Background
Access to Work is a scheme that aims to help people with physical or mental health conditions or disabilities start, or stay in, work by providing practical or financial support. The scheme is funded and administered by the Department for Work & Pensions (DWP). Support can include aids and equipment, money towards travel costs, and other help such as an interpreter or job coach. Access to Work will not pay for reasonable adjustments, which are changes an employer must legally make to support someone to do their job.
Demand for and expenditure on Access to Work support has increased significantly over the past few years and are predicted to increase further. The number of people who received DWP approval for support or a workplace assessment, or both, rose by 83% from 36,910 in 2021-22 to 67,720 in 2023-24. Expenditure on Access to Work increased over the same period by 72% from £149.9 million to £257.8 million in cash terms.
The increased demand for support, along with other factors, has adversely affected DWP’s administration of the scheme. There have been growing backlogs of people waiting for their applications to be processed or their claims to be paid – in February 2025, 62,000 applications were waiting to be processed. DWP has said it is dedicating more resource to handling the increase in demand and the government has been consulting on potential reforms to the scheme.
Scope
We will investigate how DWP is addressing challenges in the operation of the Access to Work scheme. We will examine:
- the purpose of the scheme;
- challenges with the scheme; and
- what DWP is doing in response to the challenges with the scheme
NAO team
Director: Laura Brackwell
Senior Audit Manager: Mark Parrett