[nomadking]

Reconsiderations AND the 1 month limit were around LONG BEFORE 2013.

It is DECLARED that on the proper construction of section 12 of the
Social Security Act 1998 and the Social Security and Child Support
(Decisions and Appeals) Regulations 1999 (the 1999 Regulations)
that a claimant, from whom the Secretary of State receives a
revision application under Regulation 3ZA(2) of the 1999
Regulations, and to whom the Secretary of State responds by
stating that the application is late and does not meet the criteria
for extending time under the 1999 Regulations, has a statutory
right of appeal to the First-tier Tribunal against the decision of
which revision had been sought.

And even before then a MR stage was used.

In the 1990s earlier legislation (since repealed by the 1998 Act) required claimants to seek a review before being able to appeal a decision relating to attendance allowance (AA), disability living allowance (DLA) and the now-abolished disability working allowance (DWA).

Before 2013 you had the option of asking for a reconsideration and if that failed going to appeal or going straight for appeal. As a successful reconsideration(and they did happen) could take place a lot quicker than waiting several months for a Tribunal hearing, asking for a reconsideration followed by appeal(if necessary) was always the better option of the two. Even then there were one month time limits for those steps.

The question here seems to be who takes the very final decision for a late application, the DWP or a tribunal. Either way the DWP gets first say and might allow a late reconsideration or appeal.

So if you wait 10 months, you still have the wait for the initial DWP decision and then the wait for the tribunal hearing. All that time with no money coming in, whatever way you look at it.

(5 months late in CJ’s case and 10 months late in SG’s case).

So, by the time of the substantive Upper Tribunal hearing, both claimants had been awarded ESA – in both cases the Secretary of State had agreed to reconsider the MR request,

At the case management hearing on 27 January 2017, the Secretary of State, through counsel, acknowledged that the underlying issues in the appeal and the judicial review were important and of wide application and asserted that the Secretary of State was keen to have them resolved.

The Government supported the idea that there should be a ruling one way or another.