Personal Independence Payments

Lisa Cameron Excerpts

Wednesday 13th April 2016 Westminster Hall

[Ian C. Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

It is a real pleasure to be in a debate that you are chairing, Mr McCabe—I think this is the first time it has happened for me. I apologise to all my colleagues because I have a great deal to say on the issue, and I propose to say it and then, hopefully, to take some interventions. I am very grateful to them for attending to listen to the debate, which has provoked an awful lot of interest not just from fellow colleagues, but from individuals who have contacted me. I thank all the people and organisations who have contacted me; I have read all the submissions they sent.

The Government’s present agenda on disability is to reduce the number of people receiving disability benefits and the amount of money they receive. There has been a marked increase in the number of constituents coming to my office to seek help in connection with disability benefits, particularly with the personal independence payment process. In preparing for this debate, I have worked very closely with, and I am very grateful to, Wrexham citizens advice bureau and the welfare rights service of Wrexham Council.

In recent months, it seems that the Department for Work and Pensions has targeted the Wrexham postcode, inviting large numbers of working age, pre-existing disability living allowance claimants to move to the replacement benefit, PIP. Failure to respond to the invitation results in the existing DLA award ceasing, with an associated knock-on loss of any premiums—for example, means-tested benefits, Motability car tax, blue badge entitlement and so on. At any time in the Wrexham area, about 10,000 people have been in receipt of various combinations and levels of DLA, and considerable numbers of them are now going through the migration process, which is almost entirely driven by DWP, not by the claimants themselves.

The DWP invitation gives people a limited amount of time to claim PIP and return the paperwork, with a claim form of about 40 pages in length. Many claimants struggle to complete social security benefits claim forms and seek help to do so. If constituents do not respond, the DLA stops. That is one way of the Government achieving their objective to reduce the benefit paid.

One constituent of mine—a former nurse—has a degenerative neurological condition, yet her PIP assessment resulted in her losing her Motability car, an outcome repeated and experienced by sufferers of Parkinson’s disease, according to a briefing sent to me before this debate. This does, of course, secure the Government’s objective of reducing the benefit paid to disabled people.

The changes to the system are being made against a backcloth of withdrawing specific benefits advice, reductions in legal aid eligibility and reductions in funding for citizens advice bureaux, welfare rights advisers and other sources of advice. The result is that little advice is available for vulnerable people, which further helps the Government to reduce the benefit paid. In any event, the system operated means that applicants invariably complete the long, complex forms without advice and without any knowledge of the criteria applied to award PIP. As a consequence, it is very often the case that the initial application results in previous recipients of DLA being awarded PIP, if at all, at a lower level.

When an application is made for mandatory reassessment, again the applicants have no detailed knowledge of the criteria, and the reasoning applied by assessors and communicated to the applicant is set out without specific reference to the points awarded for each individual disability. DLA was assessed by health professionals. The Government now contract private businesses such as Capita to carry out assessments. In Wrexham, the largest town in north Wales, there is no geographic base for personal assessments to be carried out and applicants are requested, as a matter of course, to travel more than 40 miles to Rhyl for an assessment. That is a disincentive to vulnerable people to proceed with the application.

On Monday evening, in the excellent “Dispatches: The Great Benefit Row”, presented by Ade Adepitan, we saw the shocking mindset of a number of the assessors. However, the views expressed in that programme reflect what I am told by my constituents. Individual applicants are subjected to rudeness from assessors when they question the obligation to travel distances. When one constituent of mine asked to have an assessment in Wrexham, rather than travel the considerable distance to Rhyl, the conversation went: “Do you receive DLA?” “Yes.” “Use the bloody money to get to Rhyl.”

When the mandatory assessment is completed, the appeal process is complex and difficult and, again, there is a paucity of advice available to applicants. There has been a huge increase in the number of individuals seeking advice in my office, and there are real capacity constraints in handling the quantity of them. Applicants are often vulnerable, stressed and upset by the whole process, and are intimidated by the complexity of the forms.

[Dr Lisa Cameron (East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow) (SNP)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Ian C. Lucas]

I am sorry but I am going to continue. I will try to take interventions later.

