Social Security (Personal Independence Payment) (Amendment) Regulations 2017

Debate between Baroness Grey-Thompson and Lord Low of Dalston

Monday 27th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Low of Dalston]

My Lords, I declare my interest as a recipient of disability living allowance, the precursor to the personal independence payment. I therefore have an interest in this type of benefit. Two simple and basic points make the case against these regulations, open and shut.

First, this is a clear breach of faith with the disability community. Back in 2012, when PIP was first introduced, Mind and other mental health charities raised concerns that people with mental health problems would be able to score points only under the criterion which used the words “psychological distress”. The Government gave reassurances that that was not the case and that people with mental health problems could potentially score points under a range of criteria if their condition meant that they struggled to plan and follow a journey. On this basis, PIP was welcomed by the mental health and wider disabilities sector, because for the first time people with mental health problems felt they would be given access to disability support equal to that of people with physical disabilities.

The Government made clear commitments that people who experienced psychological distress would be eligible under the very criterion that is now being changed. These commitments were underlined in statements by Ministers in debates on the Welfare Reform Bill at the time—the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, has quoted the statements by Maria Miller and Esther McVey, so I do not need to repeat them. However, in practice, the DWP has not deemed people who experience psychological distress eligible for the full range of points, regardless of how severely that distress affects them. This has meant that 164,000 people have received a lower rate than they were entitled to.

This is the origin of the two cases which came before the Upper Tribunal at the end of 2016. The tribunal’s rulings did not extend the scope of PIP, as the Government suggest, but clarified it. That is what tribunals do: they do not make the law; they clarify what the law is. It is the Government who are now seeking to restrict the scope of PIP from what it has always been understood to be by removing psychological distress from criterion 1f as a reason for not being able to follow a familiar route without assistance, so that a claimant can only be awarded four points under mobility descriptor 1b. The regulations are in clear breach, if not of a manifesto commitment on this occasion, then certainly of pledges given to those with mental health problems in 2012. This change to the eligibility criteria also flies in the face of the statement in the Work, Health and Disability: Improving Lives Green Paper that the Government will not seek to make any further cuts to disability benefits following the already controversial cuts for those receiving employment support allowance in the WRAG, for new claimants from 1 April this year.

My second point can be made even more briefly: the proposed changes would create a legal distinction between those with mental health problems and those with other kinds of impairment when it comes to benefit assessments, a distinction which flies in the face of the Government’s commitment to parity of treatment for people with mental health conditions. The Government have said that a person with a cognitive impairment alone will still be eligible for the highest mobility rate, but the term “cognitive impairment” far from covers the full range of people with mental health problems.

I believe these regulations are trying to move the goalposts by excluding people who experience psychological distress from eligibility for the higher number of points necessary for the higher rate of mobility component. In doing so, they effectively discriminate against people with mental health problems. This is clearly against the original intention of PIP and runs counter to the commitment the Government made to people with mental health problems—that they would be assessed in the same way as other disabled people. I support the Motions before us this evening to oppose these regulations and if the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, moves for a vote, I will support hers.

[Baroness Grey-Thompson (CB)]

My Lords, as ever, I have had a huge number of emails on this debate tonight. I had several hundred after the last debate tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas of Winchester, on the 20/50 rule, so I am expecting many more tonight.

I understand that many charities have written to the Prime Minister on this issue, and I am concerned about the way the question of who is eligible has been misunderstood. It has been suggested that this is not a big change, but like other noble Lords tonight, I have many concerns. To add to something that my noble friend Lady Campbell of Surbiton said about visible and invisible impairments, with something as simple as the use of a blue badge, there is huge misunderstanding about who can qualify for one—who should have one and who should not—and how people are treated if they are perceived as not disabled enough to need one. That is relatively simple compared to some of the intricacies of the PIP assessment forms.

I have issues with the name “personal independent payment”, because it is not terribly accurate. It is a contribution towards independent living but does not cover all the costs of someone with a disability living independently. I declare an interest in that I am a recipient of PIP, and was a recipient of disability living allowance. I went through the transfer process last year, which was interesting and arduous. Just the forms to tell you that you have to transfer are complicated enough, but when I made the phone call to register, I was left on hold for over 25 minutes. With each passing minute, you are worried that the phone call is going to drop out. Then I was asked a number of questions which could be construed as confusing. I have some understanding in this area, and they were really difficult questions for me to answer. I was asked the same questions repeatedly, back and forth. I was asked the name of the medical personnel who could best describe my impairment, which is really difficult because I am disabled, not ill—I cannot even remember the last time I went to the doctor. It got to the point where I was even doubting my own answers, and I am not exactly lacking in confidence when it comes to being able to understand and explain the challenges that I face with being mobile.

