Welfare crackdown begins with drive to reduce incapacity benefit claims - a worrying anomaly for those who also claim DLA
"Welfare crackdown begins with drive to reduce incapacity benefit claims" from the Guardian starts to add detail into how much benefits are going to be cut back and a concerted effort on reducing those who end up in the Support Group of Employment and Support Allowance (ESA).
I have long worried about the impact of the migration of those that, under the old rules, automatically received Incapacity Benefit because they were also getting the Higher Rate Care Allowance of Disability Living Allowance and were exempt from the then Personal Capability Assessment (PCA).
The introduction of ESA removed this exemption. So all claimants will now be assessed using the Work Capability Assessment (WCA). Many disabled organisations have raised concerned with this test and the DWP did review it in March 2010 but we await, from the new government, what or how the may do as a result.
The worry is simple. Those on any DLA will have supplied medical evidence to the DWP to support there claim. The assessment for ESA will entail another medical assessment in most cases and the Work Capability Assessment. If someone is not moved into the Support Group of ESA but to Job Seekers Allowance (JSA). How will this impact there existing DLA especially if they receive the higher rates? There is the potential that within the DWP the evidence and decision from an ESA assessment could raise "questions" over the already supplied medical evidence they have for a DLA claim. My concern is this will be used to in turn trigger a review of DLA again.
The point is made that you can receive DLA and work. Yes I accept that. But if you are working you will not be claiming ESA and face further medical assessment.
The main worry is a period for claimants of assessment and re-assessment, any challenges they may make and the impact of all of this on health and finances. We know the Decision Makers don't always make the right decision.
I had the oppourtunity a few weeks ago to meet Anne Begg MP the new Chair of the Work and Pensions Select Committee. Under her disclosure of interests she lists that she is in receipt of DLA. I raised this very question and she in turn raised it at an APPG Disability meeting a week later.
We await the further detail on Incapacity Benefit from the DWP this week and of course the new Welfare Reform Bill and Spending Review details. We already know they want to cut £11 billion, if not more from welfare - £1 billion from DLA over the parliament.
YOU really need to lobby individually on this to your MP and Government. I would appreciate a copy of any correspondence so we can submit it as evidence also.
You don't have the luxury anymore of relying on someone else. We need a "strong community voice" now - we simply need the numbers of people to make a stand.
HIV organisations will do there best but can only achieve so much. We can lobby government. If we write to individual MP's we are told that we are not a constituent and they cannot help, some do but this is small. That is why your activity locally is so powerful.
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Concerns that disabled people will be failed by the government's welfare-to-work plans have been heightened after a key policy statement failed to clarify the future of a specialist employment support scheme for the group.
Employment minister Chris Grayling announced today the government would be going ahead with Conservative proposals to merge existing back-to-work schemes into a single overarching work programme.
But the statement made no mention of Work Choice, a back-to-work programme for disabled people devised by Labour and due to start in October, prompting concerns that disabled people may not receive the specialist support they need when looking for work.
Liz Sayce, chief executive of the disability network Radar, said: "There's a need to reassure disabled people that there will be specialist support available. If you have autism, for example, you want somebody who understands your needs with autism.
"We hope that the overarching employment programme will work well for people but there's a need for specialist support. The sooner government can clarify how this will work the better because there will be real anxiety."
It had been expected that the government would retain Work Choice as a separate programme.
However, a Department for Work and Pensions spokesperson said no decision had been taken on its future and did not specify a timescale for one.
This is likely to cause problems for organisations that had been selected as preferred providers for Work Choice. Shaw Trust has already said it needed a decision by the end of June if it could start delivering services on Labour's proposed start date of 25 October.
Grayling also announced an independent review of the controversial work capability assessment, which will report by the end of the year and will be chaired by occupational health expert Professor Malcolm Harrington.
The WCA was introduced to assess people for employment and support allowance (ESA), which replaced incapacity benefit for new claimants in October 2008. Disability campaigners and jobcentre staff have warned that the WCA has wrongly assessed many people as fit to work, leaving them on jobseeker's allowance, which is worth £25 a week less than ESA and involves less support.
However, Grayling said the government would start reassessing existing claimants of incapacity benefit in the autumn, before Harrington's review reports and any resulting changes are made to the WCA.
