To ask the Secretary of State for Justice

(1) what the average waiting time was between submission of an appeal against a decision on the award of disability living allowance and the date of the appeal hearing in each local authority area or at the lowest available recording level;

(2) how many people are awaiting a tribunal hearing after having been refused disability living allowance in each local authority area or at the lowest available recording area for the most recent period for which figures are available;

(3) how many people appealing against the withdrawal of disability living allowance have had the date of their appeal hearing brought forward on grounds of hardship in each local authority area or at the lowest available recording area for the most recent period for which figures are available.

Data for the Social Security and Child Support (SSCS) tribunal cannot be provided by local authority area. All appeals to the tribunal are registered in the processing centre in the region where the appellant lives, and data can be broken down to the level of these processing centres.

The following table shows the average time from receipt at HM Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS) to hearing for disability living allowance (DLA) appeals for the area served by each processing centre. The information covers 1 April 2011 to 30 September 2011, the latest period for which figures are available.

Claimants can appeal to the tribunal on a number of different grounds, such as the rate of benefit awarded or refusal of benefit. The tribunal does not record the issue under appeal and, therefore, cannot isolate data relating to appeals on the basis of having been refused DLA. The total number of “live” DLA appeals (appeals at various stages of the process before hearing or decision) at 30 September 2011, the most recent period for which statistics have been published, was 42,600, down from 44,500 at the end of June 2011.

A regional breakdown of those data has not previously been published. As the management information system for SSCS is a live system which is continuously updated, it is not possible to provide retrospective data on the number of live cases by region which would be consistent with the official published statistics. I will, therefore, arrange for the numbers of live appeals in each area at end December to be provided to the right hon. Lady when those data are published as official statistics in March 2012.

The tribunal does not record the number of appeals rescheduled for an earlier hearing. Information on the number of people appealing against the withdrawal of disability living allowance that have had the date of their appeal hearing brought forward on grounds of hardship is, therefore, unavailable.