Welfare Reform Bill
Baroness Grey-Thompson Excerpts(12 years, 6 months ago)
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Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I rise to support the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, and to look specifically at the removal of the severe disability premium and the effect that it will have on young carers who are looking after a lone parent who is disabled or two parents who are both disabled.
The severe disability premium is really important in supporting young carers. Children who are still in full-time education cannot claim carer’s allowance, but many play an invaluable role in supporting disabled parents. However, if there is no other adult in the household, and no one claiming carer’s allowance, the family can benefit from the extra financial help offered by the SDP.
The abolition of the SDP will cost families with a young carer up to £55.30 per week, which is £2,876 per year. This cost could be equivalent to 20 per cent of household income after housing costs. The Department for Work and Pensions estimates that around 25,000 lone parents are in receipt of severe disability premium. That is 25,000 families with a disabled adult, in receipt of the mid or high-rate care component of DLA, but with no adult either in the household or receiving carer’s allowance to look after them, and with children in the household.
Many of these children are likely to be doing a substantial amount of caring for the parent, but this measure could force them to have to take on additional caring and household responsibilities because the family just cannot afford to pay for help. This is likely to put additional pressures on their children to make up for this loss of additional care. This is happening at a time when support services for young carers are being cut back, according to a recent survey by Action for Children. The charity surveyed 23 of its young carer projects between May and June this year. Findings reveal that almost half of services questioned reported a rise in the number of children on waiting lists and had seen an increase in the needs of young carers.
The Children’s Society, which works with young carers, gave the following example of the pressure that some of these children face and why they should not be pushed into even tighter financial circumstances. Kelly’s mum, Jenny, became ill about 10 years ago when she was only eight years old. An aggressive illness hospitalised Jenny, and has since entirely paralysed her down one side. After staying with relatives for several months while her mum was in hospital, Kelly was able to move back in to live with her mum from the age of nine. Since then she has cared for her mum non-stop. She makes meals and does the washing and cleaning. She said early on that she could only make simple dinners such as scrambled eggs on toast, but she has learnt quickly, and she has had to. She does not do it alone; she has a rota of professional carers who come to help out day to day, but they cannot do everything, and they do not stay overnight.
About three years ago, the year before Kelly was due to sit her GCSEs, Jenny became extremely ill for a while. Kelly had to get up around four times a night to help her out. Naturally, she was exhausted, dragging herself to bed as soon as she got in from school. Jenny currently receives the severe disability premium, meaning that she and Kelly are just one of 25,000 families with a disabled single parent. They will presumably be covered by transitional protection, unless Jenny’s reassessment for ESA from IB is viewed as a change of circumstances. It would be useful if the Minister would be able to clarify that. However, families who find themselves in a similar position after the measure is brought in are likely to be left £55 a week worse off as a result of losing this premium.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, we should be grateful to the noble Baronesses, Lady Meacher and Lady Grey-Thompson, for introducing this important issue on which we have all received representations. Quite a lot of numbers have been bandied around with particular reference to benefits, and I will be interested in the Minister’s response. As I understand it, in the current system the severe disability premium is paid to people, whether in or out of work, who receive at least middle-rate care, live on their own and do not have a carer. It is payable only as a means-tested benefit so it supports those with a severe disability who have a low income and face many extra costs as a result of living alone.
Alongside that is the disability element of the working tax credit, so under the present system someone who is entitled to DLA or has recently been receiving a long-term sickness benefit would be entitled to the disability element of working tax credit if they worked for at least 16 hours a week. That is where we start from. As we have heard, though, the proposed support for adults in the universal credit depends upon the gateway of the WCA. This is what will drive the new arrangements. The briefing that we have had says that only those with a level of impairment sufficient to be found not fit for work will receive any extra help. I am not totally clear whether in that context “not fit for work” means someone who would only be going to the support group or someone who was going to the WRAG as well. I think the Minister is shaking his head, or rather he is nodding to say that only those in the support group would receive that.
That creates the difficulties that have been spoken about. The changes would mean that someone who could self-propel a wheelchair 50 metres or was registered blind but could undertake a journey unaccompanied could be found fit for work or, presumably, for work-related activity. Of course no one would want to claim that such individuals could not be encouraged to work if they wanted to, but that does not mean that they do not face considerable disadvantage and cost compared with someone with no impairment. So if they are out of work but found fit for work they face the same conditionality as everyone else, but if they are in work, because the gateway for extra support within the universal credit is the WCA, someone who is found fit for work will receive no extra support in work. The juxtaposition of the present and the future is concerning.
I am sure that the Minister will have seen the briefing that we have had. It says that the following are some of the ways in which different groups will be affected. Those who are terminally ill or who develop a severe level of impairment and live on their own could be disadvantaged to a significant degree—by something like £50 a week. Someone who is entitled to a middle rate of the care component but found fit for work—for example, someone who is severely visually impaired—will in many cases be found fit for work. However, if they are living on their own and doing some work, they are likely to have considerable extra costs that are not met by the DLA or by PIP when it comes along. Currently, most would be entitled to at least the middle rate of the DLA care component and therefore the SDP.
Under the current system, a severely visually impaired person in the work-related activity group and living on their own earning £100 a week will be left with a disposable income of £188 a week plus their DLA, after housing costs are paid. Under the universal credit, the same person will be left with a disposable income of less than £100 a week plus whatever PIP is payable after housing costs. There are plenty of other examples and we have heard some of them today from the noble Baronesses. These sorts of disparities are quite disturbing. The Minister might say that these are quite specific and narrow examples of the full spectrum of people who are affected by this, but a serious issue has been raised here and we need to understand fully how people are being protected in comparison with the current system under the new world of the universal credit.
Welfare Reform Bill
Baroness Grey-Thompson Excerpts(12 years, 6 months ago)
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“(ba) any amount of support for disabled children included under section 10 should be no less than the amount that was provided under the benefits and tax credits system prior to the introduction of the universal credit,”
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, this amendment would ensure that the disability additions for children provided under the universal credit are not cut compared with the disability additions provided through the current benefits and tax credits system. Families with children who have a disability are likely to have much higher costs than other families. I would briefly like to explain the current system. Disability living allowance is there to make a contribution to those costs. In addition, the means-tested system has also offered extra support to these families to help with these costs. Families with children who are judged to have the highest needs and receive the highest rate of the care component have an extra £76 added to their child tax credit to help with those costs. Families with children receiving any rate of DLA, except the highest rate of the care component, have an extra £54 added to their child tax credit to help with those costs.
The Government have announced that the disability elements of the child tax credit will be replaced with a disability addition and higher addition within the universal credit. However, all those who receive the higher addition will receive only half of the current rate. If the child is in receipt of the higher rate of the care component of DLA, the family will receive the higher disability addition, worth £77. Children who are registered blind will also now qualify for this higher addition. This means that those families who have a child eligible for the higher addition will receive £1.50 a week more than current claimants. However, households with disabled children who are not entitled to the higher rate and who claim benefit after the measure is brought in will receive only the disability addition worth about £27, which is about £27 less than the current rate.
As can be seen, the disability addition halves the level of support provided under the current system, so most families with a disabled child will lose around £1,400 a year. I have a number of concerns regarding which families will be affected by this. Only families of children in receipt of the higher rate of care component of DLA and severely visually impaired children will receive the higher addition. All other families of disabled children receiving DLA will receive the reduced level of support. In order to receive the middle rate of the care component of DLA, children have to need help frequently throughout the day or through the night. Those care needs have to be substantially in excess of the average care needs of a child the same age. To receive the higher rate of the care component, the child has to have frequent needs through the day and the night. Many children with a very significant level of impairment such as children with Down's syndrome or children who are profoundly deaf are likely to be in receipt of the middle rate of the care component as there is no reason why they would be likely to have substantial care needs in excess of other children at night. They will thus only be entitled to the lower addition.
Lord Freud
That is the envelope in which we are operating. If I could find £200 million more to add to that envelope then I could do it, but we are not in that position. As noble Lords know, we have put a lot of money into the universal credit. The overall gross figure going into people’s pockets—the poorest people in the country—every year once we get universal credit in is £4 billion a year. Of that £2 billion is net extra; £2 billion is through a more efficient system. That is the money we have found; that is the overall envelope that we are operating in. I do not have any more money, and there are some very difficult choices.
