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Claimant has passed away before Tribunal Hearing
Hi All
I wondered if anyone else has had experience of this?
I was supporting a gentleman on UC found fit to work. He suffered with epilepsy and since being found fit to work his condition has worsened. Monday morning we were given the sad news he had passed away at the weekend. Myself and colleagues all believed the stress of being found fit to work contributed to his death.
Can we carry on with the tribunal regardless? The claimant had no savings and now his family are struggling to fund his funeral and pay bills etc.
Advice greatly appreciated
Under regulation 56 of the UC, etc (Claims and Payments) Regulations, Secretary of State may appoint such person as he thinks fit to proceed “with the claim and any related issue of revision, supersession or appeal under the Social Security Act 1998”.
We have a similar situation with PIP where we have asked the DWP to appoint our client’s ex-wife to proceed with his appeal
I do believe that the appeal can continue, certainly when I did employment tribunal cases it was established that is the case, You can speak to the tribunal service and get a direction on it anyway. The appeal regulations regs probably have a section about these sort of cases.. I think it will be a next friend situation to continue the case.
Reg 56 UC etc (Claims and Payments) Regs 2013 deal with this (reg 30 under the 1987 Claims and Payments Regs for other benefits). See our handbook p1314. So DWP should appoint someone to act on claimant’s behalf. Think Judge could maybe also appoint someone under rule 9 of the FTT Rules.
The usual practice in social security law (and in legal proceedings generally) is that the appeal is abated. Only “live” persons can bring and continue proceedings. In legal terms abatement can either mean extinguishment or suspension. Regulations, in practice, lend to suspension rather than extinguishment and, to be fair to tribunals and the DWP, this is the course usually pursued and the DWP has usually been perfectly willing to find someone to continue the proceedings.
I used to do employemnet tribunals and theycould continue with a fmily member representingthe claimant
If the appeal was lodged when the person was alive then it usually abates… unless you quickly announce to HMCTS and DWP an intent to seek an appointeeship after death. Over longer than I care to remember, DWP staff have repeatedly shown that they don’t understand this concept so you will need to refer to the actual regulation and quote it verbatim. The process tends to be slightly longer and more tedious than routine appointeeship applications and can often be interrupted or ended by the know it all DWP staffer deciding that it must be a mistake and that they are unique in spotting that the person has died! You may, so to speak, have to resurrect them (or at the least the application).
If the appeal was lodged when the person was alive then it usually abates… unless you quickly announce to HMCTS and DWP an intent to seek an appointeeship after death. Over longer than I care to remember, DWP staff have repeatedly shown that they don’t understand this concept so you will need to refer to the actual regulation and quote it verbatim. The process tends to be slightly longer and more tedious than routine appointeeship applications and can often be interrupted or ended by the know it all DWP staffer deciding that it must be a mistake and that they are unique in spotting that the person has died! You may, so to speak, have to resurrect them (or at the least the application).
I have just been through this process for a Pension Credit case. Pensions Service were an absolute nightmare to deal with - no one at the contact centre had a clue what I was talking about, finding out which section actually deals with applications for a person to be appointed to continue with the appeal, confirming they had receive the application, dealt with it and informed HMCTS (hours of T calls!!). PS seemed to think its a novel idea to inform the rep and the person requested to continue with the appeal that they had been appointed!
Can’t say whether you may have the same issues with UC but you might want to assume it will be diffcult administratively in practice!