I have said it before and I will keep saying it: it is essential that we have a better decision-making process. The cost of mandatory reconsiderations and tribunals is simply too high. Scope has said that 89% of applicants who have gone to a tribunal for a mandatory reconsideration or appeal in the last quarter have received a new decision. Could the Minister say how much the mandatory reconsiderations and appeals are costing? If decision-making were better, how much money could be saved to plough back into the system?

Care Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Grey-Thompson and Lord Low of Dalston

Tuesday 16th July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Grey-Thompson]

My Lords, Amendment 88Q relates to the eligibility for social care. This is a probing amendment in order for the Committee to debate the most critical area of social care reform for working-age disabled people—that is, whether they are eligible to receive the care and support that they need to lead independent lives.

The Government’s regulations have now confirmed that the Care Bill will be nothing more than an unachievable aspiration for more than 100,000 working-age disabled people and more than 150,000 older people who have significant care needs but will not be eligible for support. It is not my intention to debate the nuances of the regulations that have been published in draft, and the Minister would, rightly, tell me that this is not the time or the place to do so. However, it is my intention to focus on the policy principle concerning who should be eligible for social care and support. I also thank the Minister in another place for taking the time to meet me yesterday to discuss my amendment.

The difference that good-quality social care can make cannot be underestimated. It is the difference between being isolated, living locked up and staring at the same four walls or being set on the path to living a full and independent life. The recent Time to Invest in Care publication described the situation faced by David, a 23 year-old man with autism and schizophrenia who currently lives with his parents. David needs support to engage in activities and look for suitable jobs. He needs guidance to gain a better understanding of social rules and to develop his awareness of dangers in the community. He also has difficulty in understanding boundaries in regard to friendships. As a result of receiving the right social care and support, David has a volunteering job and is now working towards moving into supported living and leading an independent life. This is the difference that the right social care support can make.

However, under the current eligibility system David has been assessed as having only moderate care needs. This means that, under the eligibility regulations set out alongside the Care Bill, David would not be entitled to support and his future would therefore be far less positive. Essentially, the Government’s regulations mean that David should not receive this formal social care support.

That brings me to the policy intention of the regulations. I very much welcome the pause in the proceedings of the Care Bill in this House so that time has been allowed for us to look over the regulations that have now been published in draft. I have read them with interest and there is much in the direction of them that is to be welcomed. They represent a real improvement on the current system. Particularly positive is the focus on well-being and, specifically, the inclusion of shopping and managing household finances in the definition of basic household activities. This appears to be a very progressive step which joins up the regulations with the very first clause of the Bill, which has been widely praised, and I congratulate the Government on that. It is also a very brave and positive step to end the postcode lottery in care provision.

However, I have very real concerns about the Government’s intention—as stated by the Minister in another place in his foreword to the draft regulations—that in terms of practical outcome the regulations will be equivalent to “substantial” under the current system. This will be devastating news to the hundreds of thousands of disabled and older people with significant care needs who will be excluded from receiving formal social care.

The Minister is aware that historic underfunding of the social care system, the pressures of an ageing population and a 33% reduction in local council budgets by 2014-15 have led to many local authorities raising the threshold at which disabled and older people become eligible. In 2005, 50% of local authorities set their eligibility criteria at “moderate”. By 2012, 84% had set the eligibility criteria at the higher level of “substantial” needs. The result is that since 2008 90,000 people have fallen out of the care system.

The excellent report, The Other Care Crisis, illustrates the impact that this has had. Four in 10 disabled people who receive social care support say that it does not meet their basic needs, such as washing, dressing and getting out of the house—all things that we take for granted. The Care Bill will not resolve this crisis in care if the regulations are set at the level currently proposed. In fact, by setting a national minimum threshold at a level which maintains this crisis, the Government appear to be reducing their ambition for their social care reforms.