The question is this: does the noble Baroness want to maintain the rates for moderately disabled children at the expense of raising the limits for severely disabled people? That is really the juggle that we have to do. As I have said, this is not easy; these are difficult judgments. It has been very difficult to get to this position, and that is the decision that we think is best for people who we really want to help. We want to focus our support on the most severely disabled people regardless of their age; to simplify and to align the extra payments for disabled people; and to smooth the transition into adulthood. That is fundamentally the reason why I ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his response and I thank all noble Lords who have contributed to the debate on this vital amendment. The restructuring of support for disabled adults and children is taking money from disabled children who need it. The Government say that it is not a money-saving measure and that its main aim is to simplify the system and to give more to adults with the severest levels of impairment. However, the simplification is superficial and fails to give more to those with the greatest needs. I think that we should remember the words of the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell of Surbiton, who quoted Dame Philippa on the need to move away from categorising people based on severity of impairment.
Additionally, this measure is going to cause significant hardship to families with disabled children, who are already disproportionately likely to be living in poverty. It will make the situation much worse for those who are likely to have higher costs—those in the very group of adults whom this measure is meant to help. I believe that the Government’s proposals will undermine their own prevention agenda. There is no reason why an adapted form of the current levels of financial support could not be introduced into universal credit, with extra help being given to the support group when new moneys allow. It would not cost anything and would mean that families with disabled children were not among the biggest losers under the new system.
We have often heard it said that the devil is in the detail, and I agree, but I believe that the Minister is also making grand assumptions about the ability of parents of disabled children to work. We have heard much about the transition but this is about the new children who will be coming into the system. I believe that the measures that the Government are proposing will push more children into residential care.
I thank the Minister for asking me whom I would be most likely to support. That is not a question that I would like to answer on my own, and I therefore wish to test the opinion of the House.
Welfare Reform Bill
Baroness Grey-Thompson Excerpts(12 years, 7 months ago)
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Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for their contributions on this group of amendments and the Minister for his comments. I feel that I am not knocking at a completely shut door. However, I still believe that those who should be allowed to be consulted should be made more explicit in the Bill. I also accept that, in some cases, collecting additional evidence from the claimant’s medical practitioner may be unnecessary as the decision may be clear-cut. I think the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas of Winchester, for highlighting the fact that information should be used, not just collected. That has given me plenty of food for thought on my future wording.
There has been strong support for the use of the best evidence possible so that we can arrive at the right decision for the disabled people concerned and be effective in the use of public money. To not take medical evidence into account or use appropriate support advocacy, as mentioned by the noble Lords, Lord Wigley and Lord German, would be a false economy. However, we are still missing something.
As regards the financial cost and the cost in time of an appeals process—not to mention the stress that that will cause to the great number of people who will have to go through it and the fact that it could block up the system—I would much rather the money go into people’s pockets than into the process. On the testing process, it does not matter whether you ask 20 or 200 questions, if the claimant is not able to give the best answer or the right answer, or the answers are not correctly linked together in the process, you will not get to the right decision and will be left in a situation where there is a huge number of appeals. I am not asking for more money to be spent; only that it is spent in the right place.
The Minister referred to the correct training for assessors to ensure that they reach the right standard. That is incredibly important. However, I am not convinced that we are yet in the right place; there is still much work to be done. I shall return to this issue at a later stage. However, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
The Earl of Listowel
I suspected it might not be. For people with fluctuating conditions, where there is a likelihood of their going back on repeated occasions, perhaps one could sort out within a particular group individuals who would benefit from having regular contact with the same person. In the spirit of co-production, some individuals who are going to be assessed on a repeated basis may perhaps like to choose the person they deal with. However, as I say, I do not know how it works in practice at the moment so this may be by the by.
On listening to this debate, the question of the supervision which takes place in the social care arena seems to be pertinent. I am grateful to the Minister for making it possible for a social worker to visit the officials working on this and to discuss matters of supervision. In social care it is very important for front-line staff to receive quality supervision on a regular basis for three purposes: first, to check that they are doing the right job; secondly, to check that they are receiving the right continual professional development; and, thirdly, to ensure that they are not responding inappropriately to the clients.
On the third purpose, we all come to life with our experiences, and some assessors may find it difficult to work with particular clients who rub them up the wrong way. They need to be able to go to their supervisor and say, “Look, I feel really uncomfortable working with this person. I am not sure it is actually anything to do with them. Can you help me to sort this out?” They need a sounding board, if you like. That is one aspect.
On the continuing professional development side, this is a training aspect to check that they are continually building on their understanding of, let us say, autism. They will start from a point of ignorance but, in the course of years of experience, they will learn more and more. They are helped to do so and their supervisor ensures that they get the opportunities for that learning and enrichment. It is a draining job and the people doing it need to be recognised, supported and enriched. I have covered those three points but, as I say, I am not sure it is pertinent.
The proposal for a trial arrangement might allow an opportunity for us to find the most effective kind of supervision we can afford to provide and where there are opportunities to build continuity of relationship with clients.
I have an amendment later in the Bill which relates to how one manages the system and the culture in this area. If the people at the very top of some of these organisations had experience of social care—if one could be confident that there was a senior social worker at the top of the Jobcentre Plus arrangements, or whatever—they would have the necessary insight and the understanding to help people on the front line who will need a system of this kind to assist them in working with vulnerable adults. In that way, even with limited resources, the best outcomes could be achieved in the circumstances.
However, I will come to that amendment later. I look forward to the Minister’s reply.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I support the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell of Surbiton, and this amendment is also in my name. It is vital to ensure that the new framework is right, and this amendment gives me some comfort in what is a very difficult time for a huge number of disabled people. The noble Baroness, Lady Howe of Idlicote, mentioned time. That time is required.
If someone has a health condition that is likely to improve, or a newly acquired impairment to which they are likely to adapt, no one would argue that the costs might not change over time and that there should not be a reassessment. For example, the costs of someone who is a lower leg amputee will be very different in the first 18 months or two years after the amputation from what they may be 20 years later when they have adapted to it. However, when someone has a health condition or impairment that is unlikely to change and the costs are likely to remain the same, it does not make sense to keep sending them for more face-to-face assessments. For people in this situation it should be enough to confirm with the claimant’s healthcare professionals that their condition is unchanged. I feel very strongly about this because the following claimant told the MS Society how she feels about the prospect of face-to-face assessments. Many like her find this process very strange given that so much is known about the condition, including that it will only get worse and not better. When such claimants have to talk to a stranger about some very intimate details of their life it can have a devastating effect on them. The claimant said:
“I am already dreading the day when I have to sit in front of someone and explain myself to them … When I am already seeing a neurologist and a whole team of people who help me to try and live as best I can with MS … This is just not fair in my eyes. … Shame on the people who have come up with these changes which once again affect real people who have no choice but to try and live with this illness”.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett
My Lords, I wish to speak briefly in support of the hobby horse of the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell of Surbiton, which we should take seriously. I was struck by what she said about how a trial period in which disabled people’s organisations were involved could do a lot to restore confidence in the system. I am sure that I am not the only noble Lord who has been struck by the e-mails, letters and faxes that I have received, which demonstrate that that confidence is at rock bottom. There has been a catastrophic loss of confidence. The noble Baroness is offering the Government perhaps not an olive branch, because that suggests that a war is going on, but an opportunity—I suggest that the Government would do well to grasp it—to listen to what is being said, accept this amendment with its trial period and involve disabled people’s organisations. That could go a long way to restore confidence in this system.
Baroness Campbell of Surbiton
My Lords, I am also extremely supportive of this amendment. It is a government misuse of the social model to withdraw support by saying that if you have a decent wheelchair-adapted house and car your disability goes away. That was quoted to me by a DWP civil servant as a social model assessment. That is exactly why I tabled an amendment on social model assessment—so that we can teach assessors what the social model really means.
The noble Baroness, Lady Thomas, is absolutely right. If I were assessed today, I would probably be taken off DLA. I have my wheelchair, my adapted house, my car and some personal assistance. However the cost of maintaining that is absolutely phenomenal. My disability has gone away; it is away today. I feel equal to all who are here but tonight it might be different. Therefore, I am absolutely in favour of placing this in the Bill. It is a perverse incentive to account for aids by means-testing. It means that people might stop using their electric wheelchairs and adapted cars to get the benefit. They might hide them in the garage or swimming pool. Apparently people put their cars there to hide them from the taxman. As noble Lords can see, I am very supportive of this amendment.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I also support the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas of Winchester. When I first looked at this area, I found it quite confusing and some of it not very simple to understand. Some aids and adaptations are taken into account for the assessment. For example, for the mobility component, any aid that the person can use to assist them in walking is taken into account. However, someone who can self-propel a wheelchair will qualify because they are still unable, or virtually unable, to walk.
