2014-15 and 2015-16.
What's more, we have protected pensioners,
committing to the triple-lock guarantee for the basic State Pension,
and also protected the benefits that reflect the additional costs
which disabled people face by up-rating them by at least in line
with inflation.
For 2013-14, the main rates of working-age
benefits and the statutory payments were up-rated by 1% in the
Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2013. The Welfare Benefits
Up-rating Act 2013 provided for the 1% increase to apply for 2014-15
and 2015-16. Both of these were accompanied by Impact Assessments.
Even following this decision in 2013-14, most low income households
reliant on out of work benefits have seen, and will continue to
see, a cash increase every year.
The Office for Budget Responsibility's
latest economic assumptions and forecasts of CPI gave an economic
assessment of the changes in household income, providing a breakdown
of affected households by income decile and family type, as well
as considering the impact on household income for "protected
groups" (as defined by the Equality Act 2010).
As part of his ongoing public sector
equality duty under the Equality Act 2010 to monitor impacts on
"protected groups", the Secretary of State continues
to monitor the impacts of the Welfare Benefits Up-rating Act 2013
in light of any changes to the underlying rate of inflation. The
underlying rate of inflation for increases in 2014-15 is similar
to the OBR forecast used in the Impact Assessment; it is therefore
likely that the impacts on affected households will be broadly
similar to those set out there.
More widely, the impact of welfare reforms
on households cannot be considered in isolation to the Government's
wider decisions on tax and public spending, since the latter will
also affect the household incomes and living standards. The Committee
will be aware that Government regularly produces analysis of the
cumulative impact of all Coalition changes on households across
the income distribution. The latest analysis published at Budget
2014 shows that the richest 20% of households continue to make
the greatest contribution towards reducing the deficit.
The Department for Work and Pensions
also publishes annually, as a national statistic, the report on
Households Below Average Income. This provides robust analysis
of income poverty and living standards of the household population
in the UK, focusing on the lower part of income distribution.
2. Personal Independence Payment (PIP) implementation
We agree with the
Minister that the current level of service offered to PIP claimants
and the length of time claimants are waiting for decisions on
their PIP applications is not acceptable. People should not be
forced to wait six months or more to find out whether they are
entitled to financial support towards the additional costs of
living with disabilities and health conditions. Urgent action
is required. We recommend that DWP closely examine its own systems
and that it work with the contracted providers to resolve the
current dire situation. Penalty clauses (service credits) contained
in the contracts with providers should be invoked where necessary.
We also recommend that DWP clear the existing backlog of claims,
and reduce the average time taken to process new claims to the
expected 74 days, before it extends the natural reassessment of
existing DLA claims to other parts of the country.
(Paragraph 48)
RESOLVING THE CURRENT SITUATION
Personal Independence Payment has been
introduced in stages so that, if necessary, the Department can
slow down the roll-out to enable further improvements to be made
and be assured that the assessment providers are able to deliver
both in terms of quality and time taken.
As Personal Independence Payment is
a new benefit we are looking closely at how long the claimant
process is taking against original estimates. We are working with
operational colleagues and providers to ensure that all the steps
in the process are as smooth as they can be. We continue to look
at our processes to ensure that satisfactory arrangements are
in place to assess a person's entitlement to Personal Independence
Payment.
There have been several factors contributing
to the delays and backlogs: at initial claims stage for example,
claimants are required to complete and return a PIP2 form, within
one month, which asks them to explain how their condition affects
their daily life. More claimants than expected are taking much
longer to return this form.
The Department is working collaboratively
with both assessment providers on a wide range of improvement
measures to improve the quality of referrals to assessment providers
such as checking that claimants who have not returned their claimant
questionnaire still wish to proceed with a claim.
Assessment provider access to information
and services has been improved, by providing increased service
availability of the PIP Assessment Tool so that assessment providers
can access it up to 10pm every weekday. They have been offered
increased flexibility in the way they deliver the service, allowing
claimants, who choose to do so, to travel further to assessments
or to choose to be seen in consulting rooms not located on the
ground floor.
