Improving Lives: Work, Health and Disability Green Paper

David Winnick Excerpts

Monday 31st October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for her kind remarks. I congratulate her on all the work she has done over many years in Parliament for those on the autism spectrum. I am pleased to tell her that we will have 1,100 specialists in autism services in Jobcentre Plus premises. She is quite right that we should never assume that disabled people are in any way homogenous: people have different needs and different requirements. She will know better than anyone that the needs of those on the autism spectrum are specific, and that they therefore need to be dealt with in a personal and specific way.

[Mr David Winnick (Walsall North) (Lab)]

On the disabled, may I tell the Secretary of State that at my surgery on Saturday I saw a man—he will be 59 in two weeks’ time, and walks with tremendous difficulty on two crutches—who has had his employment and support allowance removed and who, during the time I was speaking to him, broke down in great distress? What sort of situation are we in when a law-abiding person of his age and suffering from disablement goes to his Member of Parliament in such a state of distress that he starts crying? I consider that a shameful situation. The Secretary of State should be aware that it is just one of many, many cases throughout the country. I will certainly write to his Department. With what result, we shall see.

[Damian Green]

Obviously, if the hon. Gentleman wants to write to us about his constituent he should please do so, because we do not want any wrong decisions to be taken. I will happily look at the individual case, although he will recognise that I cannot possibly comment on it at the moment. The one point on which I would take issue with him is when he says that this is the tip of an iceberg. Actually, the number of successful appeals against ESA judgments has fallen very significantly, from 14% to 5% in recent months, so the figures suggest that the system is getting better at making such judgments.