One point which has not been picked up is that the Government also appear to be reducing their ambition for the cap on care costs. While it is a welcome and important measure to attempt to cap the catastrophic costs of care that some people face, particularly in their old age, the Government have made it clear that the cap will only be triggered once an individual has been deemed eligible for care. Setting the bar for eligibility too high effectively means that there will be hundreds of thousands of people who think that they will not have to sell their homes to pay for care in their old age, yet will not be eligible for the cap itself. They will still have to pay for the cost of their care, even well above the £72,000 threshold, unless they are deemed eligible by their local authority.

For working-age disabled people the cap on care costs is irrelevant. The recent joint parliamentary inquiry, co-chaired by my noble friend Lady Campbell of Surbiton, highlighted the fact that the introduction of the cap was never designed to answer the care crisis for disabled people under 65. The inquiry was clear that the most crucial aspect of reform for working-age disabled people is where the eligibility for care is set. For them, this is the difference between living an independent life and spiralling into crisis.

I also have very real concerns that those disabled people who are set to lose out as a result of the Government’s welfare reforms will be the same people who will lose out on social care. It is highly likely that an individual who has significant care needs, but who falls just short of the current threshold, will be one of the half a million disabled people who will not get the personal independence payment under the new system. This means that not only will the social care that enables them to live independent lives be beyond their reach, but their financial independence will also be threatened further.

It appears to me that there is a clear group of disabled people whom the Government deem not quite disabled enough to receive support. Providing them with just enough support to remain independent will prevent them spiralling into crisis, costing local authorities much more money in crisis emergency care. I also believe that there is a clear economic argument to be made here. Economic modelling, carried out by Deloitte and published in the Ending the Other Care Crisis report, found that an investment of £1.2 billion in a lower eligibility threshold, equivalent to the current “moderate” level, would lead to substantial returns across government. This would include a £70 million saving to central government through increased taxes and reduced welfare spending. There would also be a £570 million saving to the NHS and local government through the avoidance of expensive crisis care.

The Government made a very welcome investment of an additional £2 billion at the recent spending review. I urge the Minister to use this money to invest in a lower national eligibility threshold, not just to ensure that his ambition for a care-based system on well-being becomes a reality, but for the savings it could generate as well.

In conclusion, as Members from across the House have repeatedly made clear, the Care Bill is a very good piece of legislation, and is welcome. However, we must make sure that disabled and older people who have significant care needs do not fall out of the social care system. If the eligibility threshold continues to be set at the level the Government have proposed, hundreds of thousands of disabled and older people will be shut out of the care system. There will be real concerns that the Government’s admirable focus on well-being will be far from reality for these people. I beg to move.

[Lord Low of Dalston]

My Lords, I am glad to support Amendment 88Q, put forward by the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson. As she has explained, the amendment seeks to ensure that the national eligibility threshold, a welcome feature of the Bill, is set at a level which will not exclude this group of more than 100,000 disabled people with significant needs from the social care system.

I would like to focus particularly on the role of the eligibility threshold in creating a truly preventive care system. While I welcome the explicit duty on local authorities actively to take steps to prevent delay or reduce the need for care and support, I fear that the regulations published last week on the national eligibility threshold will impede the realisation of this vision. In confirming their intention to set the threshold at a level equivalent to “substantial” under the current criteria for fair access to services, the Government would exclude more than 100,000 disabled people with moderate care needs from the care system. These are people who need support to get out of bed in the morning, wash, eat, get out of the house and participate in the community—the most basic of tasks that you need to be able to do in order to live a fulfilling life.

Moreover, denying disabled people with moderate needs the care and support they need is a false economy. If their needs are not met in the care system there is a real risk that they will escalate to a point where they have to be dealt with further down the line once they reach crisis point. This does not come cheap. It could lead to longer hospital stays, frequent readmissions, even the need for residential support, not to mention the lost tax revenue resulting from disabled people having to give up work as a result of losing social care support. This happens in one in three cases of working-age disabled people who need care.

Take, for example, the case of Elizabeth, of which I have been made aware. She used to have seven hours of key worker support a week to help with managing her bills and shopping. Following a letter from her council she was told, with no consideration of the impact it would have on her independence, that her hours would be reduced to three per week. As a consequence of losing this support she fell into a crisis. As she said, “I did have a job—I was working with disabled people—but I left because I couldn’t cope. I thought it wasn’t fair on the clients. I was going through a bad time, overdosing a lot”.

