Today at Prime Minister’s Questions Emma raised the case of South Shields resident Sue Martin, who has been left without vital support because of delays in assessing her Personal Independence Payment (PIP) claim.
Emma asked the Prime Minister:
“My constituent, Sue Martin, suffers from ME (myalgic encephalomyelitis) and has been waiting more than nine months for her personal independence claim to be processed. She now has to borrow from her 84-year-old mother just to get by. Why does the Prime Minister think that is acceptable?”
The Prime Minister replied:
“All delays in these sorts of payments are not acceptable: we have to make sure that benefits are paid on time. What we are trying to do with the personal independence payment is to introduce it gradually so that we ensure that the quality of decision making is good.”
But despite the Prime Minister’s reassurances, the backlog of delayed PIP claims is quickly spiralling out of control. Ms Martin is not the only constituent to have experienced severe delays in her claim being processed – other constituents have reported waiting for their claim for more than six months, and following Emma’s question even more people contacted Emma to say they had experienced similar problems.
Last month the Chair of Parliament’s Work and Pensions Committee called the delays “completely unacceptable” after a National Audit Office report found that the average wait for an assessment claim was 107 days, over a month longer than expected when the system was set up.
You can read the official transcript of Emma’s question and the Prime Minister’s response by clicking here.
Speaking after Prime Minister’s Questions, Emma said:
“The Prime Minister’s answer ignored the real problem, which is that the organisations delivering PIP are utterly failing to process claims on time. The fact that many parts of the country aren’t even covered by PIP yet makes this failure even worse, and suggests that we can expect even longer delays in the future. That will mean more hardship for vulnerable people like Ms Martin.”