Department for Work and Pensions written question – answered at on 30 March 2022.
Karen Buck
Shadow Minister (Work and Pensions)
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to the note on the cover report for the Universal Credit Programme Board’s meeting of 22 October 2019, what follow-up actions were agreed between the then permanent Secretary of the Cabinet Office and the Director General of Universal Credit to tackle the difficulties faced by vulnerable claimants when moving onto Universal Credit.
David Rutley
Assistant Whip (HM Treasury), The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
The Prime Minister’s Implementation Unit (PMIU) conducted a deep dive on the effectiveness of support for vulnerable Universal Credit (UC) claimants. DWP and PMIU worked together to consider these findings in detail.
Following a suspension during the response to the pandemic, this work is continuing on further improvements to the customer journey, especially for vulnerable claimants. This includes having established a new Customer Experience Directorate to ensure that the Department has the services and tools in place to help the most vulnerable.
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Secretary of State was originally the title given to the two officials who conducted the Royal Correspondence under Elizabeth I. Now it is the title held by some of the more important Government Ministers, for example the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.
A Permanent Secretary is a top civil servant- there is a permanent secretary in each Office/Dept./Ministry Permanent Secretaries are always Knights, (I.E. "Sir" or "Dame"). BBC Sitcom "Yes Minster" portrays Sir Humprey Appelby as a Permanent Secretary, steretypically spouting lots of red tape and bureacracy.
The cabinet is the group of twenty or so (and no more than 22) senior government ministers who are responsible for running the departments of state and deciding government policy.
It is chaired by the prime minister.
The cabinet is bound by collective responsibility, which means that all its members must abide by and defend the decisions it takes, despite any private doubts that they might have.
Cabinet ministers are appointed by the prime minister and chosen from MPs or peers of the governing party.
However, during periods of national emergency, or when no single party gains a large enough majority to govern alone, coalition governments have been formed with cabinets containing members from more than one political party.
War cabinets have sometimes been formed with a much smaller membership than the full cabinet.
From time to time the prime minister will reorganise the cabinet in order to bring in new members, or to move existing members around. This reorganisation is known as a cabinet re-shuffle.
The cabinet normally meets once a week in the cabinet room at Downing Street.