This case illustrates how only a small amount of timely support can pay real dividends. Support with shopping and managing her bills helped Elizabeth maintain an independent life. However, as a consequence of losing her support she was left in crisis, resulting in her making several suicide attempts and becoming reliant on more expensive medical services.

Under the current draft regulations Elizabeth would be shut out of the care system. I have real fears that cases such as hers will be replicated up and down the country. Indeed, despite the Government’s supportive words about prevention I am concerned that they are effectively regulating for prevention to be taken out of the care system. The consultation document published last week on the draft minimum eligibility threshold states that for those people who are not eligible for care— namely, the 100,000 disabled people with moderate care needs—local authorities will make available universal support, including information, advice and preventive services.

However, this implies that coverage of such services is comprehensive, consistent and of adequate quality when we know that this is not the case. The reality is that many such services have already been axed or are at risk of closure. Indeed, research by the Red Cross has found that nearly two-thirds—64%—of councillors said that their local authority had cut or frozen funding for prevention and lower level social care since the last local elections. This means that universal services will simply not have the capacity to provide the adequate preventive support that the Government intend. People who are not eligible for care will continue to face a postcode lottery of support and will be allowed to fall through the gap between the care system and universal services.

I end by emphasising that setting eligibility at a lower level is the essence of prevention. We cannot have a system where you have to reach crisis point before you can get the support you need. Early intervention and preventive support can also have significant financial benefits. Research undertaken by Deloitte on behalf of disability charities found that investing in people with lower levels of need provides a net positive return of at least 30% to the Government. I therefore hope that the Government will be prepared to take these points on board and ensure that the regulations on eligibility underpin rather than undermine the vision of a truly preventive care system, glimpsed in Clause 2 but, sadly, not yet fully followed through in later clauses.

Welfare Benefits Up-rating Bill

Debate between Baroness Grey-Thompson and Lord Low of Dalston

Tuesday 5th March 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Low of Dalston]

My Lords, the amendments would remove the benefits paid on behalf of children from the scope of the Bill because that disproportionately hits children and families. That is why I have added my name to them. Where 30% of all households are affected by the Bill, nearly nine out of 10 families with children are affected, including 19 out of 20 lone-parent families.

In total, the Children’s Society has estimated that about 11.5 million children are affected by the Bill. As the right reverend Prelate explained, Amendments 14 and 19 would together remove child benefit and child tax credit from the scope of the Bill. That is made particularly necessary by the fact that child benefit has already been frozen for three years before the measures contained in the Bill take effect. That means that child benefit will increase by only 2% over the course of half a decade. Over the same period, prices as measured by CPI will have risen by more than 16%. I say that that justifies the removal of child benefit from the scope of the Bill but, in truth, it would be unjustifiable not to remove it.

These benefits are paid to working families from all walks of life, as well as non-working families. The Children’s Society’s benefits uprating cap impact calculator shows that a couple with two children with one earner working as a primary school teacher and earning £600 a week would lose £424 a year by 2015. A couple with three children and one earner, a corporal in the Army, say, earning £619 a week, would lose £552 a year by 2015, so we can see the impact of having extra children.

As we have heard, Amendment 17 would remove the 1% uprating cap from the lower child disability addition under universal credit. That is particularly justified by the fact that rates of support for children in that group are already intended to be halved under universal credit. At present, families with a disabled child for whom they are in receipt of some level of disability living allowance, may be entitled to receive support through the disability element of child tax credit, currently worth £57 a week. Under universal credit, that support is to be provided through disability additions within household benefit entitlements, but it is proposed to cut that support in half to just £28 a week. That change will affect all families with a disabled child unless the child is receiving the higher rate of care component of disability living allowance or is registered blind.

The review of the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, Holes in the Safety Net, of the impact of universal credit on disabled people and their families surveyed 1,400 families with disabled children about changes to support under universal credit. The evidence received suggested that, for those likely to be affected by the cut, the impact could be disastrous. Two-thirds of those likely to be affected said that if they received £30 a week less in benefits for their disabled child, they would have to cut back on food. At this point, I cannot resist asking: if the Minister shares other noble Lords’ disappointment at the greater resort to food banks, what does that say about her view of the government policy that she is supposed to be defending, as it is government policy that is leading to people’s greater resort to food banks?