Grayling added that, in the meantime, he would extend WCA exemptions to people waiting for or between courses of chemotherapy and to those with severe disabilities due to mental health conditions.
Related stories
Coalition expected to keep disabled back-to-work programme
Incapacity benefit claimants to face flawed work assessment
Job centre staff: Disabled people wrongly deemed fit for work
http://www.communitycare.co.uk/Articles/2010/06/29/114813/welfare-to-wor...
Disabled employment support clients could be badly hit by the uncertainty over the future of a specialist welfare-to-work programme for the group, Shaw Trust has warned.
The trust was reacting to the government's failure to confirm the future of Work Choice in a key statement on its welfare-to-work policy yesterday.
Work Choice, which combines a number of existing programmes, was conceived by the Labour government and was due to start in October, with Shaw Trust, among others, selected as preferred providers for the programme.
However, the coalition government has failed to confirm whether Work Choice will continue or be merged into the Work Programme, its single, overarching welfare-to-work scheme due to start next year.
Shaw Trust has already invested £500,000 in preparing for Work Choice, and its chief executive, Sally Burton, said she was "disappointed" by the ongoing uncertainty. She said this could adversely affect existing clients of programmes such as Workstep, which is due to be merged into Work Choice.
Burton added: "This is now time critical and there are two key issues with the delay. The first is the sheer scale of implementing a new programme and the second is safeguarding the interests of our existing clients.
“If Work Choice is confirmed within the next two weeks, we can meet the October deadline. If not, we need to undertake some scenario planning."
She said that the trust met with disability minister Maria Miller last week to discuss the issue.
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Coalition expected to keep disabled back-to-work programme
http://www.communitycare.co.uk/Articles/2010/07/01/114816/shaw-trust-wel...
The Rt Hon Iain Duncan Smith
Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
Reforming Welfare
Wednesday 30 June 2010
[Check against delivery]
Introduction
Good morning, and thank you to Andrew and the team for organising this morning’s event.
The Emergency Budget gave credibility back to the British economy:
- driving down our record deficit
- cutting the second highest level of debt in Europe – projected to be £149 billion this year – over the course of this Parliament with a clear, 5-year plan
- securing a forecast for steadily falling unemployment
- and producing a plan for sustainable, economic growth.
But the Budget was not just about being financially responsible or top-slicing.
It also laid the groundwork for radical reform.
Phase One of our agenda for change sits across two critical areas:
- Housing Benefit reform
- and the new Work Programme, which includes our plan to get the people who can work off long-term incapacity benefits.
Phase One
The cost of Housing Benefit and Incapacity Benefit has spiralled out of control in recent years and put a great burden on the taxpayer.
But the true cost has been paid by some of the poorest receiving these benefits as they have become trapped in dependency.
Housing Benefit
Taking Housing Benefit first, no-one can really doubt these reforms are long overdue.
In real terms, the cost of working age HB has jumped by £5 billion in 5 years and is projected to reach £21 billion in 2014/15.
This is clearly unsustainable.
But cost is not the only problem.
The scale of these payments has meant that Housing Benefit has become a disincentive to move into work for those receiving it.
In fact, politicians of all parties have recognised the need for major reform. Yet for too long, nothing has been done.
75,000 people get more than £10,000 a year in HB and some get over £100,000 a year – payments that no-one on a low income could ever afford and it has distorted the social rented sector. So:
- we have capped Local Housing Allowance levels to the rate for four-bedroom properties
- we have introduced size restrictions to the social rented sector to make better use of existing housing stock
- and we have changed the percentile of market rents for Local Housing Allowance rates to 30% to help keep rising rents under control.
The reset the balance of incentives to move into work, these changes are vital.
Work Programme
The other key element in Phase One is the Work Programme and the transition to get people off Incapacity Benefit.
The Work Programme was launched yesterday when Chris Grayling opened the competition for the new commercial framework.
For the first time, the Programme offers providers real freedom to truly tailor support for Jobseekers.
No more centralised, one-size-fits-all schemes, but real support to help people back on the path to sustainable work.
To ensure that we are being fair to the taxpayer, the Work Programme will be run on a payment-by-results basis when it rolls out in the first half of next year.
We have to make sure people stay in work over the long term and make sure they get into the work habit.
We will also demand that Jobseekers take personal responsibility for accepting work when it is there, so there is conditionality and sanctions on the benefits side as well.
