Department for Work and Pensions

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) is a United Kingdom government department of His Majesty's Government responsible for welfare, pensions and child maintenance policy. As the UK's biggest public service department it administers the State Pension and a range of working age, disability and ill health benefits to around 20 million claimants and customers.^[6] It is the second largest governmental department in terms of employees,^[7] and the largest in terms of expenditure (£187bn).^[8]

Department for Work and Pensions
Welsh: Yr Adran Gwaith a Phensiynau

Department overview
Formed	8 June 2001 (2001-06-08)
Preceding Department	Department of Social Security
Jurisdiction	Government of the United Kingdom
Headquarters	Caxton House 7th Floor 6–12 Tothill Street London SW1H 9NA
Employees	96,011 (as of July 2021)^[1]
Annual budget	£176.3 billion (Resource AME),^[2] £6.3 billion (Resource DEL),^[3] £0.3 billion (Capital DEL), £2.3 billion (Non-Budget Expenditure) Estimated for year ending 31 March 2017^[4]
Secretary of State responsible	The Rt Hon. Mel Stride MP, Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
Department executive	Peter Schofield^[5], Permanent Secretary
Website	www.gov.uk/dwp

The department has four operational organisations: Jobcentre Plus administers working age benefits such as Jobseeker's Allowance, and decides which claimants receive Employment and Support Allowance; the Pension Service which pays the Basic State Pension and Pension Credit and provides information on related issues; Disability and Carers Service which provides financial support to disabled people and their carers; and the Child Maintenance Group which provides the statutory Child Support Schemes, operating as the Child Support Agency and the Child Maintenance Service. Three non-departmental bodies are accountable to DWP; the Health and Safety Executive, The Pensions Regulator and the Money and Pensions service.

History

The department was created on 8 June 2001 as a merger of the Department of Social Security, Employment Service and the policy groups of the Department for Education and Employment involved in employment policy and international issues.^[9][10][11]

The department was initially tasked with creating Jobcentre Plus and the Pensions Service from the remains of the Employment Service and the Benefits Agency.^[10] The department is therefore responsible for welfare and pension policy.^[12] It aims "to help its customers become financially independent and to help reduce child poverty".^[13]

In 2019, the department was found by an independent inquiry to have broken its own rules, in a case where a disabled woman killed herself in 2017 after her benefits were stopped when she missed a Work Capability Assessment because she had pneumonia.^[14] Previous research published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health by Oxford University and Liverpool University had found that there were an additional 590 suicides between 2010 and 2013 in areas where such assessments were carried out. The researchers said that the DWP had introduced the policy of moving people off benefits without understanding the consequences.^[15]

Until 2021, the DWP was still using ICL VME based computer systems, originating from its 1988 Pension Service Computer System, to support state pension payments.^[16][17] The software was migrated to an in-house VME replacement system, in one of the largest computer replacement projects in Europe.^[18][19]

Ministers

The DWP Ministers are:^[20][21]

Minister	Title	Portfolio
The Rt Hon. Mel Stride MP	Secretary of State	Overall responsibility for the department; people of working age; employers; pensioners; families and children; disabled people.
Guy Opperman MP	Minister of State for Employment	Responsible for departmental strategy on the labour market, unemployment and in work progression, with a focus on under-represented groups, young people and skills; in work conditionality including sanctions; international labour market policy (International Labour Organization, G20, EPSCO, European Social Fund, UK Shared Prosperity Fund); work services and Jobcentre Plus partnership working; Jobseeker's Allowance and Income Support; people and location programme; Youth Obligation Support Programme; Flexible Support Fund; labour market interventions for self-employment (New Enterprise Allowance and future offer); childcare in UC; benefit cap; maternity benefits; cross Department for Work and Pensions spokesperson – shadowing Lords
Tom Pursglove MP	Minister of State for Disabled People, Health and Work	Responsibility for the departmental strategy on disability and disability employment; cross-government responsibility for disabled people; Employment and Support Allowance, Personal Independence Payment, Disability Living Allowance and elements of Universal Credit that relate to disabled people, including severe disability premium; EU Exit oversight; work and health strategy including sponsorship of the joint Department for Work and Pensions and Department for Health and Social Care Work and Health Unit; disability benefit reform; devolution framework; Carer's Allowance; Motability and arms-length compensation schemes.ather Payments, Funeral Expenses Payments and Sure Start Maternity Grant); bereavement benefits
Laura Trott MP	Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Pensions	Pensioner benefits, including new State Pension, Frozen State Pension, Winter Fuel Payments and Pension Credit; private and occupational health, including regulatory powers and the National Employment Savings Trust; automatic enrolment into a workplace pension; oversight of arms-length bodies, including the Pensions Regulator, Pension Protection Fund, Financial Assistance Scheme and Pensions Ombudsman; financial guidance, including the Single Financial Guidance Body, Financial Inclusion Policy Forum and Post Office Card Accounts.
Mims Davies MP	Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Social Mobility, Youth and Progression
The Rt Hon. Viscount Younger of Leckie	Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions	Cross-DWP Lords spokesperson, fraud, error and debt strategy, national insurance number policy, oversight of departmental statutory instruments and managing the relationship with the Social Security Advisory Committee, departmental planning and performance management, and departmental business