Returning to the review of the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, more than half of those surveyed said that the changes would lead to them getting into debt, more than one in 10 that they might even need to move home. One parent told the inquiry:

“My child would have little quality of life and would lose much of the social interaction he needs. It would be like a prison sentence”.

Another simply expressed their desperation, saying:

“This would have such a huge impact on us I really don’t know what we would do”.

The Bill will further compound that cut. For a family with one disabled child, the impact of the change in uprating would be about £42 a year. It should be noted that that impact is on top of changes to the uprating of other benefits received by the family.

The Children’s Society estimates that the cost of uprating the lower child disability addition would be only £2.4 million in 2014-15 and £4.2 million in 2015-16. All this hardship for such a paltry saving. The disproportionate impact of the Bill on children cannot be overstated or justified. It is not the first time that austerity measures have had a disproportionate impact on children and families. In fact, as the noble Baroness, Lady Sherlock, told us, the Institute for Fiscal Studies found last year that, even with universal credit fully in place, taking together all the tax and benefit measures introduced or to be introduced between the beginning of 2011 and April 2014, families with children will lose a higher proportion of their income than either pensioner households or working-age households without children across the whole income distribution.

We have heard a lot this afternoon about the measurement of child poverty, but the IFS estimate of a growth in the number of children living in poverty of 400,000 between 2011 and 2015 and 800,000 by 2020, has been referred to more than once. The noble Lord, Lord Newby, said that we cannot set too much store by such predictions because we do not know what direction government policy may take. All I know is that the last time I heard, the Government intended to take a further £10 billion out of welfare. The Bill can only serve to increase the level of child poverty. Indeed, as the noble Lord, Lord Newby, acknowledged, it will add 200,000 to the number of children in poverty; 100,000 of them will be in working households.

Children do not have a vote. If they did, it is impossible to believe that they would be voting for the Bill as it stands.

[Baroness Grey-Thompson]

My Lords, my name is also attached to all three amendments in this group. I thank the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Ripon and Leeds for explaining the amendments.

First, I will cover Amendments 14 and 19 together. Households with children are much more likely to be affected by the Bill than households without children. Many families with children will be affected even when someone is working full time. A single person or couple with children obviously have much greater costs than those without dependent children. For this period of their life, the income they need to meet the basic living costs of their household is clearly greater. That means that the amount someone can be earning and still need extra financial support from benefits and tax credits stretches much higher up the income scale than for those without children.

The level of childcare costs and of rents—especially in the private rented sector— combined with the lack of a living wage means that people who can only find work at or near the minimum wage cannot escape from needing that extra financial support, for however much time they work. If they work more hours, they need more help with childcare. Many are already struggling to manage.

For example in a local paper in the north-east of England, where I live, Pauline Chambers, chief executive of Sedgefield and District citizens advice bureau in County Durham, said that the team had encountered levels of hardship not seen for 21 years. Telephone inquiries have increased by 100 per cent in the last two months, with many people struggling to pay for basic food and utilities. That view is repeated up and down the country. Julia Cornelius, manager of Luton CAB was quoted in a different paper. She said:

“Every day we see people who are struggling to keep a roof over their heads or put food on the table as wage squeezes, price rises and benefit cuts wreak havoc on household budgets”.

Those in work and on benefits gain little from their earnings increasing. A single person earning £250 a week who receives a £2.50 rise in their earnings will keep about £1.70 of the increase after deductions for tax and national insurance. If they have children, and so need to rely on benefits and tax credits, they will reduce as their income rises, so they will be left with a net gain of 10p from a rise in earnings of £2.50.

Welfare Reform Bill

Debate between Baroness Grey-Thompson and Lord Low of Dalston

Tuesday 17th January 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Grey-Thompson]

My Lords, the purpose of the amendment is to ensure that there is an independent report on the plans for both the PIP assessment and its implementation before implementation starts, and a trial period before it is implemented in full.

We have spent much time today debating why disability benefits matter so much, but perhaps I may briefly point out that nearly one-quarter of individuals in families with at least one disabled member live in relative income poverty, and over 50 per cent of working-age disabled adults are not in paid employment. One-third of working age disabled people are estimated to live in poverty.