I declare an interest as a wheelchair user and someone who spends considerable time making sure that I can get the right aids and equipment for me to live as normal a life as possible. As the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell of Surbiton, has said, you try to get as much independence as possible. For me, it is about getting a small chair that means I can fit into every lift in this building, which is a challenge when they are all built into the various chimney stacks; and one that is light enough to push for more than 50 metres, which does not get you very far in your Lordships’ House on the very expensive carpet that we have here. I also need to get it in and out of my car. I spend a lot of time making sure that equipment is right for me but I could easily buy a chair with wheels that are 16 inches in diameter, rather than 11 inches, and that weighs 30 kilos instead of four and a half. That would change my impairment considerably but I want to be as independent as possible. Those aids and adaptations make my life easier but they do not stop the patronising attitude that is out there. They do not stop the barriers.
I also want to encourage disabled people to be as fit and healthy as possible but we could be in a situation where we prevent people exercising and doing physical activity because they are penalised for doing so. Again, in my case, I spend several hundred pounds on the right cushion to sit on to ensure that I do not get a pressure sore. A cushion cover for that cushion is around £120. This costs the National Health Service considerably more than it would if I sat on a piece of old, tatty foam. However, if I sit on a piece of old, tatty foam, I might be in a better position to be considered for DLA in the future. It is the same with adaptable housing, and lifts and ramps. We are getting into a very difficult situation here, where the things that should be making disabled people’s lives easier, to enable them to contribute, will actually encourage them to think about things in a very different way.
It is very important we get this right. We do not want to push disabled people back into their houses, or ghettoise them. We are in a real danger of doing that if we do not find the right balance, and make sure that disabled people have access to the right equipment to enable them to live as independent lives as possible, and to contribute towards society.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, it is with a degree of trepidation that I rise to speak, having just heard those contributions. This issue presents a real conundrum. There is an argument that asks, if the social model is to identify the broader challenges to living that confront disabled people, is it unreasonable to take account of provisions and innovations of aids and appliances that society has developed to help people in their daily living? However, it is easy to state that; as the contributions we have just heard made clear, there is a question of what that will mean in practice.
We could recognise that the use of aids and appliances will not always remove the barriers that people face; we have certainly heard that explained. We should also recognise that not everyone will have access to aids and appliances, or indeed adaptations, which could enhance their quality of life. There is a conundrum that is recognised in the November 2011 Explanatory Note. If account is taken only of aids and appliances that people have and—other things being equal—that produces a low award, there is a potential disincentive to acquire those very aids and appliances that will improve people’s lives.
As I understand, what is currently proposed—as the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas, identified, this mirrors the current DLA formulation—is that the assessment will take account of aids and appliances that are normally used and can reasonably be expected to be worn or used. This seems to penalise those who have not yet acquired those aids and appliances. They will have a zero or low award, and not have the money to acquire the facilities. I wonder if it would not be a more reasonable approach, if there is to be some recognition of aids and appliances in the assessment, to take account of what people have initially, with some acknowledgement that, at a reassessment at some stage in the future, you might add those that people might be reasonably expected to use. At least that way, there is a transition.
We know that some aids can be differentiated from others on the basis that in themselves they do not overcome all the issues of mobility. Attaching higher scores for these circumstances—although we do not know what the tariff will be—does not seem unreasonable. The more I have thought about this, and the more contributions I have heard, the more difficult an issue I think it is.
Lord Freud
This is the Catch-22 that a number of noble Lords have pointed out today and in the past, whereby denying oneself an obvious aid is used as a method or device to maintain a higher level of PIP. Clearly, we want to discourage that because we want people to maximise their opportunities in life. The noble Lord referred to a period in which to obtain an aid. However, that drives straight down the other path of starting to multiply the number of reassessments, which we do not want to do. There is a balance to be struck here but most people are able to get aids and appliances. They may not get the four-and-a-half kilo device of the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson. That is half the weight of my bike.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, if I might interject, one of the issues is the cost of aids and equipment. You can buy a fairly okay wheelchair for £250. You can buy a semi-custom fit chair for about £3,500 and you can probably spend £6,000 on a chair. However, some aids and adaptations are very difficult to get, such as a stair lift, which costs £2,500. I tried to get one fitted in my house when I was pregnant but no company in the country would fit a stair lift in my house as the stair lift was not insured to carry two people, and as a pregnant woman I counted as two people. However, there were companies that were prepared to put one in for someone who wanted to carry their dog up the stairs. A through-the-floor lift costs £18,000. If you live in the south-east of England, moving to a bungalow is just not an option because it is so expensive. There are all these costs that keep adding up, and it is very difficult for disabled people even to think about getting the right equipment because of the huge cost.
Lord Freud
Clearly, one has to be absolutely sympathetic to this point. As we all know, levels of equipment can vary hugely. However, the point on this particular issue is that we will look at only readily available, cheap aids and appliances, which can be reasonably used. That will be the definition and it is the definition used today in DLA, so we are effectively porting that approach over. I think I have already asked for the amendment to be withdrawn.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I support the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas of Winchester, in Amendment 86A, and I believe she has covered the amendment very clearly. I also find the qualifying period worrying. As the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan of Drefelin, has said, the first months are often the period when extra costs are at their greatest, and just as people are trying to adjust their outgoings, they are also adjusting to the impairment or illness.
I do not believe that it is the case that they will be able to receive support elsewhere. Social care support may be available, but that is means-tested and has its own application and assessment process, which we have debated quite a lot this afternoon. Support from the NHS can be very limited and not immediate and I do not think we should assume that appropriate help is that easy to find.
In Committee in another place, the Minister for Disabled People stated that this proposal was not being driven by the need to make significant savings, so why are we making this change? It has been argued that, for example, in the case of someone who has had a stroke, it may not be clear at three months what their long-term needs may be, and that may also be true at six months. However, their costs are likely to be very high during these initial stages. While no one, me included, wants to see repeated assessments, we have heard a lot about giving help to those who most need it. In the initial months following diagnosis we should look at the qualifying period as detailed in the amendment because those are the people who will need immediate help.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett
My Lords, I support the amendments which seek to revert to the existing qualifying period of three months. The noble Baroness, Lady Thomas of Winchester, said that six months is a long time to wait for extra resources, and we have heard from a number of noble Lords about the significant additional costs which can be incurred during this period.
However, there is a further twist in the tale—the benefit cap—which we will be discussing next week. PIP exempts people from the benefit cap but, of course, if you cannot qualify for PIP for six months then you would not only have to wait for additional resources but could find that your own resources are being significantly depleted during this period. This is very worrying. Can the Minister say whether any estimate has been made of the number of people who may be caught in this way? I suspect that it is not a large number, but one person is one person too many. It could be potentially very frightening for people to find that they might have to face this horrible benefit cap.
I hope that the Minister will accept the amendment. If not, and the six-month period goes ahead, a perhaps minimalist way of addressing the question—although it does not really address it—is that someone who qualifies after six months should have the money backdated to cover what they lost through the benefit cap.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
I beg to move Amendment 86DZA standing in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins. The noble Baroness apologises, but she is unable to be present as she has an amendment to the Health and Social Care Bill in the Chamber.
This amendment is designed to ensure that disabled people receiving the new benefit—whether it is the personal independence payment or DLCA—before pensionable age are able to continue accessing support after they reach that age. I declare an interest in that I am a recipient of DLA.
This amendment would maintain the requirement that disabled people meet eligibility criteria, but would offer a significant reassurance to disabled people that their support will not diminish with age. Sir Bert Massie, as cited in Monday’s debate, has suggested that disabled people, “Join us or die”, given that the incidence of impairments and experience of health conditions increase with age, and that more than half of disabled people develop their impairment or health condition in adult life.
The older we get, the more we need support with the higher cost of living, and with the health conditions and/or impairments that life brings. DLA currently provides vital support to 845,000 disabled people over pensionable age in meeting their higher essential costs of living. This support offers a significant lifeline, and was planned for in the original legislation when DLA was introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Newton, and others, in the Social Security Contributions and Benefits Act 1992. That Act specifically refers to the age limit not applying to a DLA award made before someone attains the upper age limit. However, the Welfare Reform Bill does not make the same guarantee for the new benefit.
