Employment and Support Allowance and Work Capability Assessments

Glenda Jackson Excerpts

Thursday 5th February 2015 Westminster Hall

[Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Walker. I thank the redoubtable Chair of the Work and Pensions Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg), for her contribution in kicking off the debate. I also thank my colleague on the Committee, the hon. Member for Newton Abbot (Anne Marie Morris), for the points that she made.

When I first joined the Work and Pensions Committee, I think everyone on it and probably everyone in the House was most engaged by what seemed at the time to be the storming of the last barricade. It was anathema to me and, I am sure, to all members of the Committee that those with disabilities, be they mental or physical, were seen as being incapable of work. That was the golden nugget that we wanted to see being spread out into gold dust through the acknowledgement that those suffering from disabilities are capable, with the right kind of support and training, of making the contribution that they undoubtedly wish to make to our country and to our economy.

One of the most depressing things for me in the time I have served on the Committee has been seeing that optimism change. In my constituency, I see those we are most concerned about—those labelled with disabilities, be they mental or physical—having a sense of fear about being assessed and examined. In the period since I joined the Committee, terrible mistakes have been made on implementing certain definitions of people being fit for work, and a sense of fear has grown in that community. It has been presented to me more than once that when people go through the work capability assessment, or whatever it will be called in the future, they find themselves sitting opposite someone who fundamentally believes that a claimant has no desire to work and is hoping to pull the wool over the assessor’s eyes so that they can go on claiming benefits, but nothing could be further from the truth.

I have two fundamental points to make. The first is about the assessment process. There is more than sufficient evidence to show that however sweet the words may be from those who provide the services, or from Ministers of the Crown who assert their commitment to ensuring that people with disabilities can take their proper contributory place within our society, the process simply is not working. There is a marked failure by the assessors and decision makers to pass on vital information. There is a marked lack of understanding in the initial assessment —by those who we were told would be health professionals in the first instance—of the most basic aspects of the illnesses and misfortunes that the individual claimant may be undergoing. One of the most shocking examples I heard was of someone who was being assessed and who said that they suffered from bipolar disorder. The supposed GP undertaking the assessment had to look up on his computer what “bipolar” meant. That is not an isolated example of the great gap between what is being professed by the assessment provider and what is actually happening on the ground.

It is not simply a case of making the assessment better. We all know how the assessment could be made better. The hon. Member for Newton Abbot referred to the methods of informing a claimant. We all have constituents who suffer from visual impairment and all their communications come by letter. We all have constituents who are hard of hearing and their contact point is almost invariably the telephone. We have seen direct evidence of letters being sent to the wrong address when people are hoping for a face-to-face interview. The system in its many and varied forms requires a fundamental assessment that meets the needs of the claimant, not those of the assessor.

There is a glaring lack of evidence being taken on board in the assessment. The Chair of the Work and Pensions Committee referred to evidence from Parkinson’s UK. Every group that works tirelessly on behalf of individual claimants who suffer from particular illnesses has said that the assessors never really assess the variations and fluctuating nature of each illness. The list of such variations could be endless, but there is no reason for the Minister not to have it at his fingertips, because he has been getting it from the Select Committee, from Members of Parliament and from the campaigning groups working on behalf of some of the most vulnerable in our society.

The assessment programme needs a fundamental reassessment, and here we come to one of those areas that reflect across the whole of British society. What is glowingly agreed and deemed to be fundamental in the boardroom is never passed down in sufficient detail to those at the sharp end. All members of the Work and Pensions Committee have read what the new contracted provider says will be its approach to the new contract. I tend to disagree with my colleague, the hon. Member for Newton Abbot, who referred to the pause before making changes. She felt that there needed to be time for the new contract to bed in, but the Government have told us that the provider got the contract because of its wide experience in this area. The provider has made claims, as did the previous contracted provider, about the quality of the people it will hire and the sensitivity and flexibility that those assessors will bring to bear in the job they will be invested in, but we know from experience that that has never, ever worked. It is about not just fine words and the quality of the people employed, but their training, so that when they meet the claimant, they are truly sensitive and flexible and, most importantly, have the information they need.

