UN International Day of Persons with Disabilities

Debate between Marion Fellows and Stephen Timms

Thursday 24th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sir Stephen Timms]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely correct that this has quite a long history, but my sense is that it has got considerably worse in the last few years and the Department has stopped publishing things that obviously should be published and answering perfectly reasonable questions. As a result, it has badly damaged its reputation with disabled people. I hope that the new ministerial team will want to rebuild those links and rebuild trust.

My hon. Friend the Member for Battersea made some important points about the disability employment gap, which has increased in the last two quarters. Many disabled people would like to work but cannot. The pandemic has had a damaging impact, because since then, there has been a steep rise in the number of people who are out of work on health grounds. We urgently need to be able to support disabled people who would like to work into jobs, because that is one of the key ways to tackle the current labour shortage. We can take advantage of that big opportunity.

In July last year, the Select Committee published its report on the disability employment gap. Shortly before the 2015 general election, David Cameron announced a target to halve the disability employment gap, but the target was scrapped shortly after that general election. We want it reinstated. Our report called for a radical overhaul of employment support for disabled people. The big national Work and Health programme is helpful but it is not working for many people. The truth is that, as we can all recognise, smaller specialist providers are often best placed to deliver the help that is needed. People have to be on the ground locally to know who can do the best job; that kind of support cannot be commissioned from Whitehall.

We proposed that funding for this employment support should be devolved. Where the capacity exists, we want groups of local authorities, probably based on the new NHS integrated care system boundaries, to be responsible for commissioning and delivering employment support for disabled people. The Department should allocate funding, monitor performance and publish detailed comparative performance data, but it should not deliver the support, which should be closely integrated with the local health service, colleges and voluntary sector groups. In its response to our report, the Department did not reject that idea, but it has not moved in that direction at all since; I hope that it will.

My hon. Friend was right about Access to Work, which is vital to overcoming work-related obstacles resulting from disability. It is a lifeline for many, but it is not well enough known. Many employers do not know about it and it is dogged, as she said, by a bureaucratic and extraordinarily cumbersome application process that puts people off and leaves many in limbo. Once they have applied, they sometimes have to wait for quite a long time to find out what support they will receive. If somebody benefits from Access to Work in one job and then changes job, they have to go back to square one. There should be a passporting arrangement, as my hon. Friend argued. If they apply for a new job at the moment, their potential new employer cannot be certain what, if any, help Access to Work will provide.

The Minister’s predecessor told the Select Committee about a planned “digital transformation” for Access to Work, which I hope will address those obvious failings, and I hope the Department will involve disabled people themselves in the redesign of the Access to Work programme. I would be particularly grateful if the Minister, in winding up, could give us an update on the progress of that initiative.

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

The right hon. Member is making some powerful points. Does he agree that, where there is a cap on individual benefits through the Access to Work scheme, that stops some people getting everything they deserve, while money for that purpose is left lying in other pools?

[Sir Stephen Timms]

The hon. Lady is right and my hon. Friend the Member for Battersea made that point as well. I think that is unhelpful and should be removed.

We also called in our report for larger employers to be required to publish the proportion of their employees who are disabled, and my hon. Friend referred, rightly, to disability pay gap reporting. Like her, the Select Committee thinks it is high time for a rigorous evaluation of the well-intentioned Disability Confident scheme.

For our current inquiry, we conducted a survey of personal independence payment and employment and support allowance claimants. My hon. Friend referred to the experiences of some of those applicants. We are going to publish our report from that inquiry soon, but it was striking how many respondents to that survey said the assessments had damaged their mental health. In describing the assessments, many respondents said that they were humiliating, undignified or even, in some cases, traumatic. There is a serious PIP application backlog at the moment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Stephen Timms]

The Work and Pensions Committee visited Glasgow and met senior officers of Social Security Scotland. There is a great deal in the approach for which the hon. Lady is advocating. She is right and the Minister would do well to take a look at that.

[Marion Fellows]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I have spoken to many people who were employed by the DWP in Scotland. They are able to compare and contrast the two regimes and they are so pleased to be working for Social Security Scotland.

Those with disabilities are fearful of being left behind once again, with the return to the parliamentary agenda of the British Bill of Rights Bill and the corresponding abolition of the Human Rights Act, if that goes ahead. Its worrying re-emergence rekindles the fears of many disability organisations regarding the removal of statutory protections for those with disabilities. At a time when we should be strengthening the protections in place for those with disabilities to ensure that they can live with as few barriers as possible, the Government risk regressing the regulatory regime for disability rights. The Human Rights Act offers a critically important mechanism for recourse for those with disabilities; abolishing it would weaken avenues for those with disabilities to enforce their rights. I would welcome the Minister telling me that I am wrong and that that will not happen, as I think we all would.

The British Institute of Human Rights has drawn my attention to a story highlighting the necessity of challenging inequality for disabled people using human rights legislation. Bryn was 60 years old and lived in supported living. He had learning disabilities, epilepsy, was non-communicative and blind. Staff at the home became concerned that Bryn had a heart condition and called a doctor from the local NHS surgery, who came to visit. Bryn had an independent mental capacity advocate who was supporting him. The advocate attended a multidisciplinary meeting to represent Bryn. At the meeting, the GP stated that he would not be arranging a heart scan for Bryn as

“he has a learning disability and no quality of life”.

Bryn’s advocate challenged that by raising Bryn’s right to life, under article 2 of the Human Rights Act, and his right to be free from discrimination, under article 14. The advocate asked the doctor whether he would arrange a heart scan if anyone else in the room was in that situation. The GP said yes and then agreed to the scan. The Human Rights Act gave the advocate the legal grounds to challenge the discrimination and take steps to protect Bryn’s life. Sadly, Bryn passed away because of his heart condition before any treatment could take place. I would like us all to reflect on that. I thank the British Institute of Human Rights for bringing that to my attention.

