Neil Coyle – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Neil Coyle on 2015-10-20.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps his Department is taking to increase the accuracy of initial personal independence payment (PIP) decision-making to address the rate of successful appeals of PIP.

Justin Tomlinson

The Department monitors the quality and accuracy of its decision making with a robust quality assurance framework where feedback is given to individual decision makers as required. When a decision is overturned by a tribunal, it does not necessarily mean that the original decision was incorrect. A reason for a decision being overturned could, for example, be the provision of additional written evidence that was not available to the original decision maker. That is why we reformed the system, with the introduction of mandatory reconsideration, which enables a further opportunity for evidence to be provided without need to go to appeal. Of course, the Tribunal can form a different view based on the same facts and medical evidence. We will continue to use feedback from the Tribunal to inform the Department’s approach to decision-making or consider onward challenge where that is appropriate.