Clause 81 allows for regulations to be made to allow for exemptions, and the Explanatory Notes to the Bill indicate that allowing PIP to continue to be received after someone reaches pension age could be such an exemption. This would be welcomed, but leaves a gap in clarity which needs urgently to be addressed. I am aware that the Government believe that this issue should be covered by regulations. This was not the case in the original 1992 legislation, and I am unconvinced that it should be the case now.
My concern is due in part to the Public Bill Committee stage in the other place, where the Minister for Disabled People stated that the Government wanted entitlement to be addressed in regulations, to allow for flexibility. Such flexibility could include altering this entitlement in the future, and denying support to disabled people reaching pensionable age. It would offer a significant boost in confidence for many disabled people to receive reassurance during the passage of the Bill that their support will not be withdrawn at pensionable age.
Disability Alliance, and many other charities, are being approached regularly by disabled people worried about what the current plan will mean when they reach pensionable age, and whether support will end. Readers of Disability Now will also have seen this issue raised by other concerned disabled people and their families. This amendment would clarify the position and put many minds at rest.
The Dilnot Commission highlighted the pivotal role that DLA plays in preventing high-level needs escalating. This is a particularly important issue for people who are in receipt of the mobility component of DLA, as there is no equivalent to this under attendance allowance—the current disability benefit available to people who seek help after they pass pensionable age. Receiving DLA helps disabled people manage health, and prevents some avoidable NHS costs occurring. Receiving help after pensionable age could also help disabled people avoid entering council-funded residential care homes at all or prematurely. Therefore, this amendment potentially offers further financial savings in the long term, but requires the Government to work collectively and not allow a DWP silo approach to ignore the NHS and local government costs of not permitting an entitlement to be carried over to pensionable age.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his comments, especially around what happens when those currently on PIP reach pensionable age. The noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, raised further crucial issues regarding clarity in relation to people over 65 who currently receive DLA. If the amendment is too wide, as the Minister suggested, I am sure that the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, would be very happy to meet with the Bill team before Report to determine the correct words to put down. As the noble Baroness is still discussing the Health and Social Care Bill in the Chamber, she will need time to consider the Minister’s comments. I am sure that she will return to this at a later stage. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Welfare Reform Bill
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Baroness Wilkins
My Lords, I could not agree more strongly with these amendments. As ever, my noble friend Lady Campbell has nailed the issue and then hit it firmly on the head. The title of the Government’s proposed replacement benefit to disability living allowance is vague, confusing and misleading. As my noble friend Lady Campbell points out, it does not even mention disability. No doubt this is intentional, and sadly this Government have taught us to be fully justified in our cynicism. By removing any indication of PIP being a disability costs allowance the Government can manipulate entitlement to the benefit to their heart’s content.
I should declare my interest as someone who has received DLA and its predecessor benefits since the mid-1960s. Should I now expect screaming Daily Mail headlines spelling out the shocking amount this must total over the years? Of course, they will completely fail to mention that it was only this benefit that enabled me to be mobile, educated and employed, and so become a contributing taxpayer for the whole of my career. Now more than ever this week’s shocking press headlines vilifying disabled people as scroungers could not teach us more clearly that it is essential that the press and public know what this benefit is for; that they are given no excuse for the misinformation; and that the name spells out clearly what is in the tin. It is a disability living costs allowance.
The Minister has emphasised throughout this Committee stage that the Government’s whole purpose with this Bill is to change the country’s culture in people’s attitude to work. It remains to be seen whether they will succeed. I hope that they do. But sadly, what this Government have succeeded in doing is changing the public’s attitude to disabled people. It has become totally acceptable to depict disabled people as scroungers defrauding the benefits system. The Secretary of State, Iain Duncan Smith, was quoted as saying on 11 November in the Daily Mail:
“At the moment hundreds of millions of pounds are paid out in disability benefits to people who have simply filled out a form. The vast majority are getting the benefit for life without regular checks to see if they are still eligible”.
He finished that sentence by saying,
“or if their condition has worsened and they need increased support”.
Of course, concern for those who are missing out was not the lead story.
Will the Minister say when we are going to see the Government move to rebut any of these wildly inaccurate press reports which are helping to stoke disability hate crime? The Government’s acceptance of this group of amendments would be a welcome indication of their intent and I feel sure that my noble friend Lady Campbell has made the Minister very aware of the importance of this issue.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, my noble friend Lady Campbell of Surbiton has very ably described the purpose of this amendment. I, too, declare an interest in that I am in receipt of DLA. Like my noble friend Lady Wilkins, it has helped me in terms of education and working throughout my life.
When I was doing my own research on what the title PIP meant, the most common response was, “Isn’t that something linked to pensions—a personal investment plan?”. The title should more accurately reflect what the benefit is and why support is required. Obviously, a name change on its own will not solve the issue but anything that clarifies why the benefit is necessary can only be helpful. Many disabled people are very frightened, partly by what will happen to their benefit but also about the change in the way in which they are viewed by society. It is not just in the recent media coverage over the weekend.
There has been a worrying change in how disability is reported in the media. The Strathclyde Centre for Disability Research in the media unit at Glasgow University has recently published a report, Bad News for Disabled People. It compared the coverage of five papers in 2005-06 and 2010-11 and found that there had been a decrease in stories presenting disabled people in a positive way and an increase in stories concentrating on benefit fraud. The focus groups in the same study all claimed that levels of fraud were much higher than they are in reality with some suggesting that up to 70 per cent of claimants were fraudulent. Participants justified these claims by reference to articles that they had read in newspapers. One of my concerns with the current name is that it possibly suggests that disabled people are getting a lot more money than they will actually receive. I also believe that there is an ongoing misconception over the purpose of DLA that we need to correct.
The DWP has highlighted in a press release the length of time many disabled people have received DLA as if people somehow do not need the benefit after a certain time. Again, this leads people to misunderstand the purpose of the benefit. Many people with congenital conditions, like myself, will continue to have higher costs of living throughout their lives. Of course, there need to be reviews as circumstances can change, but the fact that some people continue to qualify for these benefits in the long term is not on its own a signal that the system has gone wrong. A colleague frequently says to me that language is the dress of thought. Disability cost allowance is the right name to use.
Lord Low of Dalston
My Lords, I give my support to this amendment—the first in a long series that we are due to consider on this part of the Bill which deals with the personal independence payment. Like the noble Baronesses who have already spoken, I declare my interest as a recipient of disability living allowance since its inception in 1992. I hope that that can be taken as read throughout the rest of the amendments as we speak to them.
The noble Baroness, Lady Campbell, has made a very full case. What has emerged is the iconic significance of DLA to disabled people. It was an enlightened measure introduced by a previous Conservative Government, when, as the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell, told us, the noble Lord, Lord Newton, was Secretary of State—and, if I am not mistaken, Sir Nicholas Scott was Minister for Disabled People. It corrected many anomalies, as the quotation of Sir Bert Massie by the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell, reminded us.
Blind people were particularly grateful for the introduction of DLA. They had campaigned for many years for recognition of the extra costs attributable to blindness, but they were never officially acknowledged until the introduction of DLA. There were still anomalies; blind people were only eligible to apply for the mobility component at the lower rate—an anomaly that was only removed with the passage of the Welfare Reform Act 2009. That reform was supported by the Conservative Party at the time. I very much hope that blind people will not find that that hard-fought gain is snatched from their grasp—just as it has been won—with the implementation of personal independence payments. That would surely leave a legacy of bitterness that the Government would find hard to overcome.
This brings us back to the iconic significance of DLA. For many people it is not only the means but the symbol of their independence. As we have heard, much apprehension has been caused among disabled people by the changes the Government are making to the benefit system. People are fearful that their independence will be undermined with the change from DLA to PIP, or personal independence payment.
As Ministers probably recognise, the Government have a gap in confidence to overcome as regards the reforms where disabled people are concerned. They may well feel, on reflection, that retaining the name, which has such significance for disabled people, would be a small price to pay for the changes that they wish to make to the benefit. As the noble Baroness has said, names are important, and many disabled people obviously feel that we would lose this one at our peril. I hope, after due consideration, the Minister will take the same view.
“(A1) A person is entitled to the daily living component at the basic rate if—
(a) the person’s ability to carry out daily living activities is limited by the person’s physical or mental condition; and(b) the person meets the required period condition.”
