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  • Stephen Timms – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Stephen Timms – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2014-04-04.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, when his Department plans to publish revised statistics on the number of people who have successfully appealed a sanction decision.

    Esther McVey

    DWP statisticians identified an error in the JSA sanctions appeal outcomes data. In line with normal practice for official statistics the Department has withdrawn this particular set of information. The data will be made available again as soon as possible pending investigations by DWP statisticians who will, if necessary, make corrections to this data.

    For further information see here:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/jobseekers-allowance-sanctions

    “

  • Stephen Timms – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Stephen Timms – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2014-04-04.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what average time is taken to re-imburse a jobseeker’s allowance claimant who has been wrongly sanctioned.

    Esther McVey

    We do not hold any information that just captures the average time it takes to reimburse a Jobseeker’s Allowance Claimant who has been wrongly sanctioned.

    Once a decision is made that a sanction is no longer appropriate the decision maker notifies our JSA claims maintenance teams. They identify these decisions as priority work and endeavour to input the revised decision into our system and pay any benefit due as soon as possible. For JSA our aim is to clear 90% of changes in 6 days. Based on Year to Date information, up to February 2014, we are achieving 94.9% on JSA.

  • Stephen Timms – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Stephen Timms – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2014-04-04.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many complaints have been made about the Work Programme on the grounds of the Disability Discrimination Act 2005 since June 2011.

    Esther McVey

    The Department requires providers to work directly with individuals to resolve complaints about their service. Records of complaints received are retained by providers.

    If the individual is unhappy with the response to their complaint from the provider they can take their complaint directly to the Independent Case Examiner’s Service

  • Teresa Pearce – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Teresa Pearce – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Teresa Pearce on 2014-04-04.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 6 March 2014, Official Report, columns 971-2W, on Remploy, what proportion of the £4.2 million spending has gone to Jobcentre Plus; and who the recipients are of the majority of that funding.

    Mike Penning

    Of the £4.2 million spent on providing individual support to former Remploy disabled employees, up to the end of January 2014, £0.7m has been provided to Jobcentre Plus to fund Personal Case Workers, who provide personalised one-to-one help to find and keep employment. As at 21 March 2014, 1,513 disabled former Remploy workers have chosen to work with our Personal Case Workers to find another job and 716 are in work.

  • Catherine McKinnell – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Catherine McKinnell – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Catherine McKinnell on 2014-04-04.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will estimate the number of children in poverty affected by the under-occupancy penalty since its introduction; and if he will make a statement.

    Esther McVey

    This information can only be provided at a disproportionate cost.

    This Government has made good progress in tackling the root causes of child poverty and has recently published the 2014-17 draft child poverty strategy for consultation which outlines the actions we are taking. The latest figures from 2011-12 show that 2.3 million children (17%) are in relative income poverty-down 300,000 since 2009-10. These are the lowest levels since the mid-1980s. The number of children in workless households has fallen by more than 270,000 since 2010, which is key to driving down poverty.

  • Valerie Vaz – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Valerie Vaz – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Valerie Vaz on 2014-04-04.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the extent of the availability of free telephones in jobcentres for jobseekers to contact officials within his Department.

    Esther McVey

    Jobcentres provide face to face support for claimants. There is also controlled access to telephones for claimants who need to contact officials in this department over the phone.

  • Seema Malhotra – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Attorney General

    Seema Malhotra – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Attorney General

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Seema Malhotra on 2014-04-03.

    To ask the Attorney General, what the average timescale was for the Crown Prosecution Service to provide the Independent Police Complaints Commission with advice on criminal charges against current or former police officers suspected of involvement in serious crimes in (a) 2011 to 2013 and (b) 2008 to 2010.

    Oliver Heald

    The records held by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) do not identify the number of cases referred to it for advice by the Independent Police Complaints Commission. Such information could only be obtained through a manual search of records which would incur disproportionate cost.

  • Seema Malhotra – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Attorney General

    Seema Malhotra – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Attorney General

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Seema Malhotra on 2014-04-03.

    To ask the Attorney General, what the average timescale was for the Crown Prosecution Service to provide the Metropolitan Police Service with advice on criminal charges against members of the public suspected of involvement in serious crimes in (a) 2011 to 2013 and (b) 2008 to 2010.

    Oliver Heald

    The table below shows, for the CPS in London, the average number of calendar days which have elapsed since the first decision was sought by the police to the date in which the last decision made was to charge. The records held by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) do not identify the number of cases referred to it for advice, by the alleged offence(s).

    Average Time to a Decision to Charge

    2008 – 2010

    6.7

    2011 – 2013

    6.2

    The CPS in London deals with cases referred to it by both the Metropolitan Police Force and the City of London Police Force and it is not possible to further break down the figures provided without incurring a disproportionate cost.

  • Seema Malhotra – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Attorney General

    Seema Malhotra – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Attorney General

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Seema Malhotra on 2014-04-03.

    To ask the Attorney General, how and on what basis the Crown Prosecution Service decides whether to prioritise the allocation of resources to its decision-making on criminal charges following conclusions of unlawful killing at an inquest or public inquiry; and whether there is additional consideration where the events in question occurred more than three years prior to the conclusion of the inquest or public inquiry.

    Oliver Heald

    The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) will consider whether there is any new evidence or information within the coroner’s proceedings which may have an impact upon any previous CPS decision not to bring criminal charges against an individual(s) or organisation following a conclusion of unlawful killing at an inquest or public inquiry. Where it is found that a further investigation will need to be conducted by the police, and a fresh decision made by the CPS, the police and CPS should ensure the Coroner and bereaved family / next of kin are notified of the next steps to be taken.

    The allocation of CPS resources to make decisions on criminal charges will be determined by the specific facts and circumstances of the individual case. The Complex Casework Units in each of the CPS Areas will deal with more complex homicide cases; other homicide cases will be handled by senior prosecutors in the Areas. The Special Crime and Counter Terrorism Division in CPS headquarters also deals with a wide range of homicide cases including deaths in custody, assisted suicides, terrorist-related homicides and homicides arising from so-called ‘disaster’ cases. There are no additional considerations where the events in question occurred more than three years prior to the conclusion of the inquest or public inquiry.

  • Robert Halfon – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Robert Halfon – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Robert Halfon on 2014-04-03.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what estimate he has made of the number of people who run a small or medium-sized enterprise as a secondary form of income alongside another job.

    Matthew Hancock

    Information is not available to answer this question. However, data from the Office for National Statistics estimate that around 400,000 people describe themselves as self employed in their second jobs between October 2012 and September 2013.