The MoJ achieved Disability Confident Leader status in October 2017. The externally accredited application reflected the commitment and work of all parts of the organisation including Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service.

HMCTS’ Chief Executive is also the MoJ’s Board-level Disability Champion and is developing an internal HMCTS Diversity, Inclusion and Wellbeing Strategy for staff, which will include a commitment to continuing to improve the experience of court services for disabled court users.

One of the steps taken is to provide new guidance which is currently being finalised. This includes reasonable adjustments and a tool kit for staff to support the requirements of court users; disability awareness training for court staff; communication support for HMCTS customers who are deaf, hard of hearing or speech impaired - for example using British Sign Language (BSL) interpreters and ensuring there are court rooms with hearing enhancement systems; and providing staff with access to support through a new initiative called Mental Health Allies along with training on mental health, to better support vulnerable court users.

The MoJ will continue to focus on improving disability confidence across the organisation and the services it provides.

DFID has a dedicated Education Research Team with a £12m per annum portfolio of innovative research on education systems, raising learning outcomes, and learning and skills beyond primary education. This research portfolio has a particular focus on disadvantaged groups and the pursuit of an equitable start to learning for all. Research commissioned through this team, along with the UK Research Community, has ensured that teachers, equity and systems reform are at the centre of DFID’s new education policy.

DFID has commissioned rigorous reviews of existing evidence and, as a result of the findings, concluded a focus on children with disabilities. For example, one research project, which is funded by DFID through the UK Economic and Social Research Council, investigates different modalities for teaching literacy in deaf communities in India, Ghana and Uganda. Wider inclusion and equity issues are fundamental to all DFID’s education research programmes, and we seek to mainstream them.

The report by the British Healthcare Trades Association concluded that the costs of medical care would be significantly reduced through more effective provision of equipment, and the National Health Service is continually seeking to improve equipment provision and use. NHS England is leading work to improve wheelchair commissioning and posture services through the development and dissemination of its wheelchair service specification and by working with commissioners to eliminate 18 week waits for wheelchairs by the end of 2018/19. Since 2016, the Department has funded sports activity prostheses for children who have suffered limb loss or congenital limb deficiency.

The public consultation on the Department of Transport’s draft Transport Accessibility Action plan closed on the 22 November 2017 and the responses are currently being analysed. The Department of Health will work with the Department of Transport as appropriate in responding to the consultation.

No such discussions have taken place.

Under the Equality Act 2010, service providers are under a duty to make reasonable adjustments to improve access to premises or buildings and services so that disabled customers are not placed at a substantial disadvantage compared to non-disabled customers. This reasonable adjustment duty is an anticipatory duty, which means that those who provide goods, facilities and services to members of the public are expected to anticipate the reasonable adjustments that disabled customers may require.

The delivery of accessible transport, including disabled access at stations and transport hubs is the responsibility of the Department for Transport.

Higher education (HE) providers are independent and autonomous bodies, and as such are responsible for fulfilling their duties under both acts. Recent changes to Disabled Students’ Allowances sought to encourage all HE providers to fulfil their responsibilities under the Equality Act 2010. However, it is for higher education institutions to ensure adherence. The Higher Education Funding Council for England recently published a review of the provision of support to disabled students, which contains examples of good practice from across the sector. It also contains recommendations that give clear indications of actions that can help HE providers improve their offer to disabled students.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission provides technical guidance on the Equality Act, and the Office of the Independent Adjudicator outlines good practice guidance for universities to consider when supporting disabled students. The Equality Challenge Unit supports equality and diversity for staff and students in HE, and also publishes technical guidance on the Equality Act.

I have nothing further to add to the answer I gave the hon. Member.

All main government departments have signed up to Disability Confident and have progressed through the levels, achieving Disability Confident Leader (Level 3) status. This has included having their evidence externally validated by an independent organisation.

DWP is now working closely with these departments to ensure that all agencies and arms-length bodies are also signed up to the scheme and working to Disability Confident principles.

The Government’s ambition is to ensure people with disabilities have the same access to transport and opportunities to travel as everyone else. This includes transport to attend hospital appointments.