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I will speak to the amendments tabled in my name in this grouping. These amendments identify what I believe to be a significant weakness in the current approach. When DLA was introduced it was to help with disabled people’s high living costs and to ensure that those who could not access alternative help were supported, as well as to maximise disabled people’s independence. However, since DLA was introduced, most councils have restricted access to care services. Around 80 per cent of local authorities in England now provide support only to people with needs assessed as being “critical” or “substantial”. People with low or moderate needs have been prevented from receiving support through care rationing. But the Government’s plans to end DLA and introduce PIP would abolish entirely the low-rate care DLA and deny help to many disabled people and their families least able to receive any kind of alternative support. The amendments have been proposed to ensure that some disabled people who need basic, but not a great deal of, support are still able to access help under the new benefit. I declare an interest in the level of support being targeted for total abolition.
We need to be aware of those who are at the greatest risk of losing help if the proposals progress as drafted. The amendments would secure some basic support for disabled people and would make a substantial difference between being cut off from support and receiving a little help towards high living costs. It would also ensure that some disabled people were able to manage health conditions and thus prevent the overuse of more expensive NHS treatments or inpatient care. I wonder if the Minister could say whether the Department of Health has provided costs for how it expects to see increases in NHS usage rise for this group of people.
The current support helps people manage health conditions and helps towards some of the costs of, for example, higher heating bills for people with conditions that require consistent home temperatures. To lose DLA would undermine the ability to manage and therefore enforce use of the NHS or reliance on formal care services.
Lord Newton of Braintree
My Lords, I picked up two points in the course of this debate. First, I think the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, indicated that she thought there were 655,000 potential losers from this. Is that right?
Lord Newton of Braintree
I got it nearly right, but it is still quite a lot of people. In that case, my question to the Minister is: what steps does he expect to take—it may be that this is already clear and I just do not know—to protect people who are already receiving DLA at the point of transition? We are talking about sums of money that, although not large to many of those in this Room, can be very large indeed to some of the people who are receiving them. One of the things that I always had in mind—I think at one stage my then Cabinet colleagues occasionally referred to it as “Newton’s law”—is that not giving somebody something is quite different from taking away from somebody something they already have. I would like to hear my noble friend’s comments on that.
The other thing is also, in a sense, a question directed to the Minister, although it may also have occurred to the noble Baronesses and others who are interested in this. It is the reference in the Bill and in this amendment, which follows the Bill, to a person’s ability to,
“carry out daily living activities”,
being limited by,
“the person’s physical or mental condition”.
I would like to say a word or two about how that is to be done. In my day, which some in the Room will remember, we had a benefit called the housewives non-contributory invalidity pension, which entailed a lot of tests, that were regarded as demeaning and humiliating in the extreme, about whether somebody could boil a kettle or take a tin off a shelf. I think there were others, to judge from the reaction of the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, who will remember them. I would not want to get back into that. Indeed, I got rid of it. I hope that we may have a word that there will be a more civilised way of assessing the ability to carry out daily living activities than is revealed on the surface of the Bill.
Lord Freud
My Lords, I will pick up the point of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter. I have no figures on how many people may or may not lose, mainly because we have not yet locked down the thresholds. However, I assure her that this is a bottom-up exercise based on assessing people's real needs. We are working at it that way round rather than working to a budget. That is what some of the testing we did over the summer was about.
The noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, asked about the work we have done on some passported benefits. We had detailed discussions with colleagues in the Department for Transport about passporting disabled people to the blue badge scheme. We will include key outcomes from the discussions in the updated impact assessment that we will publish in time for Report.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for their contributions this afternoon. I took over the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell of Surbiton, and I am responding as such. I absolutely understand the need to prioritise the money that is available, and the fact that choices have to be made. I understand that the Government want to support those most in need. I, too, want that. However, the people currently seen to be not in greatest need will become those in need because they will not be able to carry out the daily tasks that DLA enables them to do. We may be storing up trouble for later. I look forward to seeing the more detailed information that is required to understand what the new landscape may be; and I look forward to having many more weekends taken up with reading.
I agree wholeheartedly with the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Hollins, on the difficulty of assessments, and with those of the noble Lord, Lord Newton, on transition. The barriers are still significant to those who may not be considered so disabled in the wider context of disability.
I think of this in terms of sport—and specifically athletics, which I know well. If life as a disabled person is a race and the finish line is full integration into society where DLA is not required, disabled people are not at the start of the 100 metres but spread out at different points along the marathon course. Many disabled people are still in the warm-up area and a few were left on the bus. Of course, this should not stop our attempts to remove barriers, but we should be very careful about the choices that we make. I have concerns that we are simply pushing this issue into other areas and I look forward to continuing the discussion with the Minister, especially around the projection figures of the Department for Work and Pensions, of which I take a slightly different view. I will come back to this at a later stage. At the moment, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Baroness Hollis of Heigham
My Lords, I was rather surprised to see that the amendment was felt to be needed. I had thought that the past 30 years would have made such an amendment redundant. Some time back, for just a few months and for reasons that I am ashamed to admit, I was in a wheelchair. Looking back, it is hard to say whether the difficulties I had were due to social or medical factors. What I am sure about is that an impairment easily becomes a disability if the environment is not supportive of that individual. That seems to make the difference.
What puzzled me until the noble Lord, Lord Addington, mentioned it was that we had not referred to the DDA. The whole point of the DDA was to set the medical impairment in a context which, through social, practical, emotional and moral reasons, did not serve to bar the person from full involvement in their lives. What we asked with the DDA was that employers and providers of goods and services should be required to make “reasonable” adjustments. This seemed a perfectly intelligent balance between the costs for small businesses and the rights of individuals not to face artificially induced and constructed barriers to their full social inclusion.
I remember going around the city and looking at our historic buildings, which we had been told by various people could not be made accessible for disabled people. On the contrary, the brilliant architect John Goldsmith, who was then over at the old DoE and was himself disabled, showed how we could ensure full access to buildings from museums to 18th century chapels for disabled people in wheelchairs and the like. In the process, mothers with buggies, pensioners loaded down with bags and a whole swathe of the community found that they had added access on the back of what we were doing nominally for disabled people. We opened up some of the most beautiful buildings of the City to perhaps a third of its population who had found barriers in their way. Without needing to get into a debate about social and medical because I cannot follow down those paths, I say to the Minister that I just do not see how you can separate the one from the other, because they interlock whether they be transport, housing, public access to buildings or whatever. Unless you have both sides of that equation, an impairment will continue to remain a disability—unnecessarily so—for far too many people.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I rise very briefly to support this amendment as my name is on it. Others have explained very clearly the need for these amendments. More specifically, I rise to support the noble Lord, Lord Wigley. The social model was a lifeline to me. My parents brought me up to believe that having an impairment was not my fault. I became a wheelchair user at the age of seven—some 35 years ago. I was brought up in the social model before there was even a name for it, but I also grew up in a world where there were loads of people who almost delighted in giving me the long list of things that I never could, or even should, do, such as go to the cinema, stay in a mainstream school, go to university, go to a sports club, or even, more recently, get married and have a baby. The social model outlines very clearly how disabled people can play their part in society. We should not take this for granted because it would be too easy to forget what the social model is.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, these amendments are about encompassing the social model in the Bill. We support them. I have come to this issue somewhat later than some noble Lords here such as the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, my noble friend Lady Wilkins and others. I found the Scope document, which has been referred to, particularly helpful not only because it laid out a route to a different process of assessment, but because it took the assessment and criteria in the DWP’s document and tried to point out in practical terms why they may not have encompassed these wider issues. I say to the Minister, as others have said, that this should not be a difficulty for the Government because they have on the record their commitment to the social model. It is in Hansard for 30 November 2010. I think it was the Minister, Maria Miller. It is clearly on the record and not a matter of dispute.
Indeed, the DLA consultation paper referred to the social model in the following terms:
“The social model of disability says that disability is created by barriers in society. These barriers generally fall into three categories: the environment—including inaccessible buildings and services…people’s attitudes—stereotyping, discrimination and prejudice…organisations—inflexible policies, practices and procedures”.
