People with Disabilities: Access to Services

Baroness Donaghy Excerpts

Thursday 16th May 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Donaghy (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Browning, whose knowledge of this area is both impressive and moving. I thank my noble friend Lady Hughes of Stretford for initiating this debate and for her introduction.

We are privileged in this House to receive briefings from so many organisations when we put our names down for a debate. The brief from our own Library for this debate is absolutely outstanding. I do not know about anybody else, but I have felt overwhelmed by the sheer volume of briefings from so many charities and organisations that reveal a mixture of inspiration, human misery and struggle for basic rights. I thank all the organisations for their work and hope they understand that it is not possible to cover in this debate all aspects of disability in our society. I shall concentrate on two issues: support for independent living, and the work of the Open University, which I will deal with first.

I was always inspired by Jennie Lee’s work to establish the Open University and was delighted to receive an honorary degree from it 21 years ago. It is the largest provider of higher education for students with a disability, with more than 37,000, and an increasing number citing mental health disabilities. The OU has suffered inadequate funding levels for far too long, yet in 2023, the teaching excellence framework mentioned the OU’s

“significant effort to ensure that the curriculum is accessible to students with a disability”

as an outstanding feature of its provision. It was awarded gold for its overall provision for all students. I know that the Government set great store by these clunky assessments.

The Open University has launched some amazing initiatives, including the disabled veterans’ scholarship fund. Some 312 scholarships have been awarded so far and applications are open for 50 more disabled veterans in the next academic year. The university also supplies digital, accessible information system books, known as DAISY books, in a worldwide-standard digital-reading format that combines audio, text and graphical information in one production, making them accessible to a wide range of people with visual and print disabilities. Around 6,500 students are using DAISY books. To continue this outstanding—“gold”—work, the university needs adequate funding and the students need financial support.

The Office for Students provides grant funding to universities via the disabled student premium and the part-time student premium, which are crucial to the OU. The recent call for evidence by the OfS on public grant funding must strike terror in most universities. Disabled students need appropriate levels of funding to ensure access and participation. Without the disabled students’ allowance—DSA—many students would not be able to study. However, the timing of the award is unhelpful. Adjustments, such as assisted technology and non-medical help, cannot be put in place until a student is already studying. The lead time for receiving this help can be several months, which disadvantages those disabled students. Will the Minister say what steps are being taken to improve its implementation?

In preparation for this debate, I took another look at the Government’s announcement of the review of the personal independence payment—PIP—on 29 April this year. It starts with the Government saying that their priority is to

“make sure our welfare system is fair and compassionate”.

That is all well and good. Then we come to the verbal gymnastics. In referring to the decade since the PIP was introduced, the Government state that

“the appearance of disability and ill health in Britain has changed profoundly, and the clinical case mix has evolved in line with broader societal changes”.

They then rush their fences with,

“including many more people applying for disability benefits with mental health and neurodivergent conditions”.

It is clear that the review is all about cost. The number of those receiving the highest rates of PIP has increased from 25% to 36%. The Government call for a “new conversation” about the benefit system as almost a quarter of the adult population is now reporting a disability. It is hoped that that conversation, as my noble friend said in her introduction, will include the pressure on our health service, longer waiting lists and the complete failure to deal with social care. The Disability Benefits Consortium reacted strongly to the Government’s announcement, calling it

“a cynical, political point-scoring exercise – which cruelly and unjustly targets disabled people”.

The Office for National Statistics has said that the pay gap between disabled and non-disabled employees has widened to 13.8% in 2021. The largest gap is 33.5% for those with autism. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation, in its report UK Poverty 2022, talks of

“a gap of around 12 percentage points in poverty rates between disabled and non-disabled people”—

you get paid less and your cost of living is higher. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation also states that, once again,

“the community will be punishing disability as if it were an indulgence – which will rather call into question whether it is a community at all”.

Arrears on bills are four times as likely between the disabled and non-disabled poor; 19% go hungry and 18% are unable to keep their homes warm.

The Government’s approach to work and benefits has been criticised by the Disability Rights UK and by Scope, which said:

“It’s hard to have any faith that this consultation is about anything other than cutting the benefits bill, no matter the impact on people’s lives”.


The British Medical Association’s mental health lead said that the Government should not

“blame individuals and strip away the support they need. This approach is as cruel as it is ineffective”.

What message will the Minister give to those who live in fear and uncertainty facing increasing living costs?

Mesothelioma Lump Sum Payments (Conditions and Amounts) (Amendment) Regulations 2024

Baroness Donaghy Excerpts

Monday 19th February 2024 Grand Committee

[Baroness Blower (Lab)]

My Lords, as general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, I was aware of a number of members who died from school-acquired mesothelioma. I declare an interest: having worked in an asbestos-contaminated school myself, I have that registered on my medical record, although I am in good health at the moment.

