Musculoskeletal Conditions and Employment

Marion Fellows Excerpts

Wednesday 10th January 2024 Westminster Hall

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Caroline. I warmly congratulate the hon. Member for Wirral West (Margaret Greenwood) on securing this really important debate. I am grateful to Versus Arthritis and to the British Society for Rheumatology for their very helpful briefings. I listened with great interest to the right hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), and I absolutely agree with him that Westminster Hall is more conducive to sharing ideas, rather than just having a go at the Government. However, as the SNP spokesperson, I always have to give the Scottish perspective on things in this place, so I will do a fair bit of that this morning—not for too long, I hasten to add.

We have heard of the number of working days lost because of musculoskeletal conditions, which I will now refer to as MSK conditions, for everyone’s sake—especially those from Hansard who are here. It is really important that the Government change attitudes to people with disabilities such as MSK conditions. We have to support those people, improve their access to work and help them stay in work.

Let us look at what we tried to do in Scotland, and some of the issues that we are really concerned about. We in the SNP are deeply concerned about the changes to work capability assessments, which will lead to disabled people and those with long-term health conditions being put at risk of sanctions. We know that sanctions do not work—we have the evidence—and we really feel that they are not the way forward. More support for people who have been unemployed for a long time is welcome, but sanctions should not form part of that. We do not support mandatory work placements, either.

People with MSK, arthritis and similar conditions often have to give up work because they cannot continue, and they cannot live on statutory sick pay if they have to take short-term absences from work. If the Government are serious about closing the disability employment gap, they have to start providing statutory sick pay that treats workers with dignity. It is ridiculous that recipients get only £109.40 a week; that is wholly inadequate, and is among the lowest amounts in Europe. The Government should look at increasing SSP in line with a real living wage. We also want the Government to provide guidance to employers on reasonable adjustments, and to create statutory timescales for their implementation. We are all agreed that we want people to be able to work, but we need to give them the right support.

The right hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington and others have talked about how difficult things are for people with long-term conditions, especially MSK conditions. They need to dig deep into their household budget to be able to eat properly and keep warm—that is currently a huge problem. The SNP has asked many times for a social energy tariff, and I requested a debate on that in this very place. We need measures to help people return to work properly, when they can and want to.

It is absolutely ridiculous that there has still been no mention of work practices, nor any movement since the Taylor review was first published. We keep hearing promises from the Government, but action is not happening. The SNP’s vision is for Scotland to be a fair work nation by 2025, where fair work drives success, wellbeing and prosperity for individuals, business organisations and the whole of society. That means that we have to look at the drivers of workplace inequality and ensure that everyone is supported to enter into work and progress. That is making a difference: in Scotland people are happy, and want to sign up to the fair work scheme. I know that everyone here wants things to become better. We really need to improve things, but in Scotland we cannot do that on our own, because workers’ rights remain firmly in the hands of Westminster.

We need to look at this issue. The Smith commission tried to look at it, but we were outvoted by Labour and the Tory Government at the time. In Scotland, we want—indeed, we need—the right to set our own agenda for fair work practices. It is really important that people with MSK conditions are able to participate in work fully and do not spend months and months waiting for access to work. Also, when they have to take time off work, they should receive proper statutory sick pay. Then they can go back into the workplace and can continue to contribute to society.

I thank everyone here. We have covered a wide range of issues, and I will listen carefully to the Opposition spokesperson, and especially to the Minister who responds to this very important debate.