The constant passing backwards and forwards of information that has been given by an individual claimant on more than one occasion is utterly absurd. I cannot believe that that is not costing the taxpayer money that would be infinitely better spent on speeding up the whole process, so that people do not have to wait, in many instances in genuine fear of what might come through the letter box, if they can read, or over the telephone, if their hearing is not impaired. That is even if they are still living at the address noted as the official means of communicating with them. In my constituency, for instance, those who are vulnerable may well have had to move from their previous address because, for example, they have been unable to pay the rent. Furnishing the new address to the relevant jobcentre is the last thing on their minds when they are trying to find somewhere permanent to live.

That, in essence, is my call on the Government. We must begin to eradicate the problem whereby some of the most vulnerable people, whom we all wish to help and see play their proper part in society, have a genuine fear—a fear that can have an impact on their illness and in many instances make it worse—that the assessment process is in effect a punishment for having a disability, which is invariably through no fault of their own. We need to guarantee that the process will become as sensitive, flexible and immediate as we have been promised. If there is a genuine wish on the part of everyone to assist people to take their proper place in our society or, in the kindest possible way, to say, “Unfortunately, we acknowledge that you will never be able to function in that way again”, that would be a major contribution. I do not believe that the Minister is opposed to bringing about that solution, and I trust that everyone else in his Department shares that aim.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

Universal Credit

Glenda Jackson Excerpts

Tuesday 25th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

That is exactly what was being asked before the summer break, and the answer is that the Treasury has done that. The MPA has also signed off the roll-out process in saying that it de-risks the nature of the roll-out and approves it exactly as it stands at the moment.

[Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

Somewhat unusually, but fortunately, the House was not subjected this afternoon to a self-serving sermon in the guise of a statement. Does the Secretary of State have as a principle the idea that promises, like pie crusts, are made to be broken? Every promise he has made at that Dispatch Box about the cost of implementing and rolling out universal credit has been broken, so is today’s semi-statement merely more porky pies in the sky?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I will not follow the mixed metaphors about pies and pie crusts in the sky; I usually like them on a plate myself. The hon. Lady has a choice to make. I would much rather make it clear that we want to deliver this thing safely and securely. After all, we have listened to the MPA and we had the National Audit Office in to look at it last year. We took all the advice, and we are rolling it out in the way that it should be rolled out. I have to say—this is not arrogance—that I believe that future Government programmes will be best rolled out using the test-and-learn process that is securing these roll-outs. That is the right way. Let us get this safely and securely rolled out, not smashed to pieces like tax credits on day one.

Universal Credit

Glenda Jackson Excerpts

Monday 7th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

If ever a debate title were a misnomer, it is this one, because it should be “The failure to implement universal credit”. Failure is pretty much par for the course for the Department for Work and Pensions, certainly in the implementation of its policies, which aim to reduce costs to the benefit of claimants and taxpayers. My hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg), the Chair of the Select Committee, has detailed the fantastic amounts of public money that have already been lost in a failed IT system. She has also touched on the unwillingness of Ministers in the DWP to answer questions from the Select Committee. I point out in passing that every Select Committee is appointed by this House of Commons, and its sole purpose is to scrutinise the Department which bears the same name.

We see constant failure in the implementation of the work capability assessment. On four occasions, Professor Harrington has attempted to ameliorate the agonies which individuals who are subjected to the work capability assessment are put through, yet we are still receiving letters from our constituents detailing the humiliating experiences. This is a really serious matter. An individual claimant can be sanctioned for failing to attend a work capability assessment. We have all had examples from constituents of the letter detailing the appointment arriving two or even three days after the specified date. We have also heard about those who have turned up for the assessment only to be told by the assessors, “Sorry, we can’t take any more people today.”

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)]

As usual, my hon. Friend is making a passionate speech. I have mentioned this story before, but let me repeat it. One of my constituents was sanctioned for having a heart attack during his work capability assessment. The nurse undertaking the assessment told him he was having a heart attack, but he was still sanctioned.

[Glenda Jackson]

It is not usual for me to be gobsmacked, but I certainly am by that story, even though I have heard from constituents who, while not necessarily experiencing heart attacks, have had absolutely disgraceful treatment. We are also seeing a rise in the number of appeals concerning employment and support allowance, and the appeals that have been lodged are taking longer and longer to come to a conclusion. I will not go into the whole debacle of the personal independence payment, but it is simply scandalous that some of the most vulnerable people in our society, whom the DWP is supposed to be assisting, are being left in many instances with no financial support whatever. To add insult to injury, this Government have also reduced the funding of local authorities. Many local authorities were absolutely central to ensuring that people with disabilities could live human, productive lives. That money has now been taken away.

