Welfare Reform and Work Bill

Debate between Earl of Listowel and Lord Low of Dalston

Monday 14th December 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Low of Dalston (CB)]

My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendment 62. At Second Reading I spoke about two issues that had been highlighted for me by my work as chair of an independent commission which had been considering the future of advice and legal support on social welfare law in England and Wales: how to protect the most vulnerable from the worst effects of sanctions, and how claimants might get the advice and support they need to adjust to the changes brought about by welfare reform legislation. Amendment 58 deals with the first of these and Amendment 62 with the second.

Operational guidance has been developed over a number of years to build some minimum safeguards into the application of conditionality-based decision-making—for example, in dealing with claimants with serious mental health problems or cognitive impairments. It has been evolved in a piecemeal fashion around certain minimum requirements covering, in broad terms: the identification of claimants with mental health conditions or a background of mental illness and liaison with social and mental health services, with such cases referred to a higher managerial decision-maker before a benefit withdrawal decision is made; the requirement for the DWP to consider any good cause as to why a claimant may not have met a particular condition; and a requirement for the DWP to attempt to contact the claimant, conduct a face-to-face discussion about the conditionality and, if necessary, arrange a home visit if they do not accept that good cause.

Welfare reform legislation and new policy on sanctions since the 2012 Act in particular has complicated matters, although the same guidance on minimum requirements carries over to a significant extent. The guidance is, however, piecemeal and scattered over several different operational guidance manuals, each with subtle differences in language and terminology, leading to application and practice that is far less consistent than it should be. Overall, this has meant that the guidance is weaker in its application to new JSA claims—in fact, there is no JSA-specific guidance—universal credit claimants and clients of Work Programme providers.

Welfare rights workers can also point to numerous cases where the DWP has failed to apply safeguards correctly, especially following ESA work capability assessments. The consequences for vulnerable claimants can be devastating. In its inquiry on benefits sanctions beyond the Oakley review, the Work and Pensions Select Committee concluded that:

“Given the complexity of the existing legislation, there is a strong case for a review of the underpinning legislative framework for conditionality and sanctions, to ensure that the basis for sanctioning is clearly defined, and safeguards to protect vulnerable groups clearly set out”.

The Select Committee further recommended strengthening and clarifying guidance around the protocols and purposes of home visits or core visits. It also recommended better guidance on vulnerability specifically directed to Jobcentre Plus staff in identifying vulnerable JSA claimants, including those with mental problems and learning difficulties who may face difficulties in understanding and/or complying with benefit conditionality.

I have a number of cases that illustrate the need for a stronger legal framework to protect vulnerable claimants in situations where they potentially face sanctions. Given the time, I will mention only one, but it graphically makes the point. Mr D had his ESA stopped after failing to attend a work capability assessment. The DWP was aware of his history of mental ill health and that he was receiving support from his local NHS mental health service. However, it did not carry out safeguarding procedures and did not attempt to contact his local NHS mental health service to find out more about the risks to Mr D’s health if his income were to be stopped. After benefit was stopped, Mr D’s mental health deteriorated and he became suicidal. His psychiatrist assessed that the benefits stopping was a stressor that put Mr D at severe risk of suicide. Mr D was assisted in contacting the advice service by his psychiatric nurse. After the advice service challenged the DWP on its handling of the case, benefit was reinstated and Mr D was placed in the support group of ESA.

Amendment 58 would address the state of the guidance and the recommendations of the Select Committee by inserting a new clause in the Bill which would provide a clear statutory underpinning and codification for all safeguarding procedures and guidance; put all the guidance in one place, which should make it more accessible, user-friendly and easier for professionals to use; require consistency and robustness of application, especially consistency between new and legacy benefits systems; and require the Secretary of State to report annually to Parliament on the operation of the safeguarding procedures. As the language used in the amendment is drawn from existing guidance—for example, as regards the approach to vulnerability—it does not attempt to impose a higher threshold of safeguarding requirements in relation to conditionality but rather to ensure that existing standards are made more effective, consistent and transparent. The amendment is therefore consistent with the scope of the Bill, and the 2012 Act and its predecessor legislation.