This is a complete reappraisal of how we help people back into work and involves a major change in the way providers deliver support.
And I want to see the voluntary sector and other groups get involved too.
Incapacity Benefit / Employment and Support Allowance Migration
We are also committed to tackling the huge numbers of people languishing on Incapacity Benefits.
We currently have some two and a half million people claiming inactive benefits – a figure which has remained stubbornly high, costing the taxpayer £7.2 billion.
Despite many of these people wanting to work, people can spend years on Incapacity Benefit without ever being required to have an assessment.
In fact, 30% of those on the old style benefit never had a medical assessment.
Our society should be capable of tailoring support to get people into work.
When John Hutton was Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, he pointed out that if you have been on Incapacity Benefit for more than 2 years, you are more likely to retire or die on it than ever move back into work.
This is why we are starting the process of migrating 1.5 million of those on Incapacity Benefit on to Employment Support Allowance and simultaneously providing intensive, personalised support to help them make that transition back into work.
Phase Two
In next phase of reform will take this forward:
- reforming the benefit system to make work pay
- simplifying the system to make it more efficient and understandable
- enhancing mobility
- and reforming pensions.
Make Work Pay
Benefit reform will play a major part here.
I have been working with David Freud and experts and officials across Government to look at how we can deliver a benefits model that ensures it pays consistently to take work.
In that context, we have asked Frank Field to look at the issue of poverty, beyond the narrow definitions, for example asset poverty.
At present, the poorest in our society see little reason to take the risk of finding a job and losing their benefits.
Seen in the light of the calculation made on the basis of risk and reward, the decision looks rational.
All the figures show that work provides the most sustainable route out of poverty.
However, the complexity and perverse nature of the system have acted as disincentives.
Multiple withdrawal rates have resulted in a regressive tax and benefit system for the poorest.
For someone to seek work for the first time in an area of high economic dependency, there is a cultural issue to overcome, as well as a financial issue.
We are asking them to make a positive decision about their life, but that is more difficult if they have no examples of people in work around them.
It can be a big decision and we have to make sure the risk outweighs the reward.
For as they see it, if they take a few hours work, for every £10 they earn they might lose £7, £8 or even £9 of their benefits.
Moreover, the complexity of the system means too often they have no idea how much they will lose or when it might be clawed back.
The benefit system has to be far simpler and establish a very clear link between work and reward.
A simpler system will also help to reduce administration costs, as well as reducing the opportunities for fraud and error, which today cost the taxpayer billions every year.
This process of reform to enhance the dynamic benefit of making work pay and simplifying the system is at the heart of our reform agenda.
I hope to bring forward more detail on this soon.
Mobility
Beyond this, even as we make work pay and simplify the system, we face another problem.
Britain has one of the highest rates of workless households in Europe.
Worse, we have the highest number of children living in workless households in Europe.
But this is not about a North/South divide.
In my view, that is lazy rhetoric. The problem is more complex.
You can find workless blackspots across the country.
In fact, the gap between wealth and worklessness doesn’t have to be far at all.
For example, jobs growth and employment recovery in cities such as Manchester and Leeds has not benefited the deprived communities within them.
This is in part because the system works against labour market flexibility.
Not just transport costs, but because anyone in council housing who wants to move into an area with work runs the risk of losing their right to accommodation.
Again, it is that balance between risk and reward where we seem to penalise the poorest, yet expect them to take some of the greatest life-changing decisions.
So we will be exploring how we can take the risk out of mobility across wider areas with the Department for Transport and Communities and Local Government.
For too long, we have ignored the plight of those trapped in areas where inter-generational unemployment has become the norm.
Without the capacity to seek work, aspiration and hope become the preserve of the middle classes.
Pensions
We are applying the same principled approach to pensions too.
Steve Webb will be talking more about this later this morning, but the main point to note here is that we are taking responsibility for facing up to the long-term challenges posed by the fact that we are living longer as a society.
That is why, for example, we have already made a start by announcing the end of the Default Retirement Age.
No longer should we have employees who wish to delay their retirement forced out by this sort of mechanism.
However, long-term reform involves providing a solid Basic State Pension that people can start to build on, while creating the right conditions to reinvigorate private savings.
We have made a good start by restoring the earnings link with the triple guarantee for the Basic State Pension.