I hope to bring home to the Chamber the absolute chaos out there at the moment, and to concentrate on the questioning that an individual claimant has to go through and the kind of questioning to which the Secretary of State responds. It is clear that he is burdened with delusions of adequacy, but some of his responses to my hon. Friend the Chair of the Select Committee at his most recent appearance in front of us were absolutely disgraceful.

Let me detail the experience of an individual claimant. A 71-year-old pensioner, dubbed by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs to be self-employed, applied for housing benefit. It has now taken 17 weeks and still there is no final cut-off point where she has been assured that she will receive housing benefit. The most recent inquiry that came to her was to detail the cost of a bill of £3.40; the second was to detail the cost of a bill of £7.47. Both of those claims took place in 2012. The mind boggles at that, when the Secretary of State, who has lost millions and millions of pounds on a failed IT system, has categorically refused to give the Select Committee any detail whatever about his newly trumpeted business plan. He has refused to discuss the costs of the plan or whether there will be any direct savings either to the taxpayer or to the overarching benefit system. It is an absolute disgrace that the Select Committee, which has been appointed to scrutinise the DWP, is being buffeted away. It seems that the Department is opting for some kind of bunker mentality, but it will not work.

[Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful case. Was she as surprised as I was to learn in the evidence given by Sir Bob Kerslake to the Public Accounts Committee this afternoon that the business case that she has just mentioned, which, according to the report, is due to be finalised by the end of April, has still not been agreed by Her Majesty’s Treasury?

[Glenda Jackson]

I am sure that my right hon. Friend, and I would hope every Member of this House, would be shocked to realise that the DWP is still not giving the right answers—it is ludicrous to expect the right answer to come from the Department for Work and Pension, as simple humility is not part and parcel of its make-up. The Committees and Government Departments that scrutinise where public money goes are being pushed to one side. I have already referred to the bunker mentality of the DWP, and the example that my right hon. Friend gives me is just par for the course; it happens constantly. Arguments are not even being put up. We are all being told, “Oh no, it’s none of your business; it’s our business.”

My hon. Friend the Chair of the Select Committee has given details of the actual answers. There is a pattern, which I find very disturbing. I have already touched on the issue of disregarding any serious questioning on costs. Ever since this major benefit change came into being, the Department has employed what I would call a programme of black propaganda, and every single one of the red tops has taken it up with glee and run with it. That black propaganda told the people of this country—I am paraphrasing; the DWP would never be this cogent—that everyone who was claiming benefits was doing so because they were too lazy to work. Nothing could be further from the truth. I have already touched on the agonies that are being endured by people with serious mental and physical disabilities, and the pattern is ongoing.

A report from the Office for National Statistics last week scrutinised the level of complaints made against all the Government Departments about the misuse of statistics, and guess which one came top of the list! It was the Department for Work and Pensions. Throughout the time I have been a member of the Select Committee, we have raised again and again the issue of the misuse of stats and the misuse of the English language to proselytise this black propaganda and to confuse and distort what should be central to the Committee’s concerns—namely, the well-being of the people who require benefits, not because they are lazy or workshy, or even because there are no jobs, but because they should be supported by the people of this country, as they always have been.

After the last debate on this issue, I was touched to receive a response from the people of this country. If there is a silver lining to the black cloud that is the DWP, it is that the majority of people in this country still believe that the welfare state should do what it was meant to do, which is to support people who, through no fault of their own, cannot maintain themselves without the support of the rest of us. That support is alive and well out there in the country. The one place where it is certainly dead is within the Department for Work and Pensions.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anne Marie Morris (Newton Abbot) (Con)]

We are having an interesting debate. I should like to pay tribute to the Chair of the Select Committee, on which I serve—the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg) does a fantastic job, and she painted a good picture in her opening remarks, in which she set out all the facts. We must recognise, however, that this is a complex area. Governments and Oppositions of all political flavours have, over decades, contributed to the challenge. Many have been well-meaning and tried to resolve all the problems. Simplicity is a great objective, but it is probably one of the hardest things to deliver.

Listening to the debate so far, I have heard those who see the glass half full and those who see the glass half empty. A couple of the contributions from the Opposition have seen it has half empty, but let me remind the House of what we have in common. Both parties have said that universal credit is the right way to go.

