To ask the Minister for Communities to outline (i) why people on the Access to Work scheme have not been reimbursed for their cost of travel; (ii) any correspondence between his Department and those affected; and (i) when the backlog will be cleared.

There are currently over 700 disabled people receiving assistance through the Access to Work (NI) programme. My department’s Disability Employment Service has responsibility for the management and delivery of this specialist employment programme, including the processing of all payments. There has been no policy change in relation to any aspect of the programme, and people on the Access to Work (NI) are still being reimbursed for the cost of their travel to and from their place of employment;

Due to the fact that there has not been a change of policy, no official correspondence has been issued by my department to Access to Work (NI) customers. The Access to Work team respond to queries from participants, employers and other customers on a daily basis and will continue to do so;

(iii) The Disability Employment Service strives to pay claims for reimbursement of costs to disabled customers as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, due to a number of unexpected staff absences recently, this caused a temporary delay in our normal payment process and timeline. To address this issue, the Disability Employment Service management put in place contingency arrangements and the Access to Work payment backlog has been cleared.