In August, the Department for Transport published its draft Accessibility Action Plan (AAP), setting out proposals for addressing the gaps in existing provision of transport services which serve as a barrier to people with disabilities.

The Government will publish its response to the AAP consultation in early 2018 and a revised AAP in summer 2018. The revised Plan will include our updated proposals for improving passenger transport across all modes so that people with disabilities can travel to the destinations and appointments they need to. The Department for Transport will work with Other Government Departments, including the Department of Health as part of its development of the revised Action Plan.

The Department has already in place recruitment processes to attract Community Partners as part of the Enhanced Support Offer, as announced in the Improving Lives: The Work, Health and Disability Green Paper (published October 2016). The Department has and continues to pursue direct secondments from representative organisations, covering the whole range of disabilities. The Department has also and continues to pursue open recruitment, and it is a standard requirement of the recruitment panels that they have knowledge of or lived experience of disability issues.

We are committed to improving station accessibility and have continued with the Access for All programme which has delivered more than 160 accessible routes at stations. We will be making further funding available in the next Rail Control Period (2019-24) and will confirm the way in which we will deliver this as soon as possible.

For schemes such as Coventry to be considered for this future funding it will need strong support from the industry. A proportion of third party funding would also help to weight the station’s business case.

We are committed to improving station accessibility and have continued with the Access for All programme which has delivered more than 160 accessible routes at stations. We will be making further funding available in the next Rail Control Period (2019-24) and will confirm the way in which we will deliver this as soon as possible.

For schemes such as Flitwick to be considered for this future funding it will need strong support from the industry. A proportion of third party funding would also help to weight the station’s business case.

Early this year energy companies were contacted by the Department of Work and Pensions to find out whether they offered social tariffs for disabled people. It was found that no special tariffs were offered, however it was identified that people could save money by switching provider. Work coaches are able to direct claimants to switching services via the “Need Help Managing Your Money?” Leaflet.

In addition, my colleague the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), published a draft Bill to cap the amount that energy suppliers can charge customers who are on standard variable and default tariffs. This is currently undergoing pre-legislative scrutiny by the BEIS Select Committee. In addition, on 7 December Ofgem announced that it was extending the current safeguard tariff in place for customers on pre-payment meters, to customers in receipt of the Warm Home Discount who are on standard variable or default fixed term tariffs. This will come into effect on 2 February.

BEIS is also providing £1.3m funding this winter, for Third Sector organisations to support vulnerable disengaged energy consumers, including disabled households, to switch and save through the Big Energy Saving Network.

We have just published Improving Lives: The Future of Work, Health and Disability. This outlines the action taken over the past year, provides a comprehensive strategy and sets out plans over the next ten years, focusing in particular on the next steps planned over the next two to three years. This has been put together in partnership with stakeholders from across the work, health and disability spectrums and follows a thorough 15-week consultation via the Green Paper, which received around 6,000 responses. We have started building an extensive evidence base and are running a series of trials to build this further.

Improving Lives includes plans for a broad programme of employment support for disabled people, with a mix of internal and external provision and pan-disability and specialist support. A range of specialist providers are involved, for example in the mental health area where we plan to: double the scale of Individual Placement and Support (IPS) for people with mental health conditions; trial IPS in new settings and for new population groups; and significantly increase the capacity of the Access to Work Mental Health Support Service. A proof of concept of local supported employment will work with experts in helping people with learning disabilities and autism into work. Specialist Employment Support includes providers with specialist expertise in sensory impairments. We have also progressed with roll-out of the Personal Support Package, a range of new measures and interventions designed to offer support which can be tailored to people’s individual needs.

Implementation of the Work and Health Programme started at the end of November 2017. This will provide innovative support through local organisations for around 200,000 disabled people over the course of the programme, with the type of support personalised to the needs of each participant. Examples of the type of support available includes participants having a personal key worker with regular 1:1 face to face contact, mentoring and peer support, integrated access to specialist support networks at a local level including health and wellbeing professionals and support from dedicated employer experts with knowledge of the local labour market and job opportunities.

The Department does not hold information on whether or not correspondents have a disability.