Both assessment providers have now agreed
plans with the Department for improving performance and reducing
the backlog of cases. Within the Department we are continually
looking at how we can improve the operational processes and the
next series of improvements.
PENALTY CLAUSES (SERVICE CREDITS)
The Department is managing the PIP contracts
robustly. We have a full set of service level agreements, setting
out our expectations for service delivery, including quality of
assessments, number of days to provide advice to the Department,
and evidence of claimant satisfaction. These service level agreements
are being monitored and, where appropriate, Service Credits (a
form of financial redress) will be applied. This means that the
contracts allow us to recover any financial loss to the Department
caused by poor performance. The Department also has the right
to terminate the contract if there is sustained underperformance.
We agree with the
National Audit Office that DWP needs to address the stress and
uncertainty being faced by PIP claimants suffering delays. We
support its recommendation that DWP set out a plan for informing
claimants about the delays they are likely to face. We also recommend
that DWP takes immediate steps to ensure that claimants are given
accurate and timely information when they raise queries about
progress with their claim with either DWP itself or with the contracted
providers. (Paragraph 49)
We have always had a dedicated telephone
enquiry service for disabled people and their carers to find out
how their claim is progressing.
We have updated the PIP Toolkit to provide
better information for support organisations, including realistic
estimates of how long claims might take.[1]
This includes the sort of evidence claimants should submit to
support their claim and what else claimants can do to help speed
up the process, such as returning their form to us as quickly
as possible.
From 28 April we began sending SMS text
messages (where we have mobile phone numbers recorded) to keep
claimants informed about the progress of their claim at key points
of the journey. Texts are sent to tell them we have received their
"How your disability affects you" form and they will
be then contacted if they need to attend a face-to-face assessment.
It is particularly
important that claims from terminally ill people are expedited
and that as much of the stress as possible is removed from the
process they have to go through to claim PIP. We recommend that
DWP set a target of seven days for processing PIP claims from
terminally ill people and that it devotes all the necessary resources
to ensuring that this target is met.
(Paragraph 50)
PIP, like DLA, has always had "fast
track" arrangements in place to process claims for people
with terminal illnesses (i.e. having a progressive condition where
they are not expected to live for more than six months). At the
time of the Work and Pensions Committee hearing in December 2013
we were clearing most special rules claims within 16 days. Since
then we have improved clearance times for these cases even further.
At the hearing the Minister of State for Disabled People stated
his aspiration for special rules claims to be cleared wherever
possible within seven days, but was clear that the Government
was not in favour of setting targets.
We are continuing to work with Macmillan
and other organisations that represent terminally ill claimants
to improve the claims process and speed it up as much as possible.
In addition we are ensuring appropriate resource is deployed on
special rules work, for example on the dedicated special rules
claims service introduced in February.
We recommend that
DWP also take steps to establish a mechanism for expediting claims
from people who may not have a terminal diagnosis, but who have
rapidly deteriorating conditions, resulting in a similar need
for immediate financial support.
(Paragraph 51)
There is no automatic entitlement to
Personal Independence Payment by virtue of a health condition
or impairment, other than provisions for people who are terminally
ill. We do not think it right that we should judge people purely
on the type of impairment they have, labelling individuals and
making blanket decisions about benefit entitlement. We recognise
that people lead varied and often complex lives, with differing
circumstances and needs— they do not fit neatly into boxes.
We have designed an assessment that will treat people as individuals,
considering the impact of impairments or health conditions on
their everyday lives. The assessment will take account of the
fact that many people have complex support needs and more than
one impairment or health condition.
The fact that claimants
are taking longer to return written PIP claims forms and to provide
supporting evidence suggests that the claim form, and the guidance
for claimants on accompanying information, need improvement. It
may also be the case that the four weeks allowed to return the
form and supporting evidence is insufficient. These factors may
be contributing to the higher than expected level of face-to-face
assessments deemed by the providers to be required. We recommend
that DWP consult stakeholders on the adequacy of the PIP claim
form and the accompanying information provided to claimants and
make amendments to both if these are found to be necessary. The
time allowed to submit the completed form and supporting evidence
should also be reassessed and extended if necessary.