Applicants are also intimidated by the manner of the assessors and the way in which assessments are set out when they are presented to applicants. Having considered a number of the assessments personally, I find it difficult to draft responses to the assessments effectively. The process is much more difficult than drafting court pleadings—I am a solicitor—and, without training and support, it is very difficult even for those experienced in drafting documents.

It is essential to have detailed knowledge of the points awarded for individual actions in order to respond properly to assessments made. The reality is that most applicants do not have that information themselves and do not have adequate access to expert advice to help them. I quote the experience of one of my constituents, Lindsay Usher, who sent an email to me earlier this week. She says:

“I am a carer for my husband John who had a major stroke, aged 55, in October 2010 that left him with various disabilities. He was awarded indefinite DLA...and recently had correspondence to say that he had to now apply for PIP. I made the initial telephone call on his behalf and then the 40 page booklet appeared. We duly completed it and that in itself is stressful. John could not have done it on his own due to the complexity and ambiguity of the questions. They repeatedly try to trip you up and the stroke has left him with a degree of cognitive impairment. We returned it by the due date, 24 March. The receipt was acknowledged by the DWP by text message.

John then received a letter from Capita dated 28 March informing him that he would be assessed face to face by a ‘health professional’ at his home address on 11 April at 08.00 a.m. John takes about an hour and a half to get up, washed and dressed independently in the mornings (this information was written on the PIP claim form) but even though the timing of the appointment was not ideal we decided to accept it as the wording in the letter from Capita includes, in bold, ‘It is important that you go to this appointment. If you fail to go without a good reason, the decision-maker at the Department for Work and Pensions is likely to refuse your claim’. It’s quite intimidating. A further reminder letter dated 2 April was received from Capita confirming the appointment with the same ‘It is important that…’ sentence. Finally a text message was received from Capita on 6 April once again confirming the appointment…Roll forward to the appointment day…Alarms set for 06.00 a.m. Ready, waiting, stressed and nervous by 07.45 a.m. No sign of ‘health professional’. No email, no phone call, no text message. So I telephoned the Capita ‘Enquiry Centre’ at 08.56 a.m. The lady who answered had no idea why John had been ‘stood up’. I said we would give it a while longer. By 10.32 a.m. I phoned again. We got the obligatory ‘sorry’ but I told the young lady I spoke to that she could not be held responsible for the ‘health professional’s’ failure to appear.”

Another constituent became enmeshed in an argument over whether he was able to fully wash the top half of his body, as he has the use of only one arm due to a stroke; the assessor accepted that he could not wash the whole of the bottom half of his body. Parliamentary colleagues have approached me since this debate was listed to tell me of similar accounts affecting those they represent. This degrading assessment process makes sense only if it is understood that the policy’s central objective is to reduce the benefits of these disabled people. All these procedural steps work towards that end and make it more difficult for claimants to apply.

It made me sick to the stomach to see further personal independence payment cuts proposed in the Budget and to see the Minister defending them even before the Budget speech was made. At the same time, the Government cut capital gains tax and corporation tax. This rotten system endures and is often run by rotten people—we saw some of them on Monday night’s programme on Channel 4—who treat vulnerable people and their families with absolute contempt.

If the Minister wants to help disabled people—I respect him, and I am telling him what my constituents are telling me—will he now ask his Secretary of State to carry out a fundamental reappraisal of this appalling system? If he wants to salvage his reputation, that is the only way he will be able to do so. If he wants respect, he and his Department, and those who his Department employs and commissions, need to start treating vulnerable disabled people with the respect they deserve.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian C. Lucas]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. There is clearly a major problem, and MPs are seeing that in their constituencies across the United Kingdom. The purpose of securing such debates is to draw to the Minister’s attention to the mistakes made by Government. All Governments make mistakes—mistakes were made under a Labour Government—and there is a real mistake in this particular case that he needs to address.

[Dr Lisa Cameron]

Given the information that we have, this is an extremely valuable and timely debate. As the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on disability, I have particular concerns about the lack of involvement of individuals such as mental health professionals and general practitioners in gathering the information. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that that should be standardised as part of the procedure?

[Ian C. Lucas]

Absolutely. These assessments, which often deal with vulnerable people who in many cases have particular complex medical needs, need to be carried out by individuals who know what they are talking about and who have not just been sent on an away day to establish whatever criteria Capita want to apply to let as few applications through as possible.