We also need to be mindful of the fact that the purpose of a Select Committee is not, frustratingly, to look at what is right and what is working. We never look at that. Rightly, we look at the areas that are not working and need improvement. It is absolutely right, as the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Glenda Jackson) said, that we should ensure that those who are vulnerable get the help they need. Like her, I get constituents coming into my surgery who have not had fair treatment at the hands of the Department for Work and Pensions, but that problem has been growing for years and years. It is to the credit of this Government that they have tried, for the first time in 60 years, to consolidate the system and to simplify it and pull it together so that it works better in the future.

[Glenda Jackson]

The flaw in the hon. Lady’s argument is that the Select Committee has been consistent—there has been complete cross-party unity on this—in presenting to the Department for Work and Pensions the areas where we believe improvements could be made and, in many instances, putting forward ideas about what kind of help is needed. There has also been a consistent response from the Department—namely, total rejection.

[Anne Marie Morris]

The hon. Lady is right to say that the Select Committee has put forward a number of arguments, but that is what we are there to do. We are not there to tell the Department about the things it is doing well—more’s the pity, as that would give our work some balance—so she is right in that respect. I think that she is describing issues of obfuscation and not getting the facts, but my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South (David Mowat) was instructive in that regard when, earlier in the debate, he said that communication was the key. The devil is in the detail, and it is very difficult—when talking about, say, technology —to communicate with people and tell them exactly what is being done. I would love to say that technology was simple, but it is not.

Let us remind ourselves of the objectives of the change, to which both sides of the House agreed. The objectives were simplification, reducing costs and smoothing the transition from benefit to work. The Chair of the Select Committee talked about dealing with the wretched precipices that make people’s lives so difficult. The Committee has worked to hold the Government to account, and we should be trying to get a better result rather than just point scoring for the sake of it. The Chairman has done a good job of trying to get that balance right.

Let us look at where we are going. When we get this sorted out, 3 million households will be better off by £177 a month. We will have a system that provides better child care support, with an extra £200 million for child care helping 100,000 extra families working fewer than 16 hours a week. We will also have an extra £400 million to increase child care support to 85% of all working families. Let us look to the longer-term future: in 10 years’ time, UK plc will benefit by £35 billion. That will be a worthwhile and significant achievement. The path must continue to be trodden and the Committee must continue to fight the fight to keep the Department for Work and Pensions honest in all that it says, and to strive to get the best possible results. This must be a partnership, however.

Progress to date has included the launching of pathfinders, and we also have additional schemes such as the long-term schemes in our jobcentres. After the initial launch in the north-west, we now have universal credit rolling out in 14 jobcentres. By the end of this year, it will be in place in 90 of them. That will mean that universal credit will have been rolled out to one in eight jobcentres. That is not an insignificant achievement in that period of time, given the complexity involved. We already have 6,500 people on universal credit. I appreciate the Chairman’s view that that is a small number, but it is a start and a move in the right direction.

A point that has not been raised is that this is not just about nuts and bolts, IT systems and budgets. It is about a fundamental culture change, and as we know, changing a culture is one of the most difficult things to do in any organisation, never mind in the country as a whole.

DWP: Performance

Glenda Jackson Excerpts

Monday 30th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman will in future regret taking such pride in his Secretary of State. We have all become used to the way in which the Secretary of State avoids answering any kind of direct question or actively engaging in any of the serious issues about the destruction of the welfare state and his Department’s total and utter incompetence by opting for a self-serving, sanctimonious sermon as opposed to any direct speech. I seem to recall, to go back a very long way, that he stood at the Dispatch Box and avowedly took exclusive responsibility for the delivery of everything from IT systems to universal credit in order to take people out of poverty, when what he has in fact done is to plunge thousands and thousands of our fellow citizens into the most abject penury.

Today, the Secretary of State still managed to avoid any kind of reference to the realities of the situation for all those people affected when Atos had its contract for the work capability assessment renewed many months ago. I distinctly remember that the Select Committee was quite forensic in examining how Atos would prioritise, as the Secretary of State and the Government told us it would, the needs of disabled and vulnerable people, particularly those with mental health difficulties. Atos confirmed that that would be an absolute target. There would be champions for people with mental health difficulties and detailed examination of every single individual who came forward for a work capability assessment. Despite the Harrington recommendations, to which the Secretary of State referred, there have been no marked improvements for people who are waiting for ESA—we have already heard those figures.