But we have further to go, which is why we are taking forward the review on auto-enrolment.
I want to reverse the decline in saving levels and ask people to think carefully about how much they will need to fund the type of retirement they want.
We have already said we are committed to raising the state pension age to 66.
At the same time, we have to help people understand why this is the case and the benefits of to them of working longer.
Our figures show that working a single year beyond the current State Pension age and deferring your pension can increase retirement salary by up to 10%.
Just as importantly, working longer is also good for the economy.
If we can extend the effective working life of the country by just one year, it is forecast to increase GDP by 1% – that is around £13 billion.
66 is the starting point for this debate.
At present, there are plans in place to raise the State Pension age to 68 by 2046.
But if we want to be fair to next generation of taxpayers – and be realistic about increasing longevity – then we also need a serious debate about how far and how fast we move forward.
Conclusion
This agenda is, I believe, a bold agenda. But we have no choice.
With the welfare budget ballooning over the last few years, we need to shift the culture which underpins demand.
There is nothing good about a society that accepts people growing up without work, aspiration or hope.
The prize is a society more in balance where work is well distributed and where children grow up seeing work as a normal activity and responsibility is ingrained in them.
A society where people save for their retirement and where we can afford a more secure future for pensions.
My agenda is to make that happen.
Thank you
http://www.dwp.gov.uk/newsroom/ministers-speeches/2010/30-06-10.shtml
Employment Minister Chris Grayling today announced a series of reforms to deliver a 21st century welfare system.
The new Work Programme will replace the current back to work schemes and provide a coherent package of support for people out of work, regardless of the barriers they face or the benefits they claim. The Government is inviting expressions of interest from the private, public and voluntary sectors to help deliver this.
The Government is committed to providing unconditional support for very sick and disabled people. But there are people claiming incapacity benefits who, with help, would be able to work.
From October, starting in Burnley and Aberdeen, Jobcentre Plus will ask people who are receiving incapacity benefits to attend a Work Capability Assessment. The rest of the country will follow over the next three years.
To ensure fewer very sick people will be asked to attend an assessment, new measures will be introduced to:
- treat people waiting for or between courses of chemotherapy in the same way as those already receiving it
- extend the criteria for people with severe disability due to mental health conditions.
The Government is also establishing an independent review, to be led by Professor Malcolm Harrington, to ensure people are treated fairly and assessments are transparent. The report will be completed by the end of 2010.
Welfare Reform And People With Autism
My brother, who lives alone, has a severe mental illness, and yet he is retested every year or couple of years for his claim. It puts enormous stress on him as each time it means the threat of losing his home (through losing housing benefit) and the threat of ending up on the street, penniless. He is vulnerable and at the mercy of the system. We've fought tooth and nail with the BA to stop throwing these stupid tests at him, but to no avail. The tests are farcical and do not test for autistic/asperger type mental illnessness. Asking a patient if he can sit in a chair or raise his arm, or read for a paragraph etc., is not an adequate test for mental illness, so I wish the Government would stop pretending it is. What worries me now is that if the Coalition decide to remove the excemption for mental illness, my brother is doomed. He does not live in great comfort by any means, the pittance from welfare barely keeping him fed, but he is alive and well and with his illness that's all we can ask, but I worry what will happy once the changes to welfare take place. He will end up just another mentally ill person wandering the streets if the exemption is removed. It doesn't bear thinking about.
Thank you for your comments here. Mental Health has long been, in all its forms, very poorly handled by the State, the NHS to a certain extent and the DWP.
The is due to so much, if not all the weight of a claim subject to the physical medical supporting evidence submitted.
I have an interest in Mental Health as it affects HIV+ people but your point is relevant to us also. So I am grateful for a perspective I would otherwise not have.
Health allowing I will be attending the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Mental Health next Tuesday.
All Party Meetings are a discussion and/or forum for MP's and members of the Lords. Sometimes when the business is done, those of us in the audience get to raise points and questions if time allows. If it is the case next Tuesday I will try and raise the point you make.
Lets be very clear and this is for all disabilities. The application and assessment process is generic that is, the onus, is on the claimant to do the work to ensure the specifics of there illness are fully presented. For many this may mean providing more information on supplementary submissions as the forms don't readily facilitate the detail that is key.
Click here for the full announcement and access to report on ESA.