Guy Opperman: ...volumes of claims over recent months, at around 3,300 per week. This management information has not been subjected to the usual standard of quality assurance associated with official statistics but are provided here in the interests of transparency. The impact of these claim volumes on numbers of successful awards and on Pension Credit take-up will take longer to establish given the...
Guy Opperman: ...-rating letter. This includes prominent messaging highlighting that an award of Pension Credit can also open the door to a wide range of additional benefits – not only extra help with fuel costs, but also help with rent, council tax, certain health related costs and a free over-75 TV licence.
Guy Opperman: ...Orders (DEO) are applied as a method of payment where the Child Maintenance Service deducts maintenance directly from the Paying Parent’s wages. The DEO is primarily used to enforce payments but can be set up voluntarily. Deduction from Earnings Requests are similar to a Deduction from Earnings Order but used for Paying Parents who are serving members of the Armed Forces. The Child...
Guy Opperman: ...up-rating letter. This includes prominent messaging highlighting that an award of Pension Credit can also open the door to a range of additional benefits – not only extra help with fuel costs, but also help with rent and a free over-75 TV licence. Our initial internal management information suggests new claims for Pension Credit in the past twelve months to December 2021 were around...
Guy Opperman: ...volumes of claims over recent months, at around 3,300 per week. This management information has not been subjected to the usual standard of quality assurance associated with official statistics but are provided here in the interests of transparency. The impact of these claim volumes on numbers of successful awards and on Pension Credit take-up will take longer to establish given the...
Guy Opperman: The information requested is not available at constituency level. The latest estimates of the number of families in Great Britain entitled to Pension Credit but not claiming it are available in the “Income-related benefits: estimates of take-up” publication which can be found here: Income-related benefits: estimates of take-up: financial year 2018 to 2019 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Stephen Timms: I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Amber Valley (Nigel Mills), who makes an important contribution to the work of the Select Committee. I agree with much of what he says. May I start by acknowledging—as the shadow Secretary of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth), did at Question Time—the generous tribute that the Under-Secretary of...
Guy Opperman: First, I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his kind comments. I wanted him to stop there, but I fully understood why he did not. On his specific point, I understand that the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities is publishing guidance on that today.
Therese Coffey: I am very conscious of the important work that the hon. Lady has delivered, including the status that was addressed for her, and I am conscious that my hon. Friend the Member for Hexham (Guy Opperman) and I have also undertaken such elements in the national scheme. I am more than happy to find out about the specific example that the hon. Lady refers to, but I know that generally we are...
Guy Opperman: ...the friend I got to know from the other side of the Aisle. For three years, Jack was the shadow Pensions Minister and we became close. We would meet, talk and plan, and sometimes agree to disagree, but always with equanimity. Politics is adversarial and heated. The media encourage us—in fact, demand of us—to be aggressive and mean-spirited. Jack did not play that game. Others have...
Guy Opperman: ...and Hamilton West for the hard work she has put in to bring this private Member’s Bill to this stage. Introducing a private Member’s Bill is never easy. It is sometimes arcane and convoluted, but her Bill is genuinely making a fundamental difference to this country and to many of our constituents, and it applies across this country. As I indicated on Second Reading—colleagues should...
Guy Opperman: ...is a bit like taking an SNP horse to water and trying to make it drink; his speech started so well, with the statement that, by and large, he could not disagree with anything that had been said, but that sentiment disappeared in general criticism of the Government. He will know that the state pension is up by more than 5% in 2021-22. He will know that pension credit take-up is increasing....
Guy Opperman: ...of complaints accepted by the ICE office. As yet, it is too early to draw any firm conclusions about what may have caused any increase in complaints being accepted by ICE over the last 12 months, but we continue to monitor escalation rates closely and work with the ICE office to identify and address potential drivers.
Stephen Doughty: ...the House can raise the case of members of the Pensions Action Group, including members of the financial assistance scheme and many former Allied Steel and Wire workers in my constituency? I pay tribute to our late friend Jack Dromey for all the support he gave, typically, to those seeking justice on pensions during his time as shadow Minister. Many are suffering because of the failure to...
Guy Opperman: Yes, the Minister for Disabled People will write to the hon. Gentleman, but I can confirm that we will spend the record sum of £58 billion this year on benefits to support disabled people and people with health conditions. The hon. Gentleman will be aware of the health and disability Green Paper and the strategy published in the summer of last year, which will be responded to in this House...
Richard Holden: ...to 77.6% in 2020. By any stretch, that is a massive increase and a huge boon to people in our country who are saving for the long term. Bringing forward the Bill is all about ambition—not mine, but the ambition of people to look after themselves, their families and their communities. I know many red wall MPs such as myself and my hon. Friend the Member for Sedgefield (Paul Howell) think...
Guy Opperman: I cannot comment on the individual case, but I can say that the hon. Gentleman is right to say that there was a backlog over the summer period by reason of covid and many other factors, which we took great steps to address. A dedicated team of several hundred individuals ensured that we caught up with the backlog, and we are now operating business as usual.
Richard Holden: ...those of my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Dehenna Davison), my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Anne-Marie Trevelyan), my hon. Friend the Member for Hexham (Guy Opperman), and Members in Cumbria and North Yorkshire—remain without electricity. This morning we were informed by Northern Powergrid that the damage is more extensive than initially realised,...
Guy Opperman: It is a privilege and an honour to address the House on behalf of the Government, and to set out our position on this small but very important Bill. Let me first congratulate the hon. Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Margaret Ferrier) on her success in the ballot, because without the ballot she could not have presented any piece of legislation. It is important for people to...
Guy Opperman: ...financially during the Pandemic. For those who cannot work, the benefit system continues to provide a strong safety net. Support is available to those who are unable to work or are on a low income but are not eligible to pensioner benefits because of their age. For those who have reached their State Pension age, Pension Credit also provides invaluable financial support for the most...