There is huge concern about the effect of DLA reform. The thresholds for the new benefit were announced only yesterday. The modelling suggests that the second draft will produce a 2015-16 caseload of 1.7 million people receiving PIP. Without introducing the new benefit, we would expect the number of 16 to 64 year-olds claiming DLA in 2015-16 to be 2.2 million. That is a reduction of half a million people who will not receive any help with the cost of disability, who would have been receiving DLA.

Just last week an analysis of organisations’ responses to the original government consultation on DLA reform highlighted the amount of concern about the proposed changes. The extent of this concern was not clear from the DWP response to the consultation. Scope, in its report, The Future of PIP: A Social Model Based Approach, says:

“We remain very concerned that this decision is based purely on budgetary targets, rather than on robust evidence as to how the benefit is used and by whom”.

I just do not believe that there has been time to analyse who will lose out. The Disability Benefits Consortium stated:

“We are very concerned that there has not been due consideration of the impact this reform will have both on those who lose all their entitlement and those who are left with a reduced award following reassessment”.

The thresholds were published only yesterday, but without those thresholds it is impossible to look in detail at who will lose out. Without them, it is almost impossible to have an informed debate about this part of the Bill. The few examples in the consultation document, while helpful, cannot possible address this properly.

Why do we need an independent review and trial period? Some early analysis has suggested that one of the groups who might lose out are those with mental health conditions, who currently receive the lower rate of mobility. Many people with a mental health condition find it impossible to use public transport. They frequently use their DLA to pay for taxis. If they are unable to get out, it is likely to make them more socially excluded, and push them further from the job market. This is just one possible unintended consequence.

There needs to be careful scrutiny of who will be affected by these changes. Many more groups will emerge in the months and years ahead, together with some unintended consequences. I have a real concern that it could lead to a deterioration of people’s health. Will it impact on the social care budgets? There are so many more things to consider in this. For such a major change as this, it is important to be much clearer on what the changes will be.

There is concern not just about the test or the thresholds but about the way that the benefit is assessed, and this is a much greater change than the move from IB to ESA. An independent report on the plans for both the PIP assessment and its implementation, before the implementation starts, would provide an appropriate level of scrutiny, given the huge impact this reform will have on disabled people.

The trial of the IB reassessment process in Burnley and Aberdeen threw up a number of important lessons which the DWP learnt from and implemented in the full rollout. It is so important that there is a trial of PIP in a similar way before the full rollout to either new or existing claimants. I beg to move.

[Lord Low of Dalston]

My Lords, I declare my interest in these debates as a recipient of DLA. This amendment is every bit as important as those we passed last week. Noble Lords will know from their postbag that people are looking to us to ameliorate the worst excesses of this Welfare Reform Bill. Although the Bill has some very sensible and progressive things at its core, in the shape of universal credit, nevertheless it goes too far for most people’s consciences in the way that it takes vital support away from some of the most needy in our society, in ways that have been movingly illustrated—far more eloquently than I could—in earlier debates.

Let me be clear about what the amendment does and does not do. It does not entail the Bill being paused, as happened with the Health and Social Care Bill, and as it has been portrayed outside. It merely states that the new assessment regime should not be commenced until Parliament can be given the benefit of an independent review—a common enough procedure regarding the introduction of particular statutory provisions.

It may be said that it is pointless to pass such an amendment, and that the Commons will only reverse it. However, there are two reasons for passing it, notwithstanding that. First, it sends a strong signal to the Government that they cannot be too cavalier in the way that they drive the juggernaut of reform over those who are weakest and most defenceless in our community. Secondly, as we have seen in the last week, it ensures that they cannot do this below the radar of public attention.

I support the amendment from my noble friend Lady Grey-Thompson because I think that this is all being rushed through far too quickly to meet Treasury targets, before it is ready. The latest consultation draft of the assessment criteria reached us only yesterday, as we have heard, which has left little time to carry out the necessary analysis, but enough to see that it is still very much work in progress. For instance, just one day before we were due to discuss the Government’s plans for the future of DLA, the number of disabled people likely to lose help through the new assessment process was revised upwards to 500,000, as we have heard.