(Paragraph 52)
Claimants are not required to send in
additional supporting/medical evidence with their PIP2 form unless
they wish to do so. However, we have listened to support organisations
when they told us that people may need longer than four weeks
to return the PIP form itself. This is why we deliberately built
into the PIP Regulations provisions to allow claimants additional
time to submit their PIP2 form "How your disability affects
you" and to seek help from a support organisation. We will
extend the four week timescale where there is good reason, for
example if claimants need to seek help from a support organisation
and therefore we do not believe it is necessary to fundamentally
review the current timescales at this stage. Disability organisations
have helped us design the PIP2 form; the current version includes
a number of changes they asked us to make. They have also reviewed
the accompanying information booklet, to which we have again made
changes as a result of their input.
3. Local welfare assistance
It is often the most
vulnerable people who rely on being able to access hardship payments,
previously available from the discretionary Social Fund, in emergency
situations. Local authorities are using widely different eligibility
criteria and application processes for these schemes. This change
has also taken place at the same time as significant reforms to
other benefits, particularly support for housing costs. (Paragraph
62)
It was the Secretary
of State's impression that local authorities may not use their
full allocations for local welfare assistance schemes in this
financial year, although he acknowledged that it was still too
early to tell. However, if this does prove to be the case, it
is likely that, at least in part, this is because this is a new
responsibility and authorities may understandably have been reluctant
to allocate too great a proportion early in the year when they
were not in a position to accurately predict demand. This may
also have led some local authorities initially to impose very
exacting criteria for accessing these funds.
(Paragraph 63)
We believe that
it is essential that the Government ensures that sufficient funding
is available to local authorities to cover the costs of providing
the localised welfare support schemes which have replaced elements
of the discretionary Social Fund. We recommend that this is done
in one of two ways: either DWP should continue to transfer funding
to local authorities beyond April 2015, until it has a clear picture
of the level of demand; or the local government settlement administered
by the Department for Communities and Local Government should
be increased by the full amount that would have been allocated
for these elements of the discretionary Social Fund, and this
sum should be ringfenced for local welfare schemes.
(Paragraph 64)
Since April 2013, support has also been
available through local authorities and the devolved administrations
in Scotland and Wales. By giving them the discretionary elements
(crisis loans and community care grants) of the Social Fund budget
in full, which amounts to £178 million each financial year
up to 2015, we have enabled local areas to provide tailored, flexible
support to those in greatest need, based on detailed knowledge
of the issues they are facing in their communities. Support in
this way is being better targeted than the previous more remote,
centralised system which, for too long, paid out money to repeat
applicants without asking why they found themselves in financial
difficulty in the first place.
The Government welcomes the conclusion
that local authorities have developed their own criteria for accessing
these funds. By giving local authorities the power to do what
is right for their citizens they can place more emphasis on what
the priorities are for their area based on local knowledge and
local data. As local authorities can join up with their wider
social care provision they may not necessarily be using all of
the local welfare funding to run a separate scheme. This means
local outcomes cannot simply be measured by referral to historic
DWP data.
The Government supports the Committee's
recommendation that sufficient funding is available beyond April
2015. The size of the general grant to Local Government for 2015
was decided taking into account the totality of the pressures
on the Department for Communities and Local Government budget
and based on various objective measures of need such as adult
social care and including, from 2015, local welfare provision.
The more deprived areas of the country will therefore get more
of the general grant. As a result, local authorities will still
be able to fund and provide local welfare provision to the appropriate
level, as they are best placed to understand the needs within
their local communities. It is right for them to choose how much
funding to allocate and how to provide such support.
4. Pension charges
We welcome the Government's
decision to bring forward regulations to ensure greater transparency
in transaction costs in workplace pension schemes. The range of
charges and costs which scheme members incur can make an enormous
difference to the size of the individual's pension pot when they
reach retirement. (Paragraph
74)
There has also been
some progress in tackling the wider issue of high pensions charges
in the form of the Government's consultation on a possible charge
cap. Although we understand the reasons for the Government's announcement
that no steps to implement this important change will be taken
for at least another year, it is disappointing that there will
not be earlier progress. We reiterate our view that, at a time
when millions of people are already being automatically enrolled
into workplace pension schemes, it is vital that they are protected
from excessive charges imposed by some pension companies and that
the charges which are levied are transparent and comprehensible.