I will give a precise example of just how chaotic the system is. One of my constituents, who is paraplegic, was placed on ESA. Another constituent is 26 years old and has the mental capacity of a six-year-old, and is consistently having to go for work capability assessments. I find it absolutely impossible to believe that Government Members have no constituents coming to them in similar or even worse situations; yet they find the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves) hilarious. They find it really funny that we have seen an explosion in food banks being used by people who are working.

I point out to the Secretary of State that he furnished absolutely no evidence—no Government Member did—that the jobs that all Government Members are trumpeting have been created during his sovereignty of the Department for Work and Pensions are actually being created by his policies. Other Government Members trumpet that the new jobs are being created by the private sector.

One certain thing in an uncertain world is that 48% of appeals—I am talking about ESA; I do not want there to be any confusion—are upheld, yet people on ESA are waiting for months before their appeals are heard. During that period they are told to apply for jobseeker’s allowance, but they cannot do so because they are told that they are unfit for work. They are therefore without any financial support at all. As my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel) said, the welfare state was created to protect people from falling through the cracks. But this particular Secretary of State, along with his Department, is pushing people through those cracks and hoping that the rest of the country will not notice that they have disappeared. I believe that the rest of the country is noticing that—that it is the most vulnerable in our society who are being punished.

That is a shame and an utter disgrace for the Secretary of State. At some point I am pretty certain that he will claim that he can walk on water, but he cannot. His Department is not delivering any of the promises that were made, not to the Opposition but to the people of this country. People are being maligned and bad-mouthed. It is being presented to the country as though there are plenty of jobs out there for those people but they are too idle ever to take them. That is not the case, as Government Members know, and as the Secretary of State should know. Perhaps he is floating so high in his self-appointed sanctity that he has forgotten what is actually happening out there in this country as a direct result of his incompetence and failure to accept his responsibilities.

Universal Credit

Glenda Jackson Excerpts

Tuesday 10th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I agree with my hon. Friend. He is absolutely right.

[Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

The Work and Pensions Committee, right from the beginning of the introduction of universal credit, has warned the Secretary of State that this is one of the most complex systems to be introduced. Consistently, the Secretary of State has reassured the Select Committee and this House that everything is fine. We now know that he has failed to meet every single one of the targets that he assured us he would meet. The issue is not the people on these Benches or on the Benches opposite; the issue is our constituents who will be dependent on universal credit. The Secretary of State should stand at the Dispatch Box, apologise for the anxiety in which he has placed our constituents and try to give a straight answer to a very simple question, but that answer must be verifiable. When will universal credit be introduced for all relevant claimants?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

To deal with the first part of what the hon. Lady said, the reason we are proceeding like this—testing, learning and then implementing—is to ensure that nobody so far has been damaged at all by the changes brought in under universal credit. I repeat again that I learned my lesson from the last Government, who rolled out tax credits in a rush, all at once. The system crashed, £5 billion was lost and 400,000 people were damaged. The then Prime Minister, Mr Blair, had to go out and apologise publicly for the mess they had got in. I am saying today that we will roll this out and 6.5 million people will be on the system by 2017.

Oral Answers to Questions

Glenda Jackson Excerpts

Monday 14th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

It does, which is the whole point of the Work programme—to get more individuals to involve themselves and to help such people find the right courses, the right application and then the right skilling. The Work programme is able to do that in a more intense way than Jobcentre Plus is, so it should provide enormous help. The reality is that the benefit cap is enormously popular, which may account for why the welfare party opposite has come and gone on this issue from the beginning. First, Labour Members say they are opposed to it; then they say they are for it: we have no idea what they will do about it.

[Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

A new report by the New Policy Institute and Trust for London shows that 57% of working-age adults and children living in poverty in London are in households that work. That work is almost inevitably low paid and increasingly part time. Will the Secretary of State drop this mantra of making work pay and begin perhaps to discuss with his colleagues the possibility of encouraging a living wage?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I am always very willing to discuss issues relating to the living wage with the hon. Lady or with anyone else. However, I hope that when the hon. Lady talks to her constituents she is honest enough to tell them that the reason they find themselves in so much difficulty is that the last Government made such a mess of the economy, and caused so many people to collapse into low incomes and very poor jobs. It was the Labour party that caused that. We are changing it, and restoring the previous position.

Universal Credit

Glenda Jackson Excerpts

Thursday 5th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. As I said earlier, the Labour party has opposed every single reform since we came into government. Those reforms are set to save some £80 billion, and universal credit is part of that. At no stage have the Opposition told us what they would do instead. When they said that they would support universal credit, they voted against it. This is a party in opposition that is so opportunistic that it catches itself in the morning disagreeing with itself in the evening.

[Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

Since the Secretary of State took personal responsibility for this failure, we have seen a delay in the time scale for the universal roll-out of universal credit, a reduction in the number of pathfinder programmes, which has gone way down, and claimants being reduced to the simplest to pass through the system. When he gives us the time and the budget, as he undoubtedly will again, could they at least be accurate? I say to him that when it comes to spinning it takes one to know one—but his spinning will not create humour in the country. It could be catastrophic for benefits claimants.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The hon. Lady, not for the first time, is completely wrong. The pathfinder was exactly as we set it down. It was always going to deal with single people at the beginning and we have rolled it out as we said we would. I stand by the fact that this pathfinder is the right thing to do. I introduced it back in 2011 and it will help us enormously to develop the IT. That is the way we are doing it and that is the way we will do it.

Oral Answers to Questions

Glenda Jackson Excerpts

Monday 20th May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Steve Webb]

My hon. Friend is right. We need to ensure that local authorities use the money that has been given to them to assist households when an extra contribution would be helpful. We have given a huge amount of taxpayers’ money to councils for that purpose, and we expect them to use every penny of it.

[Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

19. Government changes already require the British taxpayer to find nearly £2 billion more to rehouse vulnerable families. How many families does the Minister think will need to be rehoused as a result of this punitive bedroom tax?

[Steve Webb]

I do not recognise that number at all. In fact, many of the scare stories that have come from the hon. Lady and others have proved not to transpire. When we capped rents in the private rented sector, we were told that there would be mass evictions and that vast droves of people would be moving all over London, but the evidence has not borne that out.

Universal Credit

Glenda Jackson Excerpts

Wednesday 6th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Dame Anne Begg]

We did not specifically consider that, but my hon. Friend has placed it on the record as something that the Government need to address. We do not know, either, to what extent they will allow direct payments into landlords’ hands. I hope that they are still considering that.

[Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

Is it not the case that many of the people we discussed when we exercised our inquiries in the Select Committee have no access whatever to bank accounts, so that issue does not arise? Is it not also the case that social landlords are already extremely reluctant to accept housing benefit claimants, and that the idea that they will not be paid directly will reduce even further the already lamentable stock of affordable housing?

[Dame Anne Begg]

I thank my hon. Friend. I was about to come to some of those issues.

In our report we drew attention to the lack of suitable bank accounts. Again, there is not much detail in the Government’s response as to what progress has been made in persuading banks that they need to cater for this part of the market. Perhaps they need to be able to have some kind of direct debit facility. That would deal with the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) about people being able to manage payments, particularly the bulk of money that needs to come out of their account every month. Also, the payment must come out on the day after the money goes in, not the day before; that is another potential problem. Banks will need to be sensitive to this market. So far they have been very reluctant to provide products that will cater for these people, simply because there is not a lot of money in it for them. I hope that they do have a social conscience and will realise the importance of this, but the Government will need to do a bit of prodding.

The monthly payment regime involving almost the whole of a household’s income makes it imperative that the Government get the delivery right. If something goes wrong with a claim or there is a delay, that could lead to real hardship for anything up to a month, or perhaps even longer. For some families, only child benefit and council tax benefit will sit outside universal credit, and all other payments will depend on the right amount of UC being paid at the right time into the single bank account.

The move away from paying housing benefit directly to landlords and to the claimant instead is causing a great deal of alarm among social housing providers, and it may be acting as a barrier to the social rented sector renting to people who are on UC. This, alongside the introduction of what has become known as the bedroom tax, could mean that many housing providers will have a large shortfall in their rental income.

In its response, the DWP says that it does not intend to define “vulnerability” in case someone with complex needs falls outside the prescribed definitions and so does not get the help they genuinely need. Instead, full guidance will include

“financial vulnerability factors that would trigger a conversation with a claimant about their budgeting needs”.

I do not know how that is going to work in practice. We fear that the person who is struggling will be picked up after they have begun to struggle and are already in debt rather than at the early stages of their claim—or, rather, before the claim is made. There is a good chance that the people who struggle with their monthly payments will be the same people who find it difficult to pay their rent in full and on time, who do not have access to a computer, who are not computer literate, and who need face-to-face help in making a benefit claim because they do not have basic literacy. The DWP is unwilling to provide a definition of who is a vulnerable claimant, yet there is a whole list of things that would act as a pointer to the fact that someone may be vulnerable. I am really concerned about the danger that claimants will get into financial difficulties before any help is provided.

