§ Mr. MallonTo ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (1) what is the average period of time taken to process an appeal in respect of an application for disability living allowance;
(2) what is the average period of time taken to process an application for disability living allowance;
(3) how many appeals have been lodged in respect of disability living allowance claims; and, of these, how many are (a) successful, (b) unsuccessful and (c) outstanding.
§ Mr. MossResponsibility for the subject in question has been delegated to the Social Security Agency under its chief executive, Mr. Alec Wylie. I have asked him to arrange for replies to be given.
Letters from Alec Wylie to Mr. Seamus Mallon, dated 25 November 1994:
769WI have been asked to reply to your recent Parliamentary Question about the average period of time taken to process an appeal in respect of Disability Living Allowance (DLA) applications.
The average number of days taken to process an appeal from the date of receipt of the letter of appeal until the date the case is sent to the Independent Tribunal Service (ITS) is 86 days for the period April 1994 to October 1994. Additional staff have been deployed and overtime is being worked to improve the clearance time. The arrangements for hearing appeals is the responsibility of the President of the ITS and I have passed a copy of your question to him.I have been asked to reply to your recent Parliamentary question about the average period of time taken to process an application for Disability Living Allowance (DLA).Information on the processing of DLA claims is not available in the "average period" format that you have requested but is available in terms of the percentage of claims cleared within time limits set by the Minister. For the 1994–95 year these time limits/targets are 68 per cent. to be cleared in 30 days and 85 per cent. to be cleared in 53 days.For the period April 1994 to October 1994, 55 per cent. of claims were cleared within 30 days and 82 per cent. within 53 days. Performance over the last few months has shown a marked improvement as a result of measures taken earlier in the year to deal with some identified problems and in October, 74 per cent. of claims were being cleared within 30 days and 92 per cent. within 53 days.I have been asked to reply to your recent Parliamentary question about the number and outcome of appeals lodged in respect of Disability Living Allowance (DLA).Since the introduction of DLA in April 1992 to the end of October 1994 there have been 2321 review decisions appealed. Of these, 601 have been successful and 857 have been unsuccessful. There were 608 appeals awaiting preparation of submissions to the Independent
Numbers of DLA claims received, allowed, disallowed, withdrawn and outstanding from April 1993 to date. Month Received Allowed Disallowed Withdrawn Outstanding April 1993 3,187 2,799 1,769 21 5,316 May 3,878 2,643 1,611 12 4,891 June 4,349 2,788 1,659 24 4,744 July 3,054 2,746 1,852 13 3,150 August 3,026 1,925 1,376 12 2,851 September 3,663 1,809 1,386 18 3,292 October 3,708 1,562 1,660 15 3,750 November 3,591 1,566 1,714 11 4,038 December 2,256 1,006 1,307 17 3,959 January 1994 2,625 1,188 1,422 35 3,933 February 2,986 929 1,333 17 4,618 March 3,629 1,578 1,843 14 4,789 April 2,883 990 1,032 12 5,627 May 3,038 1,769 1,444 12 5,422 June 3,604 2,132 1,843 25 5,001 July 2,467 2,043 1,906 13 3,491 August 2,955 1,562 1,668 11 3,179 September 3,995 1,810 1,690 23 3,609 October 3,779 1,629 1,980 11 3,734