(Paragraph 75)
On 27 March 2014 the Government published,
Better Workplace Pensions—further measures for
savers. The Command Paper announced proposals relating to:
governance in all workplace DC schemes, including creating Independent
Governance Committees (IGCs) for contract based schemes; and new
governance and reporting requirements for trustees; charge levels
in the default funds of DC qualifying schemes (those schemes used
by employers for automatic enrolment); inappropriate charging
mechanisms in all DC qualifying schemes; transparency of costs
and charges in all workplace DC schemes; and disclosure of these
to trustees and IGCs, employers, members, and the public.
The specific proposals are listed below,
along with their implementation dates.
From April 2015: new governance standards
for all DC workplace pension schemes; new requirements for IGCs
and trustees to report on costs and charges; 0.75% cap on charges
in the default funds of qualifying schemes (schemes used for automatic
enrolment). This cap will apply to all member-borne deductions,
excluding transaction costs. We have set out separately how this
will apply to schemes with combination charge structures. The
existing ban on consultancy charging will be extended to all qualifying
schemes. Giving employers a full year's notice of the new requirements
which will apply from April 2015 is consistent with the fact that
we encourage firms to start getting ready for automatic enrolment
12 months ahead of the time the new employer duties apply.
From April 2016: Active Member Discount
structures will be banned so that deferred members who are no
longer contributing to the scheme (probably because they have
moved jobs) do not experience higher charges than active members.
Member-borne advisor commission will be banned in all qualifying
schemes.
From April 2017: the Government will
examine whether some or all transaction costs should be included
in the default fund charge cap, and whether the level of the cap
should be lowered.
ANNUITIES
The Financial Conduct
Authority's intention to carry out a market study of retirement
income products, following on from its thematic review of annuities,
is welcome. However, the Government and the regulators have had
clear evidence for some time that the open market in annuities
is not yet working in the best interests of the majority of pension
scheme members, many of whom face the risk of substantial financial
loss in purchasing an annuity from their pension provider. We
recommend that the Government and the FCA take urgent action to
make the open market option a realistic one for all those who
purchase annuities, not just the minority who are currently able
to negotiate it successfully. We reiterate the recommendation
from our 2013 report: that, if improvements in the annuity market
do not occur soon, the Government might, as a last resort, have
to consider taking steps to separate the function of providing
pension schemes from that of providing annuities.
(Paragraph 79)
The Government has recognised that there
is a need to take action to deal with how individuals access their
pension savings. That is why we have recently announced the radical
overhaul which gives people greater choice about how to access
their defined contribution pension savings. The Government is
clear that, in a well-functioning marketplace, annuities can be
good products. For many, they remain the best method of ensuring
a secure income in retirement. However, the Financial Conduct
Authority's recent review of the annuities market pointed towards
the importance of stimulating competition within the annuities
market, and also the need to stimulate innovation and the development
of new products that better suit people's changing needs.
The Government has also recognised that
in order for individuals to make informed choices about accessing
their pension savings they need impartial guidance. That is why
we will place a duty on schemes and providers by April 2015 to
offer free and impartial face-to-face guidance to all consumers
with defined contribution pension pots at the point of retirement.
The details of how this guidance will operate are currently being
consulted on and the Government has asked FCA to coordinate the
development of robust standards. This will involve working in
partnership with consumer groups, the Pensions Regulator, the
Pensions Advisory Service and the Money Advice Service and will
need to take account of the operation of the Open Market Option.
By increasing the choices people have
at retirement, and with guaranteed free and impartial guidance
to support their decision-making, consumer behaviour will change
and a much more competitive and dynamic market will emerge.
The Government believes that these changes
will also provide an opportunity for annuity providers, and providers
of other retirement income products, to innovate. Over recent
years, providers have called for an increase in the flexibility
allowed by the tax rules, particularly to allow them to provide
retirement income products linked to social care. These changes
will therefore provide much greater scope for providers to meet
the needs of customers in retirement, and attract a greater proportion
of not only pension savings, but also other forms of savings.
