3. Mrs G complains about DWP’s safeguarding for her daughter, Miss L.
4. Mrs G says DWP did not identify or act on the suicidal thoughts her daughter recorded in her Personal Independence Payment (PIP) application in July 2023.
5. Mrs G says this meant DWP missed an opportunity to prevent her daughter taking her own life.
6. As an outcome to her complaint Mrs G would like service improvements so DWP can better identify and intervene when claimants are at risk of suicide.
7. Miss L applied for PIP. As part of her application, she sent DWP a form explaining how her health condition affected her daily life. In this form, Miss L explained she regularly experienced thoughts about taking her own life. Miss L sadly took her own life before DWP awarded her PIP.
10. Before we decide if we should conduct a detailed investigation of a complaint, we look at whether there are signs the issue complained about had a negative effect which the organisation has not put right. Having done so, we have found DWP has already done enough to minimise the risk of the same thing happening again.
11. Our Principles set out that part of a remedy might mean the organisation changes its policies, procedures and systems to avoid the same thing happening again. It is important that lessons are learned and changes put in place.
12. ICE investigated Mrs G’s complaint. Its report explained DWP began a pilot programme in February 2024 that used AI to scan some of the correspondence it receives. This identifies key words and phrases which can indicate the likelihood of self-harm and suicide.
13. DWP was not scanning PIP claim forms like the one Miss L sent at the time ICE wrote its report. However, DWP did plan to look at the possibility of this when it finished the pilot.
14. We have spoken to DWP to understand the progress of this pilot.
15. DWP told us it receives approximately 8,000,000 pieces of mail correspondence each year. These pieces of mail are sometimes from customers who need urgent help and support. Its AI tool will scan each piece of mail to identify key words related to two categories. These are suicide and harm.
16. When the tool identifies certain words in a piece of mail it will flag the document for a DWP member of staff to review. If the member of staff believes a customer might be at risk, they will ask a vulnerable customer champion (VCC) to intervene. A VCC is a member of DWP staff who can provide emergency help, like arranging a welfare check.
17. DWP has told us the pilot programme is now its ‘business as usual’ approach to handling mail correspondence. It also confirmed the AI tool picks up phrases of concern in PIP forms.
18. We therefore consider DWP has changed its procedures and systems to avoid similar problems in the future. This is in line with our Principles and has achieved the improvements Mrs G wanted to see. As we consider there are no additional improvements we can recommend, we have decided not to investigate further.
19. We appreciate the current system was not in place at the time Miss L took her own life, and we recognise the anguish this must bring. We hope the above information reassures Mrs G about changes DWP has made since her daughter’s heart-breaking death.
1. We have carefully considered Mrs G’s complaint about the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). We believe DWP’s actions to stop the same problem happening again have put things right. We have decided not to investigate further as there is nothing more we can recommend.
2. We understand the devastating event Mrs G has experienced. We recognise the motivation this gave her to improve public services and stop the same problem happening again.