Amendment 62 addresses the question of how claimants might get the advice and support they need to adjust to changes brought about by welfare reform legislation. The universal credit support service framework is a DWP-led collaborative project with the Local Government Association to deliver local support for more vulnerable claimants and to assist those who might be unable to use the digital claims process or who may need help budgeting, given the transition to monthly payments. The DWP drives a lot of the demand for advice as a result of delays and failures within the system, so it is only right that it should have an obligation to support and fund welfare rights advice. It therefore needs to be engaged in directly supporting the advice sector to help vulnerable claimants transition to new benefit regimes and/or adjust to new entitlement rules, as well as helping to challenge the system when it gets decisions wrong.

Amendment 62 would insert a new clause in the Bill providing that the Secretary of State shall publish guidance for local authorities about their role in developing schemes to support claimants, especially claimants with additional needs or indicators of vulnerability, and report annually to Parliament on the operation of the universal credit local support service framework. It provides that guidance shall specify, among other things, the role of local authorities in developing partnerships to deliver support and a priority role for independent local advice agencies. Finally, it provides that the Secretary of State shall ensure that the universal credit local support service framework is appropriately resourced so that it can be rolled out to all local authority areas. It is difficult to establish how far the DWP intends to roll out its local universal credit support services beyond the initial UC pilot areas and how the funding for this works. Therefore, it would be helpful if the Minister told us what the department’s plans are in this regard and what the relationship is between the universal credit local support service funding and other grants to local authorities, such as the troubled families programme, and the information and advice strategies required by the Care Act. I beg to move.

[The Earl of Listowel (CB)]

I rise to support both these amendments and have attached my name to Amendment 62. I have an interest in this as vice-chair for the last 10 years of the parliamentary group for children in care and care leavers, and as a carer of a mentally ill adult. I know how fragile many of the individuals seeking welfare support are. The Minister himself may have been shocked to discover the issues around mental health as he has done his important work in building capacity in jobcentres. I strongly support my noble friend’s amendments.

Education Bill

Debate between Earl of Listowel and Lord Low of Dalston

Monday 12th September 2011 Grand Committee

[Lord Low of Dalston]

My Lords, this is a straightforward amendment which I hope the Minister may be willing to accept. The proposed new Clause 42, which I am moving, ensures that schools cannot be designated as teaching schools by the National College for School Leadership unless they have received an outstanding grade for teaching special educational needs.

The schools White Paper, The Importance of Teaching, made it possible for schools to apply for teaching-school status, allowing them to become centres of best teaching practice in their local area. Schools’ ability to apply for teaching-school status was extended to special schools teaching children with predominantly complex special educational needs in the SEN Green Paper, Support and Aspiration: A New Approach to Special Educational Needs and Disability. The eligibility criteria for schools applying for teaching-school status include an Ofsted rating as outstanding for overall effectiveness, teaching and learning and leadership and management. In these days, when so many more children with SEN are educated in mainstream schools, it is hard to see how a school could get a rating of outstanding for overall effectiveness without being able to demonstrate excellence in the teaching of children with SEN. However, given the specialised nature of this work, it would seem sensible to require schools to be able to demonstrate expertise in this area as well as those already listed in the criteria if schools are to be expected to improve teaching in the area of SEN and improve standards and spread best practice.

The Special Educational Consortium is concerned that under the existing eligibility criteria a mainstream school applying for teaching-school status could achieve this without having the necessary expertise in the teaching of children with SEN. This is a concern because many children and young people with special educational needs are now being taught in mainstream educational settings, where it is essential that schools should be able to recognise the particular challenges they face in accessing the mainstream curriculum. Given the importance of the teaching workforce having the skills to work with children with SEN, it is vital that schools be able to demonstrate their excellence in this area as part of the criteria for achieving teaching-school status.

Having an outstanding rating for the SEN element of a school’s work is also important for giving parents and children confidence that the practice being spread through local schools partnerships will help ensure that children with SEN can participate fully in learning. Introducing the additional criterion that schools have an outstanding rating from Ofsted for their SEN teaching will encourage schools considering applying for teaching-school status to address the way they open up the curriculum to children with SEN and, where children are taught in an SEN unit outside the mainstream school, how learning outcomes can be improved. This would help to address a significant barrier across all education settings, and the lack of expertise and understanding around low-incidence impairments such as deaf/blindness where access to communication and other teaching specialisms is necessary if the challenges are to be overcome.