Of course, the model argues that these barriers can be changed or removed. We accept that dealing with these barriers is not just a matter for a DLA or PIP or whatever it is called, but the consequences of these barriers need to be taken into account in assessing entitlement. I ask the Minister how the approach to PIP is reflected in the social model of disability and how the Government would counter criticisms that their approach is still driven by the medical model which concentrated on the inability to undertake activities due to a physical, mental or cognitive impairment.
Paragraph 4.9 on page 29 of the explanatory notes to the second draft of the assessment criteria says,
“Furthermore, we remain concerned that taking greater account of issues such as housing, access to transport, informal support and utilities would make the assessment more subjective and lead to inconsistent outcomes for individuals. Many of these issues will be dependent on local circumstances and availability of services, meaning that results might differ depending on location across the country”.
Of course we understand the difficulty that taking account of a wider range of factors would involve an expanded and different process. However, any process that involves a points-based approach will have a degree of subjectivity to it.
The Minister will be aware of proposals from Scope, which other noble Lords have mentioned, that recommend the trial of a more extensive process that has co-operation with the claimant at its heart. I will not run through the detail except perhaps to comment on the last bit of the process as it sees it, which is the production of a local support plan to capture the evidence and information brought up over the course of the assessment process in order to help highlight where in the individual’s life the barriers and the needs tend to arise. This could help the claimant to identify particular areas in which PIP might provide valuable support in meeting disability costs, but would not take the form of an outcome-based agreement binding the individual to use their PIP for specific purposes. Do the Government have any plans to test this approach, together with input from disability groups? We acknowledge that a good deal of work, thought and engagement has gone into updating the assessment criteria, and this has also been recognised by the Disability Benefits Consortium, but inevitably questions arise about the rules of engagement going forward, what further consultation will be taking place, and particularly about why the Government are confident that the current proposals will take account of the full range of barriers and costs that disabled people face. I think that that is a particular bone of contention that may have been eased by the current document, but that has certainly not been fully answered. That is why it is important to have these issues in the Bill.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, the purpose of the amendment is to ensure that in all cases, as part of the decision-making process to decide eligibility for PIP, evidence is collected by the DWP from the claimant's healthcare professionals. A great deal of evidence suggests that decisions are frequently inaccurate when made on the basis of reports from face-to-face assessments alone, without being informed by evidence from the claimant's healthcare professionals.
There are lessons to be learnt from the current face-to-face assessments. Evidence shows that when face-to-face assessments are carried out for the WCA, inaccurate results frequently occur. Recent figures published by the DWP demonstrate that 29 per cent of claimants who are in the work-related activity group were placed in it only after a reconsideration or appeal, after they had originally been found fit for work on the basis of the WCA. The deciding factor in tribunals overturning decisions is frequently medical evidence from the claimant's doctor or healthcare professional.
A recent small study by Citizens Advice asked claimants to check the accuracy of the report of what they had said during their assessment. It asked claimants to take part in the study before they had been to the assessment to ensure that the claimants were not just taking part because they had had a poor assessment. Thirty-seven claimants took part in the study. Sixteen of the 37 reports were judged to have a very substantial level of inaccuracy. These claimants were not angry because they have been found fit for work. In fact, nine of the 16 had been placed in the work-related group and would not have seen their report if it had not been for the study. Eleven of the 37 reports were judged to have a medium level of inaccuracy and 10 were felt to be an accurate reflection of what happened at the assessment.
The following case is one of the 16 cases judged to be inaccurate enough to affect a decision for ESA—or, if the claimant were found not fit for work, a decision for DLA. The client had a serious mental health condition as a result of a series of traumatic circumstances. He felt that there was little interest in what he said and he reported a number of factual errors. For example, the report stated that the results of an MRI scan and an ECG were normal. The ECG should have been EG and the client had explained that he had not yet had the results. There were also significant omissions and distortions in what the client is recorded as having said, and false assumptions made as a result. There are other examples in this case study.
The medical evidence sent in by the adviser when the client appealed clearly backed the client's view of the assessment, as the decision was changed on reconsideration without the need to go to a tribunal. The DWP and Atos now recognise the value of medical evidence from the claimant's doctors. The value of this evidence as part of the assessment process was acknowledged by Dr Crawford, the clinical director at Atos, in evidence to the Work and Pensions Select Committee on 18 May 2011. HCPs working for Atos also acknowledged this when a sample group were interviewed in a survey by the DWP. The DWP now encourages claimants to send in medical evidence for the WCA.
The onus should not be placed on claimants to collect this evidence. Claimants are often charged for medical reports. While advertisers are sometimes able to negotiate with a doctor to drop the charge when a claimant goes to a tribunal, doctors who charge will clearly not make this concession in the case of every claim. The charge is often £30 or £35, and sometimes more. Someone living on the basic ESA of £67 a week cannot afford this amount. It must be the responsibility of the DWP to collect the evidence that is needed for an accurate assessment. It is vital that the assessment process for PIP includes a requirement for the decision-maker to collect evidence from the claimant's healthcare professionals as a core part of the decision-making process. Without this requirement, there is a danger that there will be a two-tier system, with the poorest and most vulnerable claimants unable to afford to pay for evidence, and as a result at risk of receiving a less reliable decision. I beg to move.
Welfare Reform Bill
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Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I, too, support this amendment and I, too, wish to speak about the assessment process. A number of people have contacted me just on this amendment alone—around 45 at the last count, and the figure is increasing daily. They want to express their concerns in this area and they are using very strong words. People are telling me every single day that they are terrified by the process they are being asked to go through. I accept that it is a difficult process. We demand that through the system we should grade impairment, which is a necessary part of the process, and we try to put people in boxes. However, disability and impairment affect people in such different ways. The process expects yes and no answers and that is almost impossible when we are considering a static condition, let alone fluctuating ones. Many people writing to me say that there is little room to give medical evidence or provide supplementary data and that every step of the process feels very confrontational. It is essential that the test is appropriate for disabled people.
I am also concerned about the number of people who tell me that the facilities used for the assessments are simply not accessible. One example is the Croydon assessment centre; it has a lift for wheelchair users but wheelchair users are not allowed to use the lift due to health and safety reasons. To enter the centre, you have to navigate 46 steps. If you cannot do that, the nearest centre is a 14-mile round trip away, which is very challenging for a number of people.
I have also received a number of e-mails saying that there is a yo-yo process going on. One ex-serviceman was assessed in 2003 as being 30 per cent disabled and yo-yoed eight times in the next five years or so between being 30 per cent and 70 per cent disabled. These various reassessments and appeals were carried out at significant expense to the public purse and distress to the individual. When he questioned the process, this man was told by the assessor that he was moved back and forth so many times because they did not really understand trauma.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, has said, disabled people are constantly being labelled in the media as benefit scroungers. The rise in the amount of hate crime is a real concern. Could the Minister reassure disabled people who are feeling vulnerable and afraid, who see no light at the end of the tunnel and no improvement in the process? They want to work and be part of society but they feel themselves to be victims of what is happening.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
My Lords, I support this amendment. As has been stated, the WCA is about deciding whether a claimant has limited capability, either for work or work-related activity. As the noble Baroness, Lady Howe, said, there is no definition in the Bill, nor indeed in regulation, about what is meant by “work”. This is particularly important for those with fluctuating conditions, who are, at different times, both fit for work and incapable of work within the same month. We already know that, apart from any assessment, people with unpredictable fluctuations find it difficult to obtain employment or to keep it. This is partly because of their previous work records, partly if any of these fluctuations occurred during a probation period, and partly if they are honest and open with a potential employer.
It goes without saying that we support the principle of helping all those who are able to work to do so, but I am concerned about the apparent drop-off in the number of new customers helped by the Access to Work scheme, which has gone down to 13,240 compared with 16,520 in the previous year—a fall of nearly a quarter. It would be interesting to know what is thought to be the reason behind that, because it is an important way of helping people into work.
The really important word in this amendment is “sustainable”. Sustainable employment is defined as 15 or 16 hours a week and on a basis probably of 26 weeks. This amendment is particularly important, as the Government are proposing that regulations about defining capability for work or work-related activity are to be subject only to negative resolution procedure and thus with no opportunity for debate.
We have had a note which states that the Government’s intention is that regulations made under subsection (3) will set out the detailed circumstances and descriptors used to determine limited capability for work and limited capability for work-related activity. These regulations will be based on the Employment and Support Allowance Regulations 2008 and the subsequent amendments contained in the Employment and Support Allowance (Limited Capability for Work and Limited Capability for Work-related Activity) (Amendment) Regulations 2011 and any other changes to the ESA provisions before the introduction of UC in 2013.
