Welfare Reform Bill

Debate between Baroness Thomas of Winchester and Baroness Grey-Thompson

Wednesday 16th November 2011 Grand Committee

[Baroness Thomas of Winchester]

That will be helpful.

[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.