DWP Permanent Secretary also tells Select Committee that, while the Department wants the claimant experience in the health transformation area to be better, ‘a difference in outcomes is not something that we can tolerate’
The roll out of the Health Transformation Programme (HTP) is capped at 20 per cent until 2029 due to 'limitations' in the Functional Assessment Services contracts, DWP Permanent Secretary Peter Schofield has told the Public Accounts Committee.
In 2019, the DWP announced its intention to integrate health assessments into one service through its HTP. While the initial pilot was delayed due to the Covid-19 pandemic, a new pilot was started in Marylebone in April 2021 and later extended to selected Birmingham postcodes in February 2022.
Subsequently, in May 2023, the DWP announced the new providers of the Functional Assessment Services that it says will 'provide the foundation for the new Health Assessment Service' from 2024 to 2029, replacing the current separate contracts for work capability assessment (WCA) services and personal independence payment (PIP) assessments with single contracts for all assessments in a geographic area.
Questioned by the Public Accounts Committee last week about the progress of the HTP – as part of its inquiry into Revising health assessments for disability benefits – Mr Schofield said he expected it to be scaled up to around 20 per cent of the country by 2026 and fully operational from 2029. However, pushed on what would happen should it be ready to deliver more quickly, Mr Schofield advised –
'It is one of the limitations in the contract for the interim period between 2024 and 2029. We have negotiated the space to be able to offer the transformed service to the maximum of 20 per cent … So it is capped out at 20 per cent without some contractual change between now and 2029.'
In addition, expressing concern about operating two different health assessment systems alongside each other, Committee member Olivia Blake asked Mr Schofield how the Department would manage a challenge from a claimant going through one system when there was evidence that the other system was much more beneficial. In response, Mr Schofield assured Ms Blake that the Department has a 'very, very low tolerance' for inconsistency between the two services and that, while the experience in the health transformation area would be better –
'… a difference in outcomes is not something that we can tolerate.'
For more information, see the transcript of the Public Accounts Committee's evidence session from parliament.uk