These lump-sum payments are meant to provide some compensation for asbestos victims who cannot get civil compensation from a former employer, but there is an inconsistency in the schemes. If a surviving partner or dependant must claim after their loved one has died, they receive a substantially lower payment. In 2019-20, a 77 year-old with mesothelioma would have received £14,334 if they claimed themselves, but if they died before claiming, which can of course happen with a cancer that is both aggressive and difficult to diagnose, their surviving partner or dependent child would have received £7,949. Mesothelioma patients typically have months left to live at the time of their diagnosis.

Many surviving partners, often women on modest wages or pensions, suffer financial hardship after the loss of their loved one. Their household income falls, but many of their outgoings remain the same. In that situation, they are further disadvantaged if they can receive only the much lower posthumous payment, so there is a clear moral case for raising that payment. Of the 3,830 payments made in 2018, only 260 were posthumous claims, according to the figures I have from the TUC. It estimates that it would cost £1.5 million to equalise payments. In its view, and indeed mine, raising the level of posthumous payments is therefore affordable.

In 2010, the Government acknowledged that there was no justification for the differential payments, stating that the inequality in payments could put pressure on victims’ families when they are most vulnerable. Does the Minister agree that it is now time to change this and equalise the payments?

[Baroness Donaghy (Lab)]

My Lords, it is ironic that the all-party group on asbestosis is meeting as we speak. The noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, and I had to leave that meeting early to be here. That group is doing good work. I also pay tribute to the staff at the DWP for all the work they do in this area. They do not always get the thanks that they deserve.

My interest in this is not related to what I am going to say. I chair the oversight committee of the mesothelioma compensation fund on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions. That committee consists of all the interests involved: victims, unions, employers and insurance companies. I have been doing this since the creation of the Act.

I simply want to support what my noble friend Lady Blower just said. This inconsistency has existed for 14 years now, and the Government themselves have always acknowledged it: if a claim is not made before the person is deceased, the family ends up with a pitiful amount of money. This is really a plea to underpin what my noble friend said, as something ought to be done to rectify this terrible anomaly.

Cost of Living Support

Baroness Donaghy Excerpts

Thursday 22nd June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)]

We keep it under review, but we are not looking at that at the moment. I understand the point that the noble Baroness makes about the LHA, but she will know that we have the discretionary housing payments, which are currently being delivered through local authorities to the most vulnerable. I reassure the noble Baroness that we keep a close eye on that to be sure, and to get the feedback, that these payments are being given and are helping those at the vulnerable end of society. Echoing the noble Baroness’s point, I am very aware that rents are very high—far too high—in the private rented sector, and seeing what more can be done is certainly very high among the Government’s priorities.

[Baroness Donaghy (Lab)]

As my noble friend Lord Liddle said, some of us are sympathetic to the noble Viscount’s predicament. It cannot be easy when the Bank of England has just announced a 0.5% increase in Bank interest rates. He said seven times—I counted—“We are not complacent”, and I know that he is sincere; he is much respected by this House. It would have helped if the Statement from the Government had not been quite so complacent. The reference to “global factors” does not seem to take any account of government responsibility over the last 12 or 13 years. Do the Government take any responsibility whatever for trashing the economy? Did Prime Minister Truss actually exist? If she did not, does that mean that she will not be able to put forward any peerages to this House? It would be interesting to know what precise responsibility the Government take for the current predicament: that our inflation rate is higher than in any other country in the G7, as the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, said.

The Minister himself said that 3.1% of GDP is not that high for helping our most vulnerable. Why will the Government not consider uprating some of these benefits to assist them? Even the 10.1% rate for pensioners scales into insignificance when the rate of inflation is 8.7%. It is probably still going up—the Minister said that it was going down, but that is slightly misleading, if he does not mind me saying so. Inflation is going not down but up. I think he is referring to the rate of increase slowing down, which is a very different matter. In view of the urgent situation, will the Government not think of more emergency uprating for some of these benefits?

[Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)]

There are a number of points from the noble Baroness, who I respect very much, but I will not be drawn into some of the political points that she started off by making. What I will say—and this was in the Statement—is that a lot of what we are facing is to do with the post-pandemic issues that have arisen. As the House will know full well, the war in Ukraine has certainly been quite a factor in that.

I remind the noble Baroness—I think she said it herself—that the uprating of 10.1% we have made to a number of benefits was, we felt, generous. Others would say that we should have done more, but we felt that it was generous at the time. To go back to the beginning of her remarks about the Statement itself, whatever she made of the Statement, as I have said before, we are continuously looking at what more we can do to help those people at this particular time.