DEFINED AMBITION AND COLLECTIVE DEFINED CONTRIBUTION
PENSION SCHEMES
The Government launched
a consultation on its plans for Defined Ambition workplace pensions
in autumn 2013. We expected to be invited to carry out pre-legislative
scrutiny on the resulting proposals for broadening the range of
pensions available to employers, but these final proposals have
not yet been published. We are concerned that the momentum for
bringing forward these proposals may have stalled. It is important,
as auto-enrolment widens out to the whole of the working population,
and with the continuing closure of private sector Defined Benefit
schemes, that employers and employees are offered new ways to
share risk and to maximise retirement income. There is additional
urgency in that the new arrangements ideally need to be in place
by the time contracting-out of DB schemes ends in 2016. We look
forward to seeing the Government's legislative proposals for these
changes very shortly. (Paragraph
87)
We welcome the Committee's interest
in Defined Ambition pensions, which is about encouraging greater
innovation in risk sharing, responding to the current polarity
in pensions arrangements between Defined Benefit pensions—where
the risk lies with the sponsoring employer, and Defined Contribution
pensions—where the risk is with individual scheme members.
We are therefore pleased that the Committee places importance
on allowing for greater risk sharing in pensions.
These proposed changes are for the long
term, and it could take time for some of the innovative, new Defined
Ambition scheme designs to be implemented. However, we agree with
the Committee's view that introducing proposals quickly could
optimise the benefits of Defined Ambition.
We are actively progressing policy development,
and this includes considering the large volume of responses to
our consultation Reshaping workplace pensions for future generations,
which closed on 19 December 2013. We intend to publish a Government
response in due course.
5. Child maintenance reforms
The impact on parents
of charging for using the new statutory child maintenance scheme
needs to be carefully monitored, particularly given that a full
evaluation will not take place until 30 months after charging
begins. The behavioural impacts, including to what extent charging
deters parents from having any maintenance agreement in place
at all, are particularly important. We recommend that DWP
publish interim updates on the impact of charging on use of the
statutory system and on the level of family-based arrangements,
in advance of the full evaluation. (Paragraph
104)
We made a commitment in the Welfare
Reform Act 2012 to deliver a report on charging within 30 months
of its introduction. The Government has also committed to evaluating
the impact of the wider reforms introduced with the 2012 Scheme.
We believe the intention to publish
our report within 30 months of the introduction of charging allows
an appropriate time scale for the full 2012 scheme to expand and
for the Government to collect and analyse a sufficient quantity
of data to allow for robust findings.[2]
This year we intend to publish the results
of survey data around the outcomes for parents who contact the
Child Maintenance (CM) Options service. CM Options provides all
customers with information on the maintenance arrangements available
to them, as well as being a precursor to those wanting to access
the statutory Child Maintenance Service. Presently, we are working
on the methodology of this survey to ensure that results are robust.
We welcome the Government's
use of a pathfinder to introduce the 2012 scheme as a means of
ensuring that the new Child Maintenance Service was functioning
effectively before it was opened to all applicants. However, replicating
and maintaining the service levels achieved in the pathfinder
in the national implementation is clearly a challenge. We recommend
that DWP monitor this carefully and publish regular updates on
standards of service provided to parents.
(Paragraph 106)
We published our strategy for the publication
of information about the 2012 Scheme on 18 July 2013. We agree
monitoring should be on-going, and therefore regular monitoring
and reporting has been, and will continue to be, put in place
as appropriate.
On 26 November 2013 we released a limited
set of ad hoc Experimental Official Statistics covering the months
of August and September 2013 (when the scheme opened to new applicants
with at least two qualifying children with the same two parents
named in the application).
