Current status: Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 31 March 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of the impact of any delays in receiving disability benefits on children and young people with cancer, and their families, particularly in respect of (a) financial pressures and (b) emotional wellbeing.
We fully acknowledge that a cancer diagnosis will be a difficult time. That is why Social Security Scotland continues to prioritise decision-making, with the last nine months of official statistics for Child Disability Payment showing Social Security Scotland has made decisions on new applications almost twice as fast as in the previous financial year.
To date Child Disability Payment has paid out over £1 billion to families with disabled children. 74% of people surveyed in the Social Security Scotland Client Survey: 2023-24 gave a high rating for how much their payment(s) had helped make a difference to their life and helped them pay for what they needed.
There is a dedicated application route for terminally ill children and young people, with previously published data showing that applications are processed in an average of three working days.