We understand that the Government are undertaking further work to develop a supplement to the assessment to accurately identify individuals with enduring health conditions that limit their long-term ability to fully provide for themselves through work. However, regulations under Clause 41, which are also subject to the negative resolution procedure, will define the meaning of “work”. Given that this is another area where we remain unclear of the Government’s plan, it will be particularly important to have assurances about how people with fluctuating conditions are to be protected.
Welfare Reform Bill
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Lord Newton of Braintree
There are too many hurdles in the amendment. In legal terms, although I am not a lawyer, it would be impossible to have guaranteed and predictable access to,
“high quality flexible and affordable childcare”,
because the parents could say that it was not acceptable. Indeed, the child could say that it was not acceptable. It is not a sensible construct, as I am sure any legal mind would advise. The noble Baroness may not agree, but that is certainly the view I would take if I was advising the Minister.
However, coming back to the noble Earl, the childcare issue is an important one, as we have recognised throughout the proceedings on this Bill. It could be crucial to whether it is sensible or reasonable to expect some people, be they single parents or others, to take up work. So we need a clear policy on this, even if in my view this amendment does not give it to us. I hope that the Minister will be able to give us some encouragement on that front.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I would like to speak up for working parents because I am a working mother, and as noble Lords may have noticed I have brought my daughter to work with me. The amendment goes some way towards addressing some of the challenges that working parents face. It is absolutely my choice that I work 300 miles away from where I live, and it is the choice that my family and I have made. But trying to find flexible, affordable and appropriate childcare is really difficult. I am not sure whether that makes me a good or a bad mother, but I think that bringing my daughter along to a Lords Grand Committee is better than leaving her in childcare for a week. However, for people in more challenging financial positions, it is a real challenge.
I agree that it is better if parents are working, and I think that I am a better mother because I work. I think also that my daughter would probably say that it is not acceptable to be dragged along to a sitting of this Grand Committee and that she might prefer to be somewhere else. The wording of the amendment might not be quite correct, but it is important that we get these exceptions right. It is bad enough that as a mother you feel guilty for everything that you do anyway. You are accused of abandoning your child, not being a good mother and all those other things, when you are trying to do a good job. So it is important to get this right so that children can benefit from it—then parents and the family will benefit from it as well.
Baroness Drake
I was not going to come in on this amendment, but I feel moved to do so—
Welfare Reform Bill
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Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I have a few words to add to those of the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas, about people in manual wheelchairs. I have been contacted by a number of disabled people recently who are very keen to get into work, but they have told me some heartbreaking stories of the hidden discrimination that they have faced. One young lady had very good skills and qualifications and she applied for more than 40 jobs but was turned away from each of them for some quite interesting reasons. It all boiled down to the fact that it would be too difficult to employ her. I think it was a case of providing a little extra support. We want to get that group of people into work and they want to be in work. It is important for them to be in work so that the rest of society can see their range of impairments and disabilities. That will encourage people to be much more open-minded. I am really concerned that we are not doing everything we can to ensure that that group of people get a fair crack of the whip.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
My Lords, we support this group of amendments, which seeks to ensure that a person’s long-term health condition or impairment is taken into account, both when drawing up a claimant commitment and when considering compliance and, therefore, possible sanctions. Amendment 51CE requires that evidence from a claimant's own health professionals is part of any health assessment required in drawing up the work preparation requirements, along the lines set out by the noble Baroness, Lady Hollins, and emphasised by the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher.
The amendments affect both those claiming ESA and those who fail the assessment process and are asked to claim JSA instead. They apply to people with long-term physical or mental health conditions and impairments. I particularly bring to the attention of the Committee the fact that many of these long-term conditions also fluctuate, as has been mentioned, particularly things like multiple sclerosis. As the Committee will know, MS is twice as prevalent in women as it is in men, so it will excuse us taking a moment on it. Some long-term conditions, such as relapse-remitting MS, also happen to have what can appear to be very non-specific symptoms, such as fatigue, generalised pain and cognitive difficulties. It is vital that the assessors understand those, along the lines mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, and that the advisers take full account of the claimant’s own physician.
The DWP note states:
“Claimants with a health condition, or who are undergoing regular treatment to manage their health condition (but do not have limited capability for work) will be required to provide evidence of any limitations on what work (hours, nature of work, and location) they are capable of doing. This will be taken into account when setting … requirements”.
However, as has already been touched on, if a claimant raises reasonable objections to their work availability and work-search requirements, although those will be considered by the adviser, where there is no agreement, the claimant can only get them reviewed by another officer. That was mentioned earlier by my noble friend Lord McKenzie. That falls short of a proper right of appeal.
As we know, the process for assessing whether someone has limited capability for work is not perfect. It is not easy. Will the Minister update us on the implementation of the year 2 recommendations from the Harrington review following last month’s closing date for evidence? This continued process and the very real concerns that it is causing disabled people mean that it is important that long-term health conditions are considered when the claimant is asked to sign up to that claimant commitment or when good cause is being considered as to whether a sanction should be imposed for failure to comply.
Even if the review process is perfect, there will still be some people with long-term health conditions who are able to undertake work search but who need their conditions to be taken into account. They may, for example, be able to work very competently and fully but for only part of the day or a few days a week from time to time. In other words, they can work well but not necessarily on a sustainable basis. The resulting absences or the requirement for additional time to travel to work or extra support at work need to be taken fully into account when assessing both their search for jobs or subsequent work record. The descriptors relating to fluctuating conditions will be crucial in assisting the assessors.
Because the claimant commitment is new, we do not know the extent to which DWP advisers will take long-term or fluctuating conditions into account. There is a precedent for health conditions to be taken into account when good cause for turning down a job is considered. Those are already set out and include,
“any condition … that suggests that a particular job or carrying out a jobseeker’s direction, would be likely to cause you excessive physical or mental stress or significant harm to your health”.
The draft regulations do not list how this issue will be dealt with under universal credit. Will the Minister outline what is intended in this regard?
I want to finish by bringing to the attention of the Committee the concerns of Scope, which is very worried about the proposals as they stand. It fears that,
“there will not be adequate safeguards to ensure that sanctions are not applied to disabled people who are unable to meet the conditions due to factors relating to their impairment or condition”.
Scope is,
“not convinced that applying long-term sanctions … will incentivise those to comply after the sanction has been introduced”.
Moreover, Scope is,
“deeply concerned that the use of stricter sanctions will impact upon disabled people receiving JSA”.
After all, sanctions are most likely to affect those who did not fully understand that penalties could be imposed. This frequently involves claimants who already face multiple barriers to work, including various disabilities.
Scope also believes that there is little to suggest that sanctioning such claimants in this way will actually do much to change behaviour when a claimant, perhaps with a learning disability, has not understood why they were sanctioned in the first place. Scope is concerned that conditionality requirements and sanctions, as has been mentioned by other noble Lords this afternoon, will not be applied to disabled people until there has been proper consideration of need. A thorough assessment of need and barriers to finding work must be carried out before any decision is taken to apply a sanction. I look forward to hearing from the Minister how he responds to the concerns raised by the noble Baronesses, Lady Hollins and Lady Meacher, and other noble Lords who have spoken.
Welfare Reform Bill
Baroness Grey-Thompson Excerpts(12 years, 8 months ago)
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The Earl of Listowel
I hope that the Committee will forgive me; I omitted to declare my interest when I spoke about the work of National Grid Transco. I have received hospitality from them on a number of occasions and I have declared that.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
I was asked yesterday morning to come into this room and check for accessibility. I came in at 2.15 pm to check that there was enough room and we are fortunate that a huge amount of work had gone on to make sure that there was enough space for wheelchair users who might come to speak or to deal with various colleagues’ needs. On the point about voting, my personal view is that it is incredibly important that if I take part in a vote, I actually walk, or push, through the Lobby. As much as being able to see my name in a list, it is important to me that Members of your Lordships’ House see which way I push. If there is a Division—I hope not today—I will be going to vote and that is something important that we should all have the opportunity to do.
I know that not all my fellow Peers feel as strongly about walking down one of the Lobbies as I do, but it is very important in terms of democracy.
Baroness O'Loan
I have a brief point in support of the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell. As we later consider the disability living allowance and the PIP which will replace it, we need to bear in mind that our understanding of the consequences of living with disability is limited. We demonstrate that by the way in which we conduct our business. People will judge the extent of our understanding in the discussion we have about social security arrangements for them. It is a hugely important issue.