Universal Credit

Baroness Donaghy Excerpts

Thursday 9th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Donaghy (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler of Enfield, for initiating this debate. She was so comprehensive that I do not think I will use all my time, so as not to repeat her.

I want to make a couple of points, if I may, in reply to the noble Baroness, Lady Eaton. Somebody who was born on the day the old benefits disappeared and UC arrived has probably celebrated their 10th birthday by now, so I wonder how long that argument will be played out in this Chamber. I congratulate the noble Baroness on her stalwart defence but, really, it is getting a bit thin and memories of how bad the old system was are fading. I am the first to accept that it was a bad system; I just do not think that this is a particularly good one. I agree with the noble Baroness that it came into its own during the pandemic, however.

I slightly resent—this is not against the noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, or anybody individually—the fact that, if the benefits were adequate, we would not be having this discussion about a £20 uplift. If the benefits were decent, people would not be struggling. We are not talking about people falling into poverty here; we are talking about people falling deeper into poverty so that they cannot even afford the basics.

I want to say a little about the impact on actors, writers and other creative workers, who are often ignored in these debates. Some 65% of Equity members rely on universal credit and other welfare to stay in the industry. Removing the £20 uplift would mean 53% of them experiencing financial hardship, with 41% unable to meet housing and other essential costs. These figures were taken from a recent impact survey; I thank Equity for its excellent briefing. It joined 100 other organisations across the UK that wrote to urge the Government to abandon their plans. Only 9% of its actors and creative workers had received a grant or other funding from Arts Councils, and more than 40%

“have not received help from the Self Employed Income Support Scheme”.

Of equal concern is the reintroduction of the minimum income floor. These moves will risk an exodus of talent from our world-leading creative industry, already clobbered by the Brexit legacy. Obviously, there will be time in future to discuss the minimum income floor and Brexit, but families will receive significantly less help from the social security system now than they would have a decade ago. The loss of the £20 uplift will take the main rate of out-of-work support down to its lowest level in real terms since 1990.

I am aware that the chairs of the relevant House of Commons Select Committees have written to the Government to ask for the uplift to be made permanent. As the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, has already said, six former Conservative Work and Pensions Secretaries have urged the Chancellor to make the uplift permanent. If they cannot change the Government’s mind, I begin to despair. Why will they not publish the impact assessment mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler? If—

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

I hate to interrupt a good speech but the noble Baroness is almost a minute over the suggested speaking time.

Universal Credit: People with Mental Health Problems

Baroness Donaghy Excerpts

Wednesday 8th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Donaghy (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Davies of Brixton for initiating this important debate. I can think of few worse fates than being mentally ill and having to rely on universal credit. Even with the best advice and practical help, there is a 7% chance of a delayed payment and increased stress and anxiety—and, of course, the amounts are totally inadequate.

Let me say first that this is not a straightforward issue. Third-party help can be a vital lifeline, provided it is of the right kind. We have all heard how vulnerable people are targeted by drug gangs so that their addresses and resources can be used to further their trade, so it is quite right that any third-party status should be checked on a continuing basis.

However, additional checks should not become additional barriers. It is incumbent on the Government to remove those barriers. Do the Government know what percentage of claimants with mental health issues have lost entitlement or faced deduction or been sanctioned as a result of failing to complete satisfactorily a UC claim? What response do the Government give to the Information Commissioner’s Office about improving routes to set up third-party access? How does the department identify those who are mentally ill? Cases must be on the increase with the pandemic, but not everyone is willing to speak about their problem or even acknowledge it. Without appropriate third-party support, how do the Government decide who is vulnerable? They have indicated that the department gives mental health training to staff. Do we know the extent of this training? Has any study been carried out on the effectiveness of this training, and what outcomes have been identified for claimants?

It is good that the Government allocated funds to Citizens Advice and Citizens Advice Scotland, but it was never going to be enough if it did not include a continuing role after the initial claim. Would the Government consider how best to tackle this by asking the CABs for their requirements?

In preparing for this debate, I looked at the Social Security Advisory Committee’s independent report How DWP Involves Disabled People When Developing or Evaluating Programmes That Affect Them—occasional paper 25. It concentrates on physical disability and there is no specific mention of mental health, but I feel sure there are some common themes: the need for relevant groups to be involved, to feel they are being listened to, to improve transparency about future thinking and improving trust. In other words, no decision about us without us. Does the DWP have specific networks with mental health organisations, that are about improving access and transparency? Are they as well developed as the networks for physical disability, given that mental health has always been a Cinderella service and lacks resources? Mental health is sometimes linked with drug addiction and homelessness. Does the DWP have specific policies to identify these links and consult the relevant organisations about how to facilitate claims? Are the Armed Forces veterans’ organisations consulted? So many homeless people seem to have served in the forces and also to have mental health problems.