It seems from the Government’s response that the first solution will be budgeting support, rather than an alternative payment method. Perhaps the Minister could clarify that. How long will somebody have to wait before their rent is paid directly to the landlord or their benefit is paid more frequently? For how long will those solutions last? I understand that the DWP is running six direct payment demonstration projects that are due to run until June 2013. How are those demonstration projects going and how will their findings be incorporated into the roll-out of universal credit?

Our report points out that there is a need to decide how passported benefits will be dealt with under UC. I do not think that things have moved on much. Apart from the temporary solution for free school meals, the Government do not seem to have any ideas about how they will deal with that matter. Again, the Minister might be able to shed some light on that today. It is important that passported benefits operate effectively because for many people, they make the difference between a bare income and one on which their family can live.

One of the problems with passported benefits is that the Government have not managed to iron out the cliff edge that might be involved. The whole point of universal credit was to smooth away all the cliff edges. However, once passported benefits are put into the equation, a lot of the cliff edges come back.

It is important for other Departments to know how passported benefits will operate. They have always used the payment of social security benefits as proxies for certain qualifications, which has made it much easier and cheaper for them to administer their benefits. If there is nothing in universal credit that signposts a claimant as someone who should receive other things, such as free prescriptions, it could land the Department of Health, the Department for Education, other Departments and local authorities with a large administrative burden in order to work out who qualifies for other benefits.

[Glenda Jackson]

Free school meals are linked directly to the pupil premium. If there is a reduction in free school meals, it is entirely possible that there will also be a reduction in funding for schools. The implications of universal credit are infinitely greater than just the effects on the actual claimant.

[Dame Anne Begg]

That is why it is important that the Government get it right. I appreciate that it has been very difficult, but before the first claimants go on to UC, which is in just over a month, they need to start answering these questions. They certainly have to have an answer before it is rolled out to other claimant groups in October. They do not have very long.

This morning, when the Select Committee was taking evidence on the Work programme, we heard that universal credit has implications for the Work programme. There are questions about how people will be labelled when they go into the Work programme because the predecessor benefits, such as jobseeker’s allowance and employment and support allowance, will disappear under universal credit as people move on to the single benefit.

There is one benefit change that flies in the face of all of this and undermines what UC was intended to do. The localisation of council tax support will add complexity back into the system and introduce local variations, which could undermine the withdrawal rates that should make work pay. I have already talked about computer programmes. I have said that the customer-facing screens must be right and that, behind that, the programmes must calculate what a claimant should get and pay it into the bank. Those computers will have to speak to the HMRC computers so that the real-time information can be fed in. However, because of the proposals on council tax support, they must also interface with the local government computer system, which apparently is called ATLAS. I do not know whether that just applies to England and Wales. That is another potential IT difficulty that could cause problems for people. On top of that, it will be more difficult for claimants to work out whether they will be better off in work than it would have been if council tax support had been included in universal credit. That will rely on working out the tapers and the disregards.

To come back full circle, the delivery of universal credit will depend on the smooth delivery of the IT—not only the IT controlled by the Department for Work and Pensions, but that controlled by HMRC and local authorities. That is a big ask. My final question to the Minister is: how is that going?

--- Later in debate ---

[Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

The hon. Member for Amber Valley (Nigel Mills) said that 92% of jobs advertised require some computer literacy. I do not know what the requirements are on that side of the House, but on this side computer literacy is not a requirement to be an MP, for which I am extremely grateful because I frankly admit to being an IT illiterate.

Before I continue, I wish to apologise to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and to both Front Benchers, because I have a previous engagement and will not be here for the wind-up speeches.

I do not wish to re-rehearse what my hon. Friend the Chair of the Select so succinctly detailed as the bedrock of the Committee’s examination of these issues. With all due respect to the Minister, he—like every Minister from the Department who has appeared before the Committee to answer questions on these issues—has been overwhelmingly over-sanguine about how easy this process will be for some of the most vulnerable people in our society. That is the central issue for me.

The Department has failed to come anywhere near defining what will be meant by “vulnerability”. We have had representations, for example, from the organisations that campaign for and on behalf of specific groups of vulnerable people, not least the Royal National Institute of Blind People and the British Deaf Association. Many of the mental health organisations have also campaigned with us, because it may be possible for a person suffering from a mental illness to be capable of doing everything on one day—probably even running the country—but the day after they can be incapable of getting out of bed, and they certainly would not be able to access a claim. We all have cases—even before this system is introduced—of people failing to meet the requirements of the recent changes made by the Department, such as the need to attend an Atos examination.