Clause 5 of the rights removal Bill destroys positive obligations, which is the positive duty on public officials to protect people from harm. The new Bill allows public bodies to refuse to act to safeguard people like Bryn, and to raise financial resources or operational priorities as the reasoning behind not taking action. Disability rights groups across the UK are gravely concerned that public officials will not take proactive steps to protect disabled people from harm, due to discriminatory attitudes or the resources required to protect that person, and that the rights removal Bill removes accountability for that. That is very dangerous and increases the likelihood of more awful stories like Bryn’s occurring—[Interruption.] I want to complete these points, Mr Deputy Speaker, so I beg your indulgence—[Interruption.] You are shaking your head.

Child Maintenance Service

Debate between Marion Fellows and Stephen Timms

Tuesday 18th April 2017 Westminster Hall

[Marion Fellows]

The hon. Gentleman is right; I am not going to concentrate on that. Family-based arrangements are what everyone wants, but they do not happen in all cases. I am here to support and talk about those who are outwith that scheme.

The support that the CMS gives is not optional; it is a legal right for children. The Child Maintenance Service is failing to secure children and their parents with care their rights, or it is taxing them to gain access to what is theirs. Maintenance payments have had both a current and historical problem with underpayment, people not paying and arrears. To date, the outstanding arrears for child maintenance stand at an astonishing £4 billion. That figure alone shows the extent to which the Child Support Agency and the Child Maintenance Service are failing people. At this point, I should add my thanks to the charity Gingerbread, because I am drawing heavily on its work in its recent report. It is likely that that figure does not represent the full picture, as paying parents under direct pay are assumed to have paid their maintenance in full unless the CMS is told otherwise.

According to Gingerbread, which has been doing fantastic work to raise this issue and support families, during the transfer process from CSA to CMS many parents have been pressured into not transferring their historical arrears over to their new claim. The Department for Work and Pensions calls that a fresh start. However, no equivalent letter is sent to paying parents to encourage them to pay off their arrears. In 2013, the UK Government issued “Preparing for the future, tackling the past”, in which they outlined their strategy of disregarding past debts and instead focusing on the payment of current maintenance. In line with that strategy, between December 2015 and March 2016, debt collections per case dropped from £35 to £22.

The DWP has calculated that as little as 12% of CSA debts on both the CSA and CMS systems will actually be collected. Current arrangements are allowing parents to renege on their responsibilities. Even though these debts were accrued in the past, parents should still be held responsible now. Collecting historical arrears should not mean a trade-off with current arrears; both are a priority.

[Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

I agree very much with what the hon. Lady is saying. I want to mention one of my constituents, who first approached me in September 1999 and the father of whose child has steadfastly refused to contribute anything. He has spent a great deal on lawyers in the intervening almost 20 years to avoid paying maintenance. Today he owes £55,000, of which £15,000 is owed to my constituent. Does the hon. Lady agree that it is absolutely vital that the money is collected and that the parent receives what is owed to them?

[Marion Fellows]

The right hon. Gentleman makes an absolutely valid point. That is exactly what I am trying to argue. We should chase arrears; not to do so seems to fly in the face of common sense and natural justice.

Members of the public, and indeed Members of this House, may not be aware that during the switch from CSA to CMS case history is not transferred, leading to a loss in accumulated knowledge that wastes resources and could allow a non-resident parent another chance to renege on their payments. Despite waiting years for an effective service that will proactively seek to collect owed maintenance, these parents with care and their children are being forgotten, with no option for recourse. If debts are uncollectable or unlikely to be collected, parents must be made aware of that. Additionally, if the UK Government are unwilling or unable to take the steps to secure children their rights, they must compensate receiving parents for their failings.

Although the CMS is taking the approach of focusing on current maintenance, it is also failing in that regard. Most arrears were accumulated under the CSA. However, since the launch of the CMS in 2012, nearly half of paying parents have been allowed to accrue arrears. As I have said, those in direct pay are assumed to have paid the full maintenance. Given that 70% of CMS cases come under direct pay, compared with just 33% of CSA cases, the magnitude of the problem under CMS is likely to be far larger than the numbers show.

Just because parents agree to pay, it does not mean they will fulfil their obligations. Under the CSA, between January and March 2016, one quarter of paying parents did not pay the full amount due. Of that number, two thirds paid less than half or nothing at all, which demonstrates that the priority of focusing on the payment of current maintenance is not being met. This Government’s strategy is failing.

Stringent criteria must be fulfilled before CSA debts will even be considered for collection under the Child Maintenance Service: a parent must open a CMS case, and CSA arrears payments must have been received in the last quarter before moving to the Child Maintenance Service, or the parent must explicitly ask for those arrears to be collected.

The Child Maintenance Service process is extremely difficult to understand and is often not communicated properly to parents. For example, DWP figures show that 17% of those using direct pay whose payments stopped or never even started were not aware that the CMS could even pursue payments for them. Similarly, 15% did not even know about the collect and pay service. Shockingly, a recent report from PayPlan found that more than half of single parents did not even know their child was eligible for support from their absent parent. Communication with parents about services available to them and their rights is lacking; they need to be informed.

The CMS needs not only to take action to collect historical arrears, but to make parents aware of their rights and of what the CMS can do to assist them. A variation claim—the main tool for receiving parents to ensure that their ex-partners’ proper income is taken into account—is kept secret. The cynic in me believes that that information is intentionally withheld to reduce the likelihood of any sort of action being taken.

Taking simple measures such as providing written breakdowns of arrears, how they were accrued and what options are available to people would go a long way towards improving parents’ interaction with the service and awareness of their rights.