The Permanent Secretary is Peter Schofield.^[5]

Pension Service

With the creation of the department in June 2001, the Pension Service was created, bringing together many different departments and divisions. The Pension Service is a 'dedicated service for current and future pensioners'.^[22]

The Pension Service consists of local Pension Centres and centrally-based centres, many of latter are based at the Tyneview Park complex in Newcastle upon Tyne. At Tyneview Park the following centres are found:

• Future Pension Centre (FPC) provides state pension forecasts for people approaching retirement age.^[23]
• Newcastle Pension Centre (NPC) originally dealt with the London area, the Home Counties, and part of West Midlands. Now the service is virtual so all pension centres deal with all areas of the country.^[24]
• Pension Tracing Service (PTS) helps track old pensions and pension schemes.^[25]
• International Pension Centre (IPC) deals with all enquiries regarding the payment of state pension, bereavement benefits, incapacity benefits and other such benefits for those living abroad.^[26]

Local Pension Centres deal with localised claims for state pension and retirement related benefits. Pension Centres are found all over the country. Benefits dealt with at local Pension Centres include:

• Pension Credit (replaced a former scheme known as 'Minimum Income Guarantee' in October 2003)
• Winter Fuel Payments
• Cold Weather Payments

Disability and Carers Service

The Disability and Carers Service offers financial support for those who are disabled and their carers, whether in or out of employment. The DCS have offices throughout the country and deal with the following benefits:^[27]

• Disability Living Allowance
• Attendance Allowance
• Carer's Allowance
• Vaccine Damage Payment
• Personal Independence Payment

The department has been found to frequently invite disabled people to interviews in buildings which are themselves not accessible to people with disabilities. When the person does not attend the interview they deny the person disability benefits, causing malnutrition and destitution.^[28][29] The DWP systematically underpaid disabled claimants who were transferred from Incapacity Benefit to Employment and Support allowance risking hardship for claimants. A cross party committee of MP's, the Public Accounts Committee accused the DWP of a culture of indifference to claimants.^[30]

Since at least 2020 DWP has had a policy of cold-calling vulnerable and disabled people to attempt to pressure them into accept lower benefit claims than they were legally entitled. In July 2021 the DWP agreed to stop after it was threatened with legal action.^[31]

Disability Confident scheme

DWP administers the Disability Confident scheme, which supports employers to employ people with disabilities and to maintain the employment of staff who become disabled. The scheme operates as three levels:

• Level 1: Disability Confident Committed
• Level 2: Disability Confident Employer
• Level 3: Disability Confident Leader.^[32]

The scheme is intended to encourage employers to “think differently about disability and take action to improve how they recruit, retain and develop disabled people”, but the DWP lost more disability discrimination cases at employment tribunal than any other employer in Britain between 2016 and 2019.^[33]

Tell Us Once

The DWP introduced the "Tell Us Once" system in 2011 to enable people to use a single interface to inform the government about a change in their personal circumstances. Using ‘Tell Us Once’, departments and agencies like the pensions service, HM Revenue & Customs, the Passport Office and local authorities are informed about a person's change in circumstances in parallel, removing the need for "repeated, unnecessary form-filling".^[34] Local authority departments making use of the service include libraries, housing departments, "Blue Badge" services and adult social care.^[35]

In most cases, a Registrar of Births, Marriages and Deaths will notify a person who registers a death about using the service.^[36]