My overriding concern is that some people—for a variety of reasons, most of which they do not have any control over—will be allowed to drop through the net. They could end up with no support and, even more frighteningly, no one would know that. I have had occasion to raise individual constituency cases with the Minister. I also remember raising with the Secretary of State the case of an individual who is agoraphobic. He has not been outside his house for 35 years. His elderly mother is responsible for maintaining and caring for him, but she is not going to live for ever. The Secretary of State said—I paraphrase—“Oh well, we’ll have house visits, we’ll ensure that someone can treat with that individual.” That is all very fine and good, but it does not happen.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg) said in her opening remarks, 8.5 million people will be affected by this change, and many of them will never have had any contact with a piece of IT equipment. That is my first concern.

My second concern is the security of the individual’s claim. They will be expected to access terminals in internet cafes and public libraries or use their phone. We are all warned to hide our phones because they could be stolen, and heaven only knows how long it would take to fill in the form over the phone. I am especially concerned that it would be more than possible for someone to steal an individual’s details to defraud the benefits system. I have asked whether someone could be validated to make a claim on behalf of an individual, and I have to say that I did not get a categorical answer that calmed my concerns. I know of cases under the existing system in which someone who regularly claims benefit has a lot of friends on the day the money is paid, but they disappear with the money about half an hour later. This is already happening to some of the most vulnerable people in our society, and this obsession with all claims being made online will only increase the possibility of people being cheated in that way.

All hon. Members broadly welcome the idea of universal credit, but the details of its delivery to the most vulnerable in our society are a long way from being defined by the Department. Those who have spoken in the debate so far have mentioned the need for additional resources. We all know about the work force in our local jobcentres being reduced, and that the voluntary organisations that have been of such wonderful assistance to our constituents—such as citizens advice bureaux, voluntary organisations and local authorities—are seeing a big diminution in staff numbers, so even fewer people will be able to afford advice to someone who simply cannot handle what happens when they look at a monitor. Added to that is the possibility that the Department’s budget will be drastically slashed. If the Ministry of Defence makes its case for money to come out of the DWP, the resources to assist claimants could be greatly diminished.

[Anne Marie Morris]

Does the hon. Lady agree that if the new scheme makes claiming easier and simpler for the majority—say, 75% or 80%--it should mean that the resources that exist, albeit potentially diminished, will be more than adequate for the individuals who are vulnerable and need the help?

[Glenda Jackson]

I would like to be able to say yes, but I am old enough and cynical enough to be able to say categorically, “No, it never, ever works like that.” If 75% are sailing along on the crest of a wave, the 25% are always, in my experience, left paddling in the shadows, and nobody notices when they are waving. I am very concerned about this for the reasons that I have already elucidated.

I am also concerned about the possibility of the Department having to slash its budget even further—I have already mentioned the MOD rolling its tanks on to the Department’s lawn. The Secretary of State is already saying that because of the supposed invasion of these shores by new citizens of the European Union he will have to address the whole issue of welfare benefits all over again. I suspect that has a political basis and has nothing to do with the delivery of benefits, but if there are to be reductions—no one has argued that the Government have managed to tackle the issue of our as yet far from booming economy—these issues will come into play further down the line. There will be more and more complexities for many people who already find every single day of their lives a struggle, from the minute they open their eyes in the morning until they go to bed at night. Those are the people on whom we need to concentrate and I hope that the Department will do just that.

Personal Independence Payments

Glenda Jackson Excerpts

Thursday 13th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Esther McVey]

My hon. Friend is right. We listened and consulted, and we have made the alterations required for blind and deaf people in relation to their ability to communicate, make journeys, and so on.

[Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

The Minister will be aware that the majority of the recipients of DLA/PIP and their carers are dependent on the services provided by local authorities. However, because of the Government’s savage financial cuts for local authorities, those services are being eroded or removed, or in some instances charged for. As part of the impact assessment, will she examine in no small detail whether the services that enable disabled people to live independent lives will still be available or whether the cost of buying them will become prohibitive?

[Esther McVey]

We are working with local government to ensure that we are delivering on this. It is about what is best for disabled people and focused support for the billions of pounds that we are spending.