On 26 March 2014 we released an updated
version of these statistics, which include information on telephony,
accuracy and complaints, covering data to the end of February
2014. Moving forward, these statistics will be released on a quarterly
basis. These statistics are still in the early stages of development
and assurance and will therefore remain as Experimental.[3]
On 11 June 2014 we released the latest
version of these statistics, which now also includes information
on compliance and service type (chosen method of payment), covering
data to the end of May 2014.[4]
The Government's
motivation in introducing the new child maintenance scheme is
to encourage parents to come to voluntary arrangements. However,
many parents will need effective support to enable them to come
to arrangements which are workable and acceptable to both parents,
and parents will need to know at an early stage where they can
go to find this support. We welcome the funding of around £10
million provided for voluntary and third sector organisations
as part of the Innovation Fund to test and evaluate interventions
that can help parents work together in the best interests of their
children. We recommend that, in response to this report, DWP sets
out how these projects will be evaluated and what the process
will be for extending, funding and publicising the schemes identified
as the most effective. (Paragraph
109)
We expect to tender the main-stage evaluation
of the Innovation Fund Round 1 and 2 projects in 2014. This will
be published in the contracts finder website and will include
details of how we expect the evaluation to be carried out.[5]
Upon selection of contractors, the methodology will be finalised
taking into account the financial resource available for the evaluation.
It is anticipated that the methodology would include qualitative
research with clients and project staff and management information
data analysis, to fully assess any changes in parental collaboration.
Additionally, there is a range of existing
support services offered for separating or separated families.
Our Sorting out Separation Web App enables better co-ordination
of the support available, providing information on both emotional
and practical issues such as managing conflict, parenting apart,
housing, money and employment.[6]
Since launching in 2008, the CM Options
service has also provided free, impartial information and support
on the various ways to set up child maintenance arrangements,
along with signposting to relevant organisations who can help
with the other issues parents face during separation.
DWP's strategy for
dealing with child maintenance arrears—both historic arrears
and those in the new 2012 scheme—needs to be shown to be
practicable. It is not yet clear whether the steps introduced
to prevent new arrears arising are feasible; nor what the prioritisation
of historic arrears for collection means in reality for those
parents with care who are owed money. DWP needs to ensure that
the decisions it takes regarding the collection of arrears are
transparent and communicated clearly and promptly to all parents
affected by the new arrangements. (Paragraph
114)
Collecting outstanding arrears from
parents whose children will no longer benefit is costly, and will
not help today's children receive the child maintenance they need
to help them flourish. The priority is to do all we can today
to keep money flowing to children who will benefit from regular
ongoing child maintenance now. Our publication of 31 January 2013,
Preparing for the future, tackling the past: Child Maintenance-Arrears
and Compliance Strategy 2012-2017, clearly states our approach
to driving compliant behaviour and collecting historic arrears—giving
transparency and addressing what is practical. [7]
However, we must also alleviate the
burden on families of historical unpaid child maintenance by doing
what we can to address previous inefficiencies and collect what's
owed.
We are committed to ensuring today's
children get a better service than their predecessors, including
those whose parents are part of that small minority who do not
meet their responsibilities willingly. To this end, we are taking
action to ensure that the 2012 scheme enables missed payments
to be chased promptly, and for enforced methods of payments such
as deduction from earnings orders to be put in place quickly and
efficiently. The introduction of collection and enforcement charging
later this year will also provide additional incentives for parents
to collaborate and be compliant, while offsetting part of the
cost to the taxpayer.
6. Use of DWP statistics
DWP releases a great
deal of statistical information about benefits. We have commented
before that it needs to exercise care in the language used in
accompanying press releases and ministerial comments in the media.
2013 saw heightened and quite widespread concern—including
from the UK Statistics Authority and organisations representing
disabled people—about the DWP commentary accompanying releases
of benefits statistics. (Paragraph
141)
The Department for Work and Pensions
is very careful about the language used when referring to benefit
claimants, making clear that it is the system itself that has
for too long trapped people into a life of welfare dependency.
That is why this Government is making such a radical overhaul
of the benefits system, to restore integrity and ensure that everyone
who needs help and support receives it.
The Department for Work and Pensions'
statistical releases are produced and published separately to
and independently from other Departmental comment or publications.
Great care is taken by our statisticians to ensure the statistical
releases are easy to read and understand, and are balanced and
impartial.
So too when it comes to the content
of press releases and other material, where Press Office take
great care in their use of language. Training courses have also
been run for Press Office staff, together with guidance having
been issued on the use of statistics.