Any sharing of best practice needs to have a well-developed knowledge base to draw on. However, the Special Educational Consortium’s experience is that knowledge of SEN and the added difficulties that learners with special educational needs face is lacking in many local areas. Requiring schools desirous of acquiring teaching-school status to be able to demonstrate expertise in teaching children with SEN could help to address this issue. I beg to move.

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, I support my noble friend’s amendment. We have seen a great change in the training of teachers in recent years. In the past, teachers typically were trained for three years to their bachelor educational degree, which was a good long grounding. We have seen that period reduced to one year, and more and more teachers are being trained on the job. I welcome the move to more classroom-based learning for teachers but we have to be sure that it is right. There is a risk to that strategy and I look for reassurance from the Minister that teachers will be getting an understanding of SEN in that training. Perhaps I may make a further comment—we should not forget that more and more classroom assistants are those who work one-to-one with children with SEN. They too need the high-quality training.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Earl of Listowel]

I hope that the Minister will forgive me if I make one further comment. Within the SEN group, I can see those children with emotional and behavioural difficulties particularly profiting from the Government's strategy to increase classroom-based learning. With those children, it is often the case that they can act out, act aggressively towards a teacher or other pupils. That can give rise to an understandable anger or irritation in the teacher which they may feel very moved to act on, but which will not be a helpful or appropriate reply to the behaviour. On the other hand, some children become very depressed, and it is easy to ignore them. Having an outsider observing the class and seeing how the teacher reacts can be a very helpful method to enable teachers to engage with EBD children and help to include them in the mainstream.

Models such as consultation for school staff, such as has been done for many years by the child and adolescent psychotherapist Emil Jackson in north London, is another way to help staff to think more deeply about their relationships with their pupils, particularly those who are challenging. I hope that the Minister will forgive me for making that additional comment.

[Lord Low of Dalston]

I am grateful to all those who have spoken in the debate, which has been supportive of the issue I raised. I am therefore glad to have flagged it up, but I am reassured by what the Minister said about the work going on—in particular what he said to the effect that an Ofsted designation of overall effectiveness will increasingly be difficult to achieve without a demonstration of quality or excellence in the field of SEN. I hope that the Minister and the department will continue to make clear to Ofsted that overall effectiveness requires all-round effectiveness but necessarily includes excellence in special educational needs. With the Minister’s reassurance about the work that is going on and the indication that he has given of the work being done to clarify that an Ofsted designation of teaching-school status will increasingly require excellence in special educational needs, I am happy to beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Academies Bill [HL]

Debate between Earl of Listowel and Lord Low of Dalston

Tuesday 13th July 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Low of Dalston]

The case has been well made by the noble Baronesses, Lady Wilkins and Lady Howe, and others. I spoke on the issue on Report so I shall not labour the point further. Indeed, it is hardly necessary as I think that the Minister acknowledged, in responding on Report, as the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, said, that there is a problem. There is a case to answer but the Minister has not answered it. I very much hope that he can do a little better when he responds. Otherwise, as other noble Lords have said, the discussion will have to continue in another place. I very much hope that that will not be necessary and that the Minister can respond in a way that will sufficiently reassure the House this afternoon.

It is not only that there is a problem; it is an increasing problem. The dissipation of local authority budgets will increase with the number of academies. There are few private providers who can take over the provision of the specialist services that we are talking about. The only way realistically to provide them is for local authorities, which have a sufficient critical mass to sustain services for these low incidence groups, to do so. If the budget is removed from local authorities so that they cannot provide specialist services, there is the problem of knowing where academies will buy them in for their pupils from low incidence groups. The problem is serious and is likely to grow. I hope that the Minister can give us further reassurance when he replies.

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, I am concerned that there is continuing anxiety about the protection for children’s special educational needs in the Bill. I am grateful to the Minister for the meetings he has had with Peers interested in this area and I will listen to his response with great care.

Concern about the continuance of educational psychologists has been raised by the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, and the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, in previous stages of the Bill. In the past there has been a lot of concern that there were insufficient educational psychologists and that more was not done to ensure that their development was of the highest quality. I hope that the Minister can, either now or in writing later, provide some further reassurance that the changes in the Bill will not impact on the future supply of educational psychologists.