Welfare Reform Bill
Baroness Grey-Thompson Excerpts(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I understand the need for reform of the welfare system, and I support a system that is more simplistic and better able to deliver what is required to those who need it. I am pleased to hear that the most vulnerable and those in greatest need will get the support they deserve, but it must not be at the expense of others who need it to live equally.
My concerns cover a number of areas. Like many in your Lordships’ House, I have been contacted by many disabled people who are terrified that this is the first step towards an insurance-based, perhaps Americanised system which will further discriminate against those in need. I am concerned that the Bill will leave a significant number of disabled people in a precarious position where they do not get the help and support that they require. Under the new system, those people may not be considered disabled enough to be supported, but may be considered by society to be too disabled to play a full part in it.
As many disabled people as possible should be in work, but many will still experience discrimination in the workplace, will be in the lowest paid jobs, and will struggle to reach their potential without support. The new system may provide those in low-paid work with a higher earnings disregard, but it looks likely that a narrower group will be able to access this than those currently receiving the disability element of working tax credit. We need to ensure that this group is able to make the transition into real work and to have the right support until this is possible. I believe that the ethos of support needs to change. Perhaps now is a good time. Until now, to get support has been about proving what you cannot do. We need to look at what people, whoever they are, can achieve if the correct mechanisms are in place.
Disability is not homogenous. Even two people with the same impairment—for example, with my level of spina bifida—will have very different needs, depending on their upbringing, on where they live, on their education and on what support they have around them. The Joseph Rowntree Trust has estimated that it costs 25 per cent more to be a disabled person in the UK due to housing costs, aids, transport, et cetera. Being disabled puts a great burden on the individual and their families.
The media coverage of disabled people is already varied. Disabled people are either portrayed as athletes or as work-shy benefit scroungers. There is not much in the middle. The reality is that we know that the rate of abuse of the current system is 0.5 per cent. From my own personal experience, I know that if I am recognised as “the one who used to be the athlete” or as someone in your Lordships’ House, I am generally treated extremely well. However, if I am seen as “that woman in a wheelchair”, or more usually, “that wheelchair”, then my treatment can often be somewhat less favourable. Recently, on returning to the UK by air, I had a difficult experience, when I was left sitting on the plane for a time. I was removed, left at the gate, then left sitting in an airport without any mobility and very nearly crawled through passport control because I wanted to get home. As it was, I missed my connection and an hour and a half later I managed to get to where my bags were and finally to my wheelchair.
I am very concerned that the 20 per cent cut to working-age DLA expenditure, although estimated at £1.3 billion, will affect the care and mobility support that disabled people can access, and increase reliance on council services. I have great concerns that this could radically change people’s ability to work and push the problem into other areas, such as health.
Those who will fall outside the system could be pushed into a ghetto from which it will be hard to escape. I wonder how far away we are from a point where we have the “deserving disabled”, who require support, and the “undeserving disabled”, who are left in limbo. Growing up, I did not see many disabled people. They existed but they were locked away in schools and care homes—and I never want to return to that. We have to ensure that disabled people are still allowed to be independent.
Take me, for example. I am relatively healthy—perhaps not as fit as I used to be. Without the support of DLA I might have been able to learn to drive at 17, but I would not have been able to afford a car or insurance. I would not have been independent. I would not have moved away from home. I would have found it nearly impossible to go to university and I would have struggled to become an athlete. Because of the support that I had then, I am now able to give back. I am fortunate that I am now in a position to buy the equipment and support that I need, but 99 per cent of disabled people are not.
If we are to support changes, much more needs to be done to ensure that discrimination in the workplace disappears and that there is an improvement in public transport, which outside London is not generally that accessible. If I want to travel by train, I am meant to book the exact train time 24 hours in advance. Can anyone imagine a non-disabled commuter having to do that every single day? This is the unseen reality that disabled people face.
Like many in your Lordships’ House, I am concerned about the DLA removal from residents of council-funded care homes. Many disabled people living in residential homes use this component to pay for either a mobility aid, such as a wheelchair, or travel costs to see family and friends. If this is removed, we remove people’s freedom. I listened to the Minister’s opening remarks and look forward to future discussions in this area.
We must also have faith in the PIP assessment process and, as was clear from listening to the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell of Surbiton, disabled people do not. Many of these assessments are complicated, but they must take into account all the medical evidence that is available and use the best documentation. They must ensure it is done properly the first time, and that the use of appeals is not a delaying tactic in providing the support required.
I also have concerns about time-limiting ESA to one year. I will refrain from commenting now, with the constraints on time that we have, but I acknowledge the speeches of the noble Baronesses, Lady Hollins and Lady Morgan of Drefelin, and the noble Lord, Lord Rix. Will the Minister assure us that all disabled people will continue to get the support that they need to live equal lives? Can I have his assurance that we are not dooming a generation of disabled people to a life of hardship? Does he consider that I have disability-related costs? People like me are afraid that we will lose vital allowances. Will we?
Yes, we are in tough economic times and there is a need for change, but we need to ensure that these changes help disabled people fulfil their potential and not hold them on the first rung of the ladder.
Pensions Bill [HL]
Baroness Grey-Thompson Excerpts(13 years, 3 months ago)
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Baroness Howe of Idlicote
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, on his amendment and I thank everyone for the very warm support that it got. Obviously, I would rather that amendment had won, but the vote was indeed very narrow. With that in mind, I would certainly want to support the proposal of my noble friend Lady Greengross, which would certainly do something along the lines that the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, was trying to achieve with his amendment.
If the Minister can find a way to accept that, it will give some comfort at least to those who feel strongly—and have shown how strongly they feel—about this issue. I hope he will bear that in mind when he comes to reply.
Baroness Grey-Thompson
My Lords, I rise to speak to this amendment as someone who is certainly not an expert in pension provision; I admit to finding a lot of it rather confusing. The amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Greengross, is a very positive and useful way forward.
What concerns me is not the arguments that we heard earlier about the 2.6 million women having to wait longer than expected, the 330,000 who will have to wait 18 months or even the 33,000 who will have to wait two years to receive their pension, but the fact that, of the current pensioners who live in poverty, two-thirds are women. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has made estimates about the poverty level, which it set at around £14,000 a year, and recognises that one in four women retiring today has less than £10,000 a year to live on. We know that women earn less pay on average, while taking time out to raise children means that they earn less over their lifetime. For me, though, the inequality in savings that women have access to is a stark reminder of where many women live today. The average savings in pension schemes of women between 51 and 59 are £37,000, compared to the £54,000 that men hold.
We have heard many case studies. I am very fortunate. I employ someone who is 56 and has a sister who is four years older. Maureen will have to wait 10 years beyond the age of her sister to receive her pension. This is someone who worked for a number of years, took time out to bring up a disabled child, went back into part-time work and, with nothing impelling her to contribute to a pension scheme, made decisions to try to save money but also had to recognise that there was a huge potential loss of salary in contributing to a personal pension scheme. I fear that we are going to alienate a large group of women and penalise them for making sound family choices to stay at home and bring up children and look after them.
It may be true that we need change and need to move on. It might be true that women have relied too heavily on their husbands’ careers and earnings in setting their pension limits, but I strongly believe that women deserve to have more time to adjust to this change in thinking.
Lord Stoneham of Droxford
We are very sympathetic to the noble Baroness’s amendment. I congratulate her on an important contribution to this debate on an issue that the Government must address. A number of reasons have been explained, in this debate and in the preceding debate, on why that is important. Men are not being disadvantaged by more than one year, but over half a million women are. The period of notice is inadequate. Women in this age group are some of the most disadvantaged in terms of their pension provision. We have to accept that there is a contradiction with the coalition agreement. We are expecting some assurances from the Government in this debate, but we also accept that this is largely a negotiating matter with the Treasury. We welcome the announcement in the Budget of the new basic pension.
The noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, complained at Second Reading that the Pensions Bill ignored the £140 new basic pension, and said that it was like Hamlet without the prince. Now we have Hamlet with the prince but without a script. We want to see some details of the government proposals before committing ourselves to new transitional arrangements. We know that in present value terms the amendment will cost £7 billion, but the Government need to address the problem and come back with a considered amendment during the passage of this Bill in the other House with regard to how women affected by these transitional arrangements will benefit from the new higher basic pension.