• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • About DNS
  • Subscribe to DNS
  • Advertise with DNS
  • Support DNS
  • Contact DNS

Disability News Service

the country's only news agency specialising in disability issues

  • Home
  • Independent Living
    • Arts, Culture and Sport
    • Crime
    • Education
    • Employment
    • Housing
    • Transport
  • Activism & Campaigning
  • Benefits & Poverty
  • Politics
  • Human Rights
You are here: Home / Benefits and Poverty / Information commissioner questions DWP’s ‘highly unusual’ failure on benefit deaths
Hundreds of white flowers lying on grass

Information commissioner questions DWP’s ‘highly unusual’ failure on benefit deaths

By John Pring on 2nd March 2017 Category: Benefits and Poverty

Listen

The information commissioner has questioned why the government failed to keep track of whether it had implemented recommendations on improving the safety of “vulnerable” disabled people that had been made in its own secret reports into benefit-related deaths.

Elizabeth Denham said the failure of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) to keep track of its actions on “such sensitive cases” was “highly unusual”.

DWP has told her that it has no idea whether it implemented the 10 recommendations.

Last May, following a 21-month battle with Disability News Service (DNS) to keep them secret, DWP was forced to publish 49 heavily-redacted internal “peer reviews”, each of which had been carried out following the death of a benefit claimant.

Many of the reviews – which took place between February 2012 and August 2014 – had included recommendations for improvements in national policies and procedures, in order to avoid future deaths.

Following their publication, DNS asked DWP whether it had implemented 10 particular recommendations for national improvements that related to “vulnerable” benefit claimants and had been included in the peer reviews.

One recommendation was for a review of the employment and support allowance process to help identify vulnerable customers; another called for “a re-launch to staff of the importance of identifying vulnerable claimants and taking their needs into account throughout the whole process”.

A third recommendation was for DWP to consider if claimants with mental health conditions should be considered for a safeguarding visit if they were thought to be at risk, were about to have their benefits removed, and the DWP “decision-maker” had been unable to contact them via telephone.

DWP told DNS last year that it was “not possible” to say if it had implemented the 10 recommendations.

Now, following a complaint submitted by DNS to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) about this failure to provide this information, DWP has told ICO that it has destroyed records relating to how these recommendations were passed to and from the relevant national “customer journey teams”.

It has also told ICO that there was “no requirement” for the department to keep track of what action was taken after these recommendations were passed on.

And it argues that because the peer reviews were a “voluntary internal process”, it had no legal duty to keep this information.

It has told ICO that it has searched its centrally-held files but has failed to find the information sought by DNS.

In a letter to DNS, the ICO says: “DWP has explained that records concerning these communications were not retained and no requirement was in place to track subsequent actions taken.”

The letter adds: “Whilst she does find the lack of requirement for confirmation of action highly unusual following a peer review of such sensitive cases, [the commissioner] is not in a position to issue a decision that DWP should have required feedback in these cases.”

ICO is now writing again to ask DWP to carry out a wider search of its records, something it has so far refused to do.

A DWP spokeswoman said she was unable to comment because the appeal was ongoing.

Share this post:

Share on TwitterShare on FacebookShare on WhatsAppShare on Reddit

Tags: benefit deaths DWP Information commissioner Peer reviews

Related

DWP yet to sign claimant deaths legal agreement with watchdog
30th June 2022
DWP ignored ‘hugely alarming’ research that linked WCA with 600 suicides, MPs are told
23rd June 2022
DWP’s ‘failing assessment system is increasing poverty and worsening mental health’
23rd June 2022

Primary Sidebar

Image shows a man wearing glasses sitting by an open laptop The text reads: Free Career Support for Disabled People Our services include: 1-2-1 Coaching Online Career Resources Find Support near you Search for Inclusive Jobs Career Events and Workshops Visit the Evenbreak Career Hive today to find out how we can help you

Access

Latest Stories

Disabled people are playing their part in defending their country, say Ukraine activists

DPO gives stark warning to disabled people about Covid pandemic

Covid inquiry ‘must examine catastrophic impact of pandemic on disabled people’

Mayor’s ‘ultra low emission zone’ plans ‘will impact tens of thousands of disabled people’

Disabled activists will push for changes to draft mental health bill that ‘breaches rights’

DWP yet to sign claimant deaths legal agreement with watchdog

‘Huge barrier’ of care charges is forcing disabled people into poverty, peers are told

DWP ignored ‘hugely alarming’ research that linked WCA with 600 suicides, MPs are told

Transport secretary silent after misleading MPs about tactile safety markings

DWP’s ‘failing assessment system is increasing poverty and worsening mental health’

Advice and Information

Readspeaker

Footer

The International Standard Serial Number for Disability News Service is: ISSN 2398-8924

  • Accessibility Statement
  • Privacy Policy
  • Site map
  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Copyright © 2022 Disability News Service

Site development by A Bright Clear Web