DWP transferred to a cloud-based service in 2016 using the government's G-Cloud purchasing process for IT services. The Crown Commercial Service states that "cutting administration costs and reducing the overpayments of benefits – usually because of out-of-date records of people’s personal circumstances – protected the cross-government savings generated by Tell Us Once, estimated at more than £20 million per year. By switching from a physical infrastructure to a cloud solution, DWP has also benefited from cost savings of around 50% on the IT running costs of Tell Us Once".^[34]

Former structure

Main article: Pension, Disability and Carers Service

Before 2008, The Pension Service and the Disability and Carers Service were two separate executive agencies; however it was decided in April 2008 to merge them into one entity named The Pension, Disability and Carers Service.^[37]

Both former agencies kept their corporate branding and provided services under their separate identities. The decision was made due to the two agencies sharing about half of the same customers; as a single agency, the rationalisation of services would provide a better service for customers.^[38]

The status of PDCS as an executive agency (and its existence as a merged entity) was removed on 1 October 2011 with the functions being brought back inside the department; and both The Pension Service and the Disability and Carers Service becoming distinct entities once again.^[39] Prior to July 2012 the Child Support Agency was the operating arm of the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission (CMEC).

All are now operated wholly from within the department, with the names continuing as brand identifiers.

 

DWP buildings at Quarry Hill, Leeds

Public bodies and estate

The department's public bodies include:^[40]

• the Health and Safety Executive
• the Pensions Ombudsman
• the Pensions Regulator

The department has corporate buildings in London, Leeds, Blackpool, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Newcastle upon Tyne, Warrington, Manchester and Sheffield. Jobcentre Plus, The Pension Service and the Disability and Carers Service operate through a network of around 1,000 Jobcentres, contact centres and benefit processing centres across the UK.

Budget

The total annual budget of the department in 2011–12 was £151.6 billion, representing approximately 28% of total UK Government spending.^[41] The department spends a far greater share of national wealth than any other department in Britain, by a wide margin. The department spends an average of £348.9 million with suppliers a month.^[42]

A report of February 2012 found that billions of pounds payable had not been claimed. In 2009–2010 the Dept stated £1.95 billion job-seekers allowance, £2 billion income support and employment and support allowance, £2.4 billion in council tax, £2.8bn in pension credit and £3.1 billion for housing benefit; in total £12.25 billion had not been claimed.^[43]

Research

The department is a major commissioner of external social science research, with the objective of providing the evidence base needed to inform departmental strategy, policy-making and delivery.^[44] The department has developed and uses various microsimulation and other models, including the Policy Simulation Model (for appraisal of policy options), Pensim2 (to create projections of pension entitlements up to 2100) and Inform (to produce the department's benefit caseload forecasts). Datasets held include the LLMDB and the Family Resources Survey.

During 2012 the department announced records of the number of people born outside of the United Kingdom ("non-UK nationals") claiming work-related benefits from 2011, using data already collated within the department together with those of HM Revenue and Customs and the UK Border Agency^[45] (whose duties are now fulfilled by UK Visas and Immigration).

Devolution

Scotland

See also: Social Security Scotland

Employment, health and safety, and social security policy are reserved matters of the United Kingdom government. The Scotland Act 2016 devolved specific areas of social security to the Scottish Government to administer and reform. The Scottish Parliament passed the Social Security (Scotland) Act 2018 to establish a statutory basis of Social Security in Scotland. This created a principled based legislative agenda for Social Security providing for social security to be a human right in Scotland. Most aspects of social security in Scotland remain reserved to the United Kingdom and those will remain administered by the DWP.

The Act established Social Security Scotland, an executive agency of the Scottish Government.

Northern Ireland

Northern Ireland has parity with Great Britain in three areas:

• social security
• child support
• pensions

Policy in these areas is technically devolved but, in practice, follows policy set by Parliament to provide consistency across the United Kingdom.^[46] Employment and health and safety policy are fully devolved.