When the proposals were first announced in the June 2010 Budget we were told that a 20 per cent reduction in case load was likely. At that time this represented 360,000 disabled people, so the figure for the total of losers from the Government’s proposal has risen by 140,000, to which we should probably add the 80,000 care home residents who will no longer lose their mobility payments.

The Treasury’s target saving of 20 per cent was always arbitrary, being cost-driven rather than evidence-based. The Government themselves admit that the level of fraud is very low with DLA, at only 0.5 per cent. There are even suggestions that the increased figure for losers which we heard of yesterday will not achieve the Treasury’s target, either. At all events, the DWP is giving the impression of making it up as it goes along, all in an effort to satisfy its Treasury masters.

Disabled people do not have confidence in this process, which all serves to underline the fundamental unfairness of taking needed support away from the most vulnerable simply to meet Treasury targets. Confidence is not enhanced by the experience disabled people have had of the work capability assessment for out-of-work benefits. This was trialled on new claimants and regionally piloted for 18 months before national implementation, and has been the subject of two independent reviews, yet still gives rise to considerable difficulty, with 40 per cent of appeals upheld. This is a massive waste of money. We need to be sure that we have got the system right for the personal independence payment before it is introduced. So far, the DWP has tested the proposed assessment for PIP on fewer than 1,000 people. A sample of fewer than 1,000 is simply not enough to get a proper handle on the complexity of the issues that will arise when the full DLA caseload of 2.2 million people is put through the reassessment process; it is not like saying whether you vote Labour or Conservative.

Welfare Reform Bill

Debate between Baroness Grey-Thompson and Lord Low of Dalston

Monday 14th November 2011 Grand Committee

[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.

Academies Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Grey-Thompson and Lord Low of Dalston

Wednesday 7th July 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Low of Dalston]

My Lords, I will speak briefly given the hour. Despite the reassurances received by the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, there remain a number of concerns that need to be addressed. The specialist services of which the noble Baronesses, Lady Wilkins and Lady Howe, have spoken are at the heart of special education provision. As we have heard, they include support for mainstream teachers, Braille teaching and mobility instruction for visually impaired pupils, communication support, advice on equipment and speech and language support for pupils who are deaf or hard of hearing. I declare an interest as a vice-president of the RNIB, an organisation that is very concerned about the maintenance of services for blind and partially sighted pupils.

The services that I have mentioned are examples of those that meet low-incidence needs. The LEA is a large enough unit for these needs to attain a critical mass and generate demand for a level of support services that is capable of being sustained. The academy system is much more atomised and fragmented, and much less able to sustain a critical mass of support services. Of course, academies can form consortium arrangements, and the Minister spoke of partnerships; but it will inevitably take time to get these up and running, and in the mean time local authority arrangements are likely to become increasingly vulnerable as academies, with their attendant funding, opt out of the local authority system. Therefore it is absolutely essential that the Government make clear in detail exactly how specialist support services will be sustained in the new environment.

[Baroness Grey-Thompson]

My Lords, I support the amendments tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins. The noble Baroness, Lady Campbell, wanted to speak in support of the amendment, but could not make the late hour for health reasons. I am therefore pleased to take her place, after taking her considerable briefing.

I share her concern about losing essential support for disabled children if we do not ensure that the Bill delivers an appropriate system to do the job. I am a member of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Disability, chaired by the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell. The group has frequently been told that too many disabled children are not getting the specialist support that they need at school fully to engage with the curriculum. I am concerned that the Bill may have the unintended consequence of worsening this problem. I will give an example. The National Deaf Children's Society identified a case in the West Midlands in which a small all-through school became an academy. It admitted a disabled child who required significant levels of support. However, the academy had difficulty in funding this support as it took up a disproportionate amount of its special educational needs budget. As a small school working with one deaf child, the academy was unable to access the economies of scale that would have made the support for this child affordable.

On a more positive note, I am pleased to hear about Waltham Forest local authority, which decided to adopt a different funding model when a delegated structure similar to that proposed in the Bill failed to support the needs of disabled children. Now, a local special school receives its funding to operate an outreach service for all other local schools free of charge.

The lesson from Waltham Forest demonstrates how important it is to think through the impact of any changes to funding, especially for support services, before proceeding. I believe that this amendment helps us to do that and to avoid unnecessary damage to the education of disabled children. I urge the Minister to respond positively to it.