DWP has processes in place to ensure
ministerial and official public statements are accompanied, whenever
possible, by the released data and/or a link to the statistical
release to which the press release refers. These statements are
cleared with the relevant analysts for their statistical integrity.
The Government is doing
a great deal to promote a positive image of disabled people, including
in the principles behind its Disability Strategy and the Disability
Confident campaign to help disabled people into employment. However,
this positive action risks being undermined if the language used
in DWP press releases and ministerial media comments accompanying
releases of benefit statistics adopts a tone which feeds into
negative preconceptions and prejudices about people on benefits,
including disabled people. (Paragraph
142)
Whilst clearly concerning, this is not
a new issue. Disabled people have been telling governments for
some years that media reports tend to highlight the negative and
these types of stories are used to affirm some people's prejudices
about disabled people.
A big part of our "Disability Strategy"
looks at promoting positive attitudes and behaviours towards disabled
people and tackling discrimination and harassment wherever they
occur.
We agree with our
colleagues on the Public Administration Select Committee (PASC)
that Government statistics should be presented in a way that is
fair, accurate and "unspun" and that this is especially
the case when they are being used to justify a particular policy
or a particular allocation of resources. We reiterate our view
that DWP should avoid feeding into negative public views about
people who receive benefits, and that statistics should be used
objectively to shed light on policy implementation, not to prop
up established views and preconceptions. We recommend that, in
response to this Report, DWP sets out the specific steps it has
taken in response to the comments from PASC, the UK Statistics
Authority, and this Committee, to ensure that statistics are released
in a way which is accurate, and fair to benefit claimants.
(Paragraph 143)
Since May 2010 the Department for Work
and Pensions has led the way in openness and transparency of statistical
releases by publishing over 730 releases and datasets. This includes
57 separate statistical series. In this time the UKSA has only
written to DWP on a small number of occasions about certain points
in a handful of statistical releases, and to Ministers on only
two occasions. The Department has responded to these points and
taken on board UKSA's suggestions.
The National Statistician, Jill Matheson,
when asked at the Public Administration Select Committee hearing
in November 2013: "Which Departments are the most and least
helpful to the open data agenda?", praised the DWP when she
said: "Some of the good examples I could point to would be
DWP, with both the way that it handles the ad hoc requests […]
and its means of access".
The Department ensures that all its
statistics are of high quality, impartial and issued in an open
and transparent manner, free from political interference and according
to the Code of Practice for Official Statistics. All official
statistics are pre-announced, 28 calendar days prior to publication.
Ad hoc statistical releases aim to be pre-announced by seven calendar
days where possible. Our statistics are produced and published
separately to and independently from other departmental comment
or publications.
Following a request from UKSA to improve
the accessibility of figures cited in press releases and ministerial
statements, the Department introduced procedures for the publication
of ad hoc statistical analyses in 2010. We have also developed
a dissemination tool, Stat-Xplore, which allows the wider statistical
audience to interrogate our statistical data sets in much more
detail than was possible previously. We intend to continue to
add data to this tool to make the Department's statistics even
more accessible.
The Department also continues to call
on the UKSA's Good Practice team for advice on how we write our
statistical releases, when we feel it is appropriate, and have
set up a statistical commentary champion within the Department
to share good practice.
1 See https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-personal-independence-payment-toolkit-for-partners/the-personal-independence-payment-pip-toolkit-for-partners
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2
See https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/265174/childrens-futures-consultation-response.pdf
(page 28)
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3
Our strategy for the publication of information about the 2012
Scheme, and Experimental Official Statistics on the 2012 statutory
child maintenance scheme, are available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/statistics-on-the-2012-statutory-child-maintenance-scheme.
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4
Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/2012-statutory-child-maintenance-scheme-aug-2013-to-may-2014-experimental-statistics Back
5
See https://online.contractsfinder.businesslink.gov.uk Back
6
See https://www.sortingoutseparation.org.uk/en/hub.aspx Back
7
See https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/preparing-for-the-future-tackling-the-past-child-maintenance-arrears-and-compliance-strategy-2012-to-2017 Back
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