Select committee: Work and Pensions Committee
Recommendation 17
Fifth Report - Health assessments for benefits
Published 14 Apr 2023
Paragraph 77
Addressed to Department for Work and Pensions
Work and Pensions Committee Health assessments for benefits All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
DWP provides assessors with guidance on issues including evidence use, contributions of family members and carers, and informal observations which, if correctly followed, would address many of the concerns raised in this area. The accounts we have heard in this inquiry, and those from the previous Committee’s Health assessments for benefits 91 inquiry, suggest that, too often, guidance is not followed correctly. We believe this points to fundamental weaknesses in the Department’s quality control over its contractors, which we return to later in this Report. We recommend the Department reviews the guidance on carers’ and family members’ evidence to assess why they may still not be being given due weight, and confirm what action it will take to ensure assessment providers are following it correctly. We also recommend the Government urgently investigate the use of covert surveillance by assessors, working with organisations that support claimants to establish whether this practice is widespread, and work with the assessment providers and contractors to ensure claimants are treated fairly and in line with the guidance.
From: Work and Pensions Committee, Fifth Report - Health assessments for benefits (HC 128), paragraph 77, 14 April 2023
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 26 June 2023 (deadline 14 June 2023).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The Department welcomes the Committee's report and says it 'wholeheartedly agrees' that assessments must be fit for purpose, while setting out where it accepts, declines or is still testing individual recommendations.
- It accepts the recommendation on accessible digital services (Recommendation 14) and agrees with the call to evaluate the Health Transformation Programme, having published an evaluation strategy on 25 May 2023.
- It does not support extending the deadline for returning ESA50, UC50 and PIP2 forms to two months, citing 15 years' experience and a balance between time to respond and getting the correct award in place "at the earliest opportunity".
- It remains "committed to retaining audio recording on an opt-in basis" rather than recording by default, and says payment of a PIP assessment rate "could lead to inappropriate expenditure of public funds".
- On timing, it says reforms would require primary legislation and would be rolled out "from no earlier than 2026/27", with improvements to the UC50 journey to be delivered "by the end of 2023".