§ Mr. AltonTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many claimants have been transferred from unemployment benefit and supplementary benefit to invalidity benefit for each of the last five years.
§ Mr. Peter LloydI regret the information is not available in the form requested. The following table gives the number of incapacity spells where invalidity benefit commenced in each year and the number of these spells which relate to previous unemployment.
Year All commencement of invalidity benefit Claimant unemployed at start of spell Claim links with unemployment benefit claim (i) (ii) (iii) 1987–881 278 126 89 1986–87 284 120 82 1985–86 285 106 68 1984–85 272 103 67 1983–84 278 101 77 1 Provisional. Notes:
1. All figures are in thousands.
2. A spell of incapacity following unemployment may begin with immediate entitlement to invalidity benefit, because there is a link to an earlier spell of incapacity. Where there is no such link, a spell of incapacity following unemployment will begin with entitlement to sickness benefit. The information in columns (ii) and (iii) relates to the situation at the start of the spell of incapacity, where this begins with sickness benefit or invalidity benefit.
3. Many of the cases included in column (iii) will also be in column (ii), but they are not necessarily the same. This is because someone can be unemployed at the start of the incapacity spell, but if they have not registered there is no link with an unemployment benefit claim. Conversely, someone who goes back to work after an unemployment benefit claim but then goes sick within eight weeks has a link with that unemployment benefit claim but is not recorded as unemployed at the start of the incapacity spell.
4. Information is not available to distinguish in columns (ii) and (iii) whether, during the preceding unemployment, the benefit paid was unemployment benefit, supplementary benefit, or a combination of the two.