APPENDIX 22
Memorandum by Incapacity Action
Incapacity Action are a network of Disabled Claimants
campaigning for income rights for Disabled People. We are opposed
to the Single Gateway which introduces compulsory job focused
interviews for all those of working age. This includes Disabled
People who have already satisfied the All Work Test for Incapacity
Benefit and those housebound because of illness and disability.
Only terminally ill people will be exempted. The Single Gateway
takes no account of choice, type of work, wages and conditions.
Neither does it consider the inaccessibility of our society for
Disabled People living on low incomes, or that some of us are
working as carers or parents, as well as managing our impairments
with few resources.
Alongside the Single Gateway, the Welfare Reform
and Pension Bill cuts Incapacity Benefit through means testing
and places new restrictions on eligibility via national insurance
contributions. A Capability Test said to measure employability
is to be added to the draconian All Work Test, which the Government
opposed while in opposition, on the grounds that it would cause
great distress and hardship for Disabled People. Severe Disablement
Allowance will be abolished for those over twenty leaving those
Disabled People who have had no waged employment dependent on
Income Support or in receipt of no money at all if they have savings
or live with a partner. Disability Living Allowance Life Awards
have been terminated and the process of spot check visits initiated
under the discredited Benefits Integrity Project are to be made
routine.
All these measures place intolerable pressure on
Disabled People who are simply claiming money needed to live on.
Disability Benefits have already been cut through the All Work
Test and Benefits Integrity project, putting thousands of Disabled
People at risk from loss of vital income and resources for personal
assistance and mobility. Four deaths have resulted from the All
Work Test Thomas Causton and David Holmes died in 1996 of heart
attacks after benefits were withdrawn, (reported by the Mirror).
In 1999 Jacky Mackenna of Merseyside, diagnosed as having endogenous
depression, cut her wrists and then hung herself after Incapacity
Benefit was denied, (reported in the Big Issue). BBC's
Panorama Programme in February 1998 referred to the death of an
ex miner in Wales who killed himself due to the constant pressures
of repeated reviews under the All Work Test process.
Functional Testing, part of the All Work Test examination
can be damaging to the health of Disabled People. This was documented
by a National Citizen's Advice Bureaux report in 1997, "An
Unfit Test" which stated that: "there is widespread
evidence of the anxiety, distress and pain caused by the operation
of the All Work Test. These concerns reported to the CAB are also
reflected in the DSS research." The report called for the
All Work Test to be scrapped but the Labour Government rejected
its findings. The Social Security Select Committee which investigated
the All Work Test in 1996 received extensive evidence from Disability
Organisations which support the CAB's conclusions. Sarah Chapman
from Newcastle told the Committee how her arm fractured during
the All Work Test examination. Her experience further damaged
her health and that of her husband who is now on kidney dialysis
due to the stress. Sarah has since been called for a further All
Work Test. She has appealed to Junior Social Security Minister
Hugh Bayley and has been told that she must undergo the test again
to satisfy legal requirements!! The fact that her health has not
improved does not seem to matter.
The Select Committee Inquiry showed how damaging
the process of compulsory testing is to those claimants with mental
health difficulties. The organisation Breakthrough reported that
the process had led to people attempting suicide due to extreme
anxiety and that an Appeal tribunal had "expressed disgust
at the way the system was treating people with mental illness.
A recent report by Mind showed that admissions to psychiatric
hospitals and incidents of self harm and attempted suicide had
increased due to fears of loss of benefit.
Benefit cuts also lead to homelessness. Incapacity
Action have been in touch with a woman who was admitted to a psychiatric
hospital for the duration of a year, becoming mentally ill after
her benefit was cut off. She consequently lost her council flat.
There is clearly a wealth of evidence to show that
benefit cuts which go hand in hand with compulsory work tests
bring casualties. The new measures further erode the minimum safeguards
that existed for Disabled People through the Sickness and Disability
Benefits system. They will not increase employment opportunities.
A DSS commissioned report "Leaving Incapacity Benefit"
(PSI 1998) found that people forced off Incapacity Benefit had
continuing health problems which prevented them from getting jobs.
The few who found jobs were no better off because wages are so
low. Many returned to Incapacity Benefit.
In conclusion the proposals of the Single Gateway
and the further cuts proposed by the Welfare Reform Bill threaten
the health and safety of Disabled People. We fear more fatalities.
Incapacity Action
5 May 1999
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