The department's main counterparts in Northern Ireland are:

• the Department for Communities (administers welfare policy)
• the Department for the Economy (oversees the Health and Safety Executive for Northern Ireland)

Controversy

In August 2015, the department admitted using fictional stories from made-up claimants on leaflets advertising the positive impact of benefit sanctions, following a Freedom of Information request from Welfare Weekly,^[47] claiming that they were for "illustrative purposes only"^[48][49] and that it was "quite wrong" to pass these off as genuine quotes.^[50]

Later that month figures were released which showed that between December 2011 and February 2014, 2,650 people died shortly after their Work Capability Assessment told them that they should be finding work.^[51] The DWP had fought hard for the figures not to be released, with chief minister Iain Duncan Smith at one point telling Parliament that they did not exist.^[52]

In 2019, a computer systems was introduced but the DWP refused to reveal details. Claimants and their supporters feared it would add to poverty and hardship. Frank Field MP stated in early 2020 that claimants, “will be left at the mercy of online systems that, even now, leave all too many people teetering on the brink of destitution. We’ve already seen, in the gig economy, how workers are managed and sacked, not by people, but by algorithms. Now the welfare state looks set to follow suit, with the ‘social’ human element being stripped away from ‘social security’.^[53]

In 2022 the department refused to release data to researchers at Glasgow University investigating if benefit sanctions were linked to suicides. This was despite earlier promises by ministers they were supporting the researchers.^[54]

See also

• Benefit fraud
• Pensions Commission
• Office of Manpower Economics
• Pension, Disability and Carers Service
• United Kingdom budget
• Welfare rights