Finally, on a slightly lighter note, I pay tribute to Martin Lewis’s work in this area. If the Minister is in a position to hand out sainthoods, I think he would be a good candidate.

Covid-19: Work-related Cases

Baroness Donaghy Excerpts

Monday 5th July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

The HSE has been really busy and proactive during the pandemic in three key areas: regulating, by targeting businesses and organisations, to prevent workplace transmission; working with other government departments, developing, assisting and promulgating policy guidance and research; and providing other workplace regulatory functions, including market surveillance to ensure a safe supply chain.

[Baroness Donaghy (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, Covid-19 infections in food factories could be more than 30 times underreported. The HSE said that the figure lacked credibility. In transport, there were 608 Covid deaths among workers and only 10 notifications during a similar period, a rate of just 1%. These are shocking figures. Second only to Romania, we have had the highest level of cuts to inspectors since 2010, and many of these industries have extremely poor sickness absence pay. This lets employers off the hook and the Government are complicit in this appalling level of underreporting. What further action will the Government take to deal with this?

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

I will need to look to my noble friend Lady Vere, sitting to my left, to get some information about transport and Covid reporting there; she will like me for that. Given the number of Covid clusters among food and drink manufacturing workers towards the end of 2020, the HSE organised a series of proactive high-risk sector inspections to be carried out. Inspectors carried out 531 site visits and 58 remote inspections, 62 of which resulted in written correspondence. Inspection topics included ensuring that, in the organisation of work, changing and welfare areas allowed for social distancing proportionate to the situation.

Kickstart Scheme

Baroness Donaghy Excerpts

Thursday 29th April 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

I understand the noble Lord’s question exactly. I am advised at the moment that there are no plans to extend the scheme, but we never know what might happen in the future. I pay tribute and thanks to the noble Lord in his capacity as chairman of the CBI, which has been an outstanding supporter and helper in the establishment of Kickstart.

[Baroness Donaghy (Lab) [V]]

Even given the difficulties created by the Covid pandemic, a 6% success rate is an abject failure. The Minister knows more than most the importance of work experience for a young person. Calling on 195,000 approved vacancies does not add up to actual jobs. If the target of 250,000 placements is not reached by December 2021, will the scheme be extended, or will the cash be grabbed by the Chancellor when he announces a new age of austerity?

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

I do understand the concern about the 16,500 placements but, as I tried to explain, during the lockdown employers have shown great commitment to involvement in Kickstart but wanted to do it when the lockdown ended. I say again to the noble Baroness that we are seeing day by day vast increases in the number of vacancies being filled, and we are confident that we are going to create hundreds of thousands of vacancies and place young people in them. On moving money around, I dare not get involved in that; I think I would be going a bit too far if I confirmed anything in that regard.

Universal Credit (Transitional Provisions) (Claimants previously entitled to a severe disability premium) Amendment Regulations 2021

Baroness Donaghy Excerpts

Thursday 11th February 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Donaghy (Lab) [V]]

I support everything that my noble friend Lady Sherlock said in moving her regret Motion.

I have some experience of the grinding juggernaut of universal credit—a High Court reversal here, the occasional telling-off there by the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, on which I served for a couple of years—with the Government’s policy being that nothing will stop this managed migration. I think that it should be stopped. Remember, universal credit was never universal in the first place. It did not cover most disability benefits, it did not fit the needs of the self-employed, and the minimum income floor is a particular burden during the pandemic.

Some of the structural problems are coming home to roost. Even now, the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee had to remind the Government that they should include in their Explanatory Memorandum the fact that, because the gateway closed last month, people moving to UC may face an erosion of their benefits. Independent advice is vital and will not be readily available to those people who receive the severe disability premium.

These allowances are not a luxury; they help to cover the extra costs that disabled people face—particularly during the pandemic, with extra heating costs and increased food costs. Many of us can afford broadband and take it for granted that we can do our grocery shopping online, with a minimum spend of £40. The Disability Benefits Consortium’s report on disabled people on legacy benefits found that

“82% of disabled claimants have had to spend more money than they normally would during the pandemic”—

mainly on food shopping and utility bills. Charities and campaigning groups on poverty issues have called for the extension of the uplift to legacy and related benefits. The disabled, carers and those with a long-term illness are in the poorest 10% of the population. Quite simply, it is not good enough for the Minister in the Commons to say that this will take several months to implement.

