To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 21 July 2022 to Question 17850 on Personal Independence Payment: Tribunals, what proportion of decisions overturned at Tribunal were based on (a) the tribunal panel drawing a different conclusion based on the same evidence, (b) cogent oral evidence given by the individual and (c) new written evidence provided at the hearing, for each year for which data is available.
Answered on
5 September 2022
Analysis of unpublished Personal Independence Payment (PIP) data held by DWP provides data on why decisions by DWP decision makers have been overturned at a tribunal hearing between July 2013 and March 2022 and is shown annually in the table below. This information is taken from Decision Notices and recorded on the PIP computer system.
This data only provides one reason per appeal why decisions by DWP decision makers have been overturned at a tribunal hearing, and therefore may not give the full story as there may be other reasons.
Appeals data is taken from the DWP PIP computer system’s management information. Therefore, this appeal data may differ from that held by Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service for various reasons such as delays in data recording and other methodological differences in collating and preparing statistics.
These figures are the result of a complex data match across a number of data sets. This data is unpublished data. It should be used with caution, and it may be subject to future revision.
Summary reason DWP decision | Appeal Clearance Year | |||||||||
2013 (from July) | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 (up to March) | |
New written evidence provided at hearing | 14% | 6% | 9% | 15% | 9% | 8% | 4% | 4% | 1% | 2% |
Cogent Oral Evidence | 57% | 74% | 67% | 54% | 50% | 43% | 43% | 26% | 32% | 32% |
Reached a Different Conclusion on | 29% | 15% | 13% | 18% | 26% | 36% | 41% | 58% | 59% | 59% |
Other | 0% | 5% | 10% | 12% | 15% | 13% | 12% | 11% | 7% | 7% |
Learning from this information, we have made improvements to our decision-making processes to help ensure we make the right decision as early as possible in the claim journey. We have introduced a new approach to decision making at both the initial decision and the Mandatory Reconsideration stage, giving Decision Makers additional time to proactively contact customers where they think additional evidence may support the claim.