References

1. "DWP's headcount and payroll data for July 2021" (ODS). Department for Work and Pensions. 27 August 2021. Retrieved 12 September 2021.
2. "How to understand public sector spending – Annually managed expenditure (AME)". HM Treasury. 29 May 2013. from the original on 18 September 2016. Retrieved 2 August 2016. Annually managed expenditure, or AME, is more difficult to explain or control as it is spent on programmes which are demand-led – such as welfare, tax credits or public sector pensions. It is spent on items that may be unpredictable or not easily controlled by departments, and are relatively large in comparison to other government departments.
3. "How to understand public sector spending – Departmental Expenditure Limits (DEL)". HM Treasury. 29 May 2013. from the original on 18 September 2016. Retrieved 2 August 2016. The government budget that is allocated to and spent by government departments is known as the Departmental Expenditure Limit, or DEL. This amount, and how it is split between government departments, is set at Spending Reviews. Things that departmental budgets can be spent on include the running of the services that they oversee such as schools or hospital, and the everyday cost of resources such as staff. The government controls DEL by deciding how much each department gets.
4. Central Government Supply Estimates 2016–17. London: HM Treasury. 2016. p. 138. from the original on 17 September 2016. Retrieved 2 August 2016.
5. HM Government (12 January 2018). "Appointment of Peter Schofield as Permanent Secretary at the Department for Work and Pensions". www.gov.uk. from the original on 16 January 2018. Retrieved 15 January 2018.
6. "Department for Work and Pensions". GOV.UK. Retrieved 14 December 2020.
7. "Civil service staff numbers". Institute for Government. 22 October 2020.
8. "Departmental budgets". Institute for Government. 26 March 2020.
9. E Carmel; T Papadopoulos. "The New governance of Social Security in Britain" (PDF). University of Bath. Retrieved 6 June 2012.
10. Dept. of Social Security. "Resource Accounts 2000–2001". rightsnet.org. Retrieved 6 June 2012.
11. European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions 29 March 2013 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 6 June 2012
12. "About – Department for Work and Pensions – GOV.UK". from the original on 1 September 2009. Retrieved 25 August 2009.
13. "Department for Work and Pensions – GOV.UK". from the original on 23 April 2011. Retrieved 4 May 2011.
14. "Disabled mum who killed herself failed by benefits agency". BBC News. 23 February 2019. Retrieved 23 February 2019.
15. David Rankin (17 November 2015). "Hundreds of extra suicides in 'fit to work' regions, study finds". Times newspapers. Retrieved 17 November 2015.
16. Clark, Lindsay (21 January 2022). "You might want to consider the cost of not upgrading legacy tech, UK's Department for Work and Pensions told". The Register. Retrieved 24 January 2022.
17. Clark, Lindsay (22 September 2021). "Thatcher-era ICL mainframe fingered for failure to pay out over £1bn in UK pensions". The Register. Retrieved 24 January 2022.
18. Evenstad, Lis (26 March 2021). "DWP completes in-house VME replacement project". Computer Weekly. Retrieved 24 January 2022.
19. "Case Study – Department for Work and Pensions" (PDF). Micro Focus. 2021. Retrieved 24 January 2022.
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27. "Carers and disability benefits – GOV.UK". Dwp.gov.uk. from the original on 12 July 2014. Retrieved 22 June 2015.
28. "The disability system is blocking people like Jaki from their benefits – literally | Frances Ryan". TheGuardian.com. 24 May 2018. from the original on 24 May 2018. Retrieved 24 May 2018.
29. "PIP is a disaster for disabled people. At last the full horror is emerging | Frances Ryan". TheGuardian.com. 7 June 2016. from the original on 25 May 2018. Retrieved 24 May 2018.
30. Disability claimants owed £340m after DWP blunder, say MPs 18 July 2018 at the Wayback Machine The Guardian
31. "DWP policy of cold-calling disabled people over benefit claims to end". The Guardian. 14 July 2021. Retrieved 19 July 2021.
32. DWP, How to sign up to the Disability Confident employer scheme, updated 25 November 2019, accessed 17 January 2022
33. "DWP to pay £500,000 to disabled civil servant it drove to suicide attempt". Disability News Service. 3 November 2022. Retrieved 8 November 2022.
34.   This article incorporates text published under the British Open Government Licence: Crown Commercial Service, G-Cloud cuts cost of DWP's ‘Tell Us Once’ in half, accessed 9 February 2021
35. London Borough of Sutton, Deaths and 'Tell us once', accessed 5 February 2021
36. Bereavement Advice Centre, The tell us once service, accessed 5 February 2021
37. "[ARCHIVED CONTENT] UK Government Web Archive – The National Archives – Pension, Disability and Carers Service Business Plan 2008/09" (PDF). Dwp.gov.uk. July 2008. Archived from the original (PDF) on 13 February 2013. Retrieved 2 August 2016.
38. "[ARCHIVED CONTENT] UK Government Web Archive – The National Archives – DWP Press release: Joining up to improve service – 22 January 2008". Dwp.gov.uk. Archived from the original on 28 January 2013. Retrieved 2 August 2016.
39. "Government announces organisational changes to Jobcentre Plus and the Pension, Disability and Carers Service – Press releases – GOV.UK". Dwp.gov.uk. 12 September 2011. from the original on 1 April 2013. Retrieved 22 June 2015.
40. "Departments, agencies and public bodies – GOV.UK". from the original on 11 May 2011. Retrieved 4 May 2011.
41. News Distribution Service 15 March 2012 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved September 2011
42. "Open Spending Data bought to life". www.spendnetwork.com. from the original on 26 October 2016. Retrieved 22 March 2018.
43. BBC 23 February 2012 report 18 October 2017 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 8 July 2012
44. "Department for Work and Pensions – GOV.UK". from the original on 2 May 2011. Retrieved 4 May 2011.
45. Department for Works and Pensions – newsroom:20 January 2012 13 July 2012 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 9 July 2012
46. "Northern Ireland Act 1998". www.legislation.gov.uk. from the original on 23 March 2018. Retrieved 22 March 2018.
47. . Dial2Donate. Archived from the original on 7 January 2016. Retrieved 26 August 2015.
48. Kevin Rawlinson; Frances Perraudin (18 August 2015). "DWP admits inventing quotes from fake 'benefits claimants' for sanctions leaflet". The Guardian. from the original on 1 December 2016. Retrieved 14 December 2016.
49. Kevin Rawlinson (21 August 2015). "Fake benefits claimant 'Zac' quoted in other DWP documents". The Guardian. from the original on 1 December 2016. Retrieved 14 December 2016.
50. The Minister for Work and Pensions, Iain Duncan-Smith, admits a leaflet about benefits containing fake quotes from fictitious claimants was 'wrong' Andrew Sparrow (24 August 2015). "Use of fake quotes in benefits leaflet 'quite wrong', Iain Duncan Smith admits". The Guardian. from the original on 5 March 2016. Retrieved 14 December 2016.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
51. "Mortality Statistics: Employment and Support Allowance, Incapacity Benefit or Severe Disablement Allowance" (PDF). Department for Work & Pensions. August 2015.
52. Stone, Jon (27 August 2015). "Thousands have died soon after being found 'fit to work' by the DWP's benefit tests". The Independent. from the original on 29 August 2015. Retrieved 28 August 2015.
53. "Benefits system automation could plunge claimants deeper into poverty". The Guardian. 14 October 2019. Retrieved 19 May 2020.
54. "DWP criticised over repeated failure to release data on benefit sanctions". The Guardian. 2 March 2022. Retrieved 3 March 2022.

External links

• Official website
• DWP YouTube channel