The £20-a-week uplift is due to end in April 2021, unless the Chancellor decides to extend it. The poorest households would lose 10% of their budget. Policy in Practice says that stopping the uplift would mean that

“683,000 households, including 824,000 children, would no longer be able to afford to meet their essential needs”.

Citizens Advice has said that this

“would push those just about managing into debt.”

Even more worryingly, BASW—the British Association of Social Workers—suggests that

“low income is a driver of children being investigated as part of child protection concerns.”

Support targeted at the lower half of wealth distribution in the UK or the unemployed is two to three times more effective at increasing spending in the economy than a universal stimulus, as low-income households spend a higher proportion of their budget on essentials. A case study provided by the Zacchaeus 2000 Trust, a small charity, outlined the experience of Lee, who was incorrectly moved on to universal credit despite being in receipt of the severe disability premium on a legacy benefit and the SDP gateway still being in place. She went into serious debt and rent arrears. She was moved back on to legacy benefits and she would not want to go back on to universal credit. The overworked DWP did not always acknowledge her inquiries, or looked only at the most recent correspondence rather than at her whole history.

Seriously unwell and disabled people such as Lee do not need the added stress of UC’s failing system, especially during a pandemic. The Government must look at this again.

Universal Credit

Baroness Donaghy Excerpts

Tuesday 1st December 2020 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Donaghy]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact on families of not maintaining the £1,000 uplift of Universal Credit.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Baroness Stedman-Scott) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government have introduced a raft of temporary measures to support those hardest hit, including the furlough scheme, the Self-employment Income Support Scheme and the £20 UC uplift. With the uplift confirmed until the end of March 2021, my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer set out last week why it is right that we wait for more clarity on the national economic and social picture before he decides on the best way to support low- income families from 1 April. I stress to the House that discussions are very much ongoing with Her Majesty’s Treasury.

[Baroness Donaghy (Lab) [V]]

If those who lost their jobs last April could not be expected to live on £73 a week, will the Minister explain why it is enough for people losing their jobs next April? There is overwhelming support for the £20 uplift for the poorest families in the country. Why are the Government changing the rules in the middle of a pandemic and a recession? How will they address children going hungry?

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

I understand the noble Baroness’s concern over those hardest hit by the pandemic, especially their income, but it is not right to say that we are changing course. All we are confirming at the moment, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer set out last week, is that we wait for more clarity on the national economic and social picture before making the decision on the best way to support low-income families.

Pension Schemes Bill [HL]

Baroness Donaghy Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 26th February 2020 Grand Committee

[Baroness Stedman-Scott]

Requiring the payment of dividends to be reported is not necessarily very helpful to the regulator. It is likely to inhibit legitimate business processes without getting more resources for the scheme. We need to take a proportionate approach. We think that the priority is to ensure that a suitable recovery plan is put in place that takes account of the full range of circumstances of the employer and the scheme.

Trustees and the regulator need to look at a whole range of demands on the employer’s resources. Dividends are just one of these. Others may include maintenance of its business, and investments in its sustainable growth and debt repayments. All of these need to be considered in deciding whether a recovery plan is fair.

The Pensions Regulator scrutinises all valuations and recovery plans submitted, assesses the key risks, and assesses whether further engagement and potential enforcement action is required. Measures in the Bill will help to clarify exactly what is required for an appropriate recovery plan. Along with the regulator’s revised funding code, these measures will make it clear to trustees and employers what is expected, and will support the regulator in taking enforcement action where necessary. Provided that an appropriate recovery plan is in place, how the employer chooses to spend the remainder of its free resources is rightly a matter of business priority.

[Baroness Donaghy (Lab)]

I have listened carefully to the debate and cannot help but think that this is not sufficiently fleet of foot to prevent those such as BHS and Carillion—there is recent past history on this—which were basically giant Ponzi schemes towards the end, where they were paying dividends instead of funding the pension scheme, had deliberately obscure governance rules and left their pensioners bereft of a considerable proportion of their money. Is this system sufficiently fleet of foot? Would it take account of a company which then decided to sell itself to another person for, for the sake of argument, £1? Would it help to cover the situations covered by the amendments? It does not sound to me as though we are doing anything different from just saying, “Everybody has the right to the appropriate dividends.” How do we know that those dividends are appropriate, and how do we have power for the regulator to ensure that there are not some really bad guys out there?

[Baroness Stedman-Scott]

The noble Baroness makes some valid points. We consider that dividends are paid at a point in time. The regulator needs to form a picture of the employers’ ability to pay and, for a period in the future, needs to see the whole picture.