Tag: Chris Ruane

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Ruane on 2014-03-17.

To ask the hon. Member for South West Devon, representing the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission, pursuant to the Answer of 22 Janaury 2013, Official Report, columns 131-3W, on the electoral register, what assessment the Electoral Commission has made of the reasons for the increase from 8 to 58 in the number of electoral registration officers who failed performance standard 3 between 2010 and 2011.

Gary Streeter

The Electoral Commission informs me that it has previously corresponded with the honourable member on this issue.

Within that correspondence the Electoral Commission set out that following its 2010 report assessing the performance of Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) it became aware of anecdotal evidence suggesting that for various reasons, including local authority budget reductions, there may have been a greater number of EROs who were not meeting performance standard 3. Therefore, in addition to the 2011 performance standard return, the Commission asked all EROs for the first time to confirm specifically whether or not they carried out a personal canvass of all non-responders and, if not, to provide an explanation as to the reasons why.

The Commission subsequently requested further data from EROs who had not confirmed that they carried out a personal canvass of all non-responders in order to make a better-informed assessment of performance against performance standard 3. This data included the number of non-responding households that were not contacted by a personal canvasser or by any other method (not including forms and reminders); how many of these households had entries confirmed by other records; and how many of those households had entries that could not be confirmed and were removed.

Following this process, the Commission revised the assessments of 51 EROs to ‘below’ the standard. This meant that, including the seven EROs who originally reported that they did not meet the standard, there were 58 EROs who did not meet this standard in 2011.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Ruane on 2014-03-13.

To ask the hon. Member for South West Devon, representing the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission, if he will list the registration rates for students in higher education institutions in the UK in ranked order for the most recent period available.

Gary Streeter

The Electoral Commission informs me that it does not hold data on the registration rates of students by higher education institution.

The Commission has conducted an analysis of the results of the dry run of the confirmation process to be used during the transition to IER. This indicated that students were one of the groups less likely to be matched against the Department of Works and Pensions database.

This analysis and all the associated data is available to EROs across the country. This has allowed them to identify areas, such as those with large student populations, where they may need to target more of their resources in order to maintain or improve levels of registration.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Ruane on 2014-03-07.

To ask the hon. Member for South West Devon, representing the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission, which local authorities in Great Britain failed the Standard Three performance standard for the completeness and accuracy of electoral registration records in 2013.

Gary Streeter

The Electoral Commission informs me that this information was published and tabled in a written statement to the House on 31 March. The Commission has written to the hon. Member with a copy of the report.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Ruane on 2014-03-25.

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what his Department’s policy is on allowing officials to appear before all-party parliamentary groups.

Gregory Barker

I refer the hon. Member to answer given by my rt. hon. Friend the Minister of State for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General on 26 March 2014, Official Report, Column 300W.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Ruane on 2014-03-24.

To ask the hon. Member for South West Devon, representing the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission, pursuant to the Answer of 19 March 2014, Official Report, column 655W, on electoral register, what assessment the Electoral Commission has made of the reasons for the increase between December 2000 and April 2011 in the proportion of eligible people not registered at their current address.

Mr Gary Streeter

The Electoral Commission informs me that it has set out its analysis of the key reasons for the decline in levels of registration in this period in two reports – ‘The completeness and accuracy of electoral registers in Great Britain’ and ‘Great Britain’s electoral registers’.

Both reports can be found here: http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/our-work/our-research/electoral-registration-research

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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Ruane on 2014-04-08.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what tests his Department has made on its operating assumption across the whole claims process to identify future bottlenecks.

Mike Penning

The Department does not have a target for completion of Personal Independence Payment (PIP) claims whilst processes are bedding in. Clearly, we want to minimise the length of time claimants have to wait for assessments but the key requirement is to produce high quality assessments, to enable DWP decision makers to make the right decisions about benefit entitlement.

We are committed to driving up PIP performance and are in regular contact with our assessment providers to do this. We already monitor performance closely and liaise with assessment providers on a daily basis, supplemented by formal monthly performance review meetings. We will continue to work closely with assessment providers on an ongoing basis to monitor quality.

Our original Departmental operational delivery plans assumed a larger volume of assessment provider referrals than we are currently receiving and we have retained this surplus capacity using it to consolidate learning or carry out other duties. This will be available for deployment as cases are returned to the Department for decision maker action. The Department has contingency plans in place to secure additional capacity from other areas of the Department should assessment provider volumes exceed plans.

From 10 March we have included with the PIP2 ‘How your disability affects you’ questionnaire, issued to PIP claimants, communications explaining how long they might be expected to wait for a PIP assessment. This information is also available on Gov.uk.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Ruane on 2014-04-08.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what discussions he has had with Capita on the need to seek evidence from health and social care professionals in progressing personal independence payment assessments.

Mike Penning

The Department’s guidance to Personal Independence Payment assessment providers explains that they should take steps to obtain further evidence if they believe it would help inform their advice to the Departmental case manager, who will make a decision on the benefit claim, or negate the need for the claimant to attend a face-to-face consultation. Such evidence can come from a variety of sources, including but not limited to health and social care professionals.

More information can be found at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/210722/pip-assessment-guide.pdf

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