LIST OF CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
(a) We reiterate a number of recommendations
made in the Committee's Employment Strategy report that the Government
should simplify conditions of qualification for schemes, devolve
more discretion to front-line staff and to recipients of funding,
make greater use of intermediate labour markets, tackle regional
and local more effectively and improve assistance for those contemplating
self-employment or starting a small business (paragraph 15).
(b) We invite the Government to consider whether
the driving cause of these problems is the balkanised structure
of the New Deal and, if so, whether the different new deals, pilots
and programmes should be rationalised into a Single New Deal,
with different eligibility criteria for benefits but a single
gateway for job help. This flexibility would draw on the experience
of Action Teams for Jobs, and be aimed at all economically inactive
people, whether claiming or not (paragraph 16).
(c) The Committee agrees with the view expressed
by Professor Fothergill that not enough emphasis is placed
upon regional employment policies. A wider view of the causes
of local and regional unemployment is required if the local and
regional concentrations of incapacity benefits claimants are to
be effectively tackled (paragraph 25).
(d) We believe that a substantial number of
the 2.7 million incapacity benefits claimants do represent 'hidden
unemployment', however, we do not believe this means that these
people have wrongly or fraudulently claimed (paragraph 28).
(e) The Committee supports the move to change
the name of Incapacity Benefit to something with more positive
connotations. This will help to dispel the myth that many disabled
people are unable to work (paragraph 29).
(f) We recommend that occupational nurses
and Disability Employment Advisers should have more input into
the Personal Capability Assessment. We also recommend that
the Government investigate the 'nonNHS' models of voluntary
groups and private providers, who have developed medical models
aimed at job retention and, where that is impossible, a rapid
return to work. We further recommend that this should be built
into the pilots proposed in the Green Paper, so that half of the
pilots should have their medical services delivered other than
through the NHS. We hope that this would ensure that consistent
standards are operating across the UK (paragraph 32).
(g) The Committee recommends that all frontline
staff should undergo disability awareness training to prevent
disabled people being further disillusioned by the service (paragraph
39).
(h) We call on the Government to say how big
the new team of specialist advisers will be, how their role will
differ from that of the Disability Employment Advisers and what
action is being taken to reduce the turnover of Disability Employment
Advisers. We welcome the Green Paper's proposal that those disallowed
incapacity benefits should automatically see a Disability Employment
Adviser or specially trained Jobcentre Plus adviser, but we believe
the Government should make it standard procedure that those moving
from Incapacity Benefit to Jobseeker's Allowance see a Disability
Employment Adviser (paragraph 42).
(i) We recommend that the Government provides
sufficient resources to ensure the intensive work-focussed regime
can be implemented effectively, preferably allowing appropriately
trained staff to manage actively their caseload and at the very
least ensuring staff are not over-burdened to the point where
they cannot deliver a high quality service (paragraph 45).
(j) We recommend close working with a range
of disability organisations to ensure all aspects of disability
access, including access to information and transport, are addressed.
We also ask the Department for Work and Pensions to ensure
that all its JCP offices are fully accessible to disabled claimants
and that hearing loops are available for use (paragraph 46).
(k) We recommend the Department makes every
effort to reassure participants in the intensive work-focussed
regime that participation will not lead to loss of benefit (paragraph
49).
(l) We recommend that contact is made with
people in the exempted categories to ensure that they are fully
aware of the services Jobcentre Plus has to offer and that they
can access these services should they so wish (paragraph 51).
(m) We recommend that the Access to Work budget
should be increased by a significant proportion to reflect the
number of disabled people who want to work and who need support
to enable them to do so. We also urge the Government to embark
on a much wider publicity campaign - aimed at disabled people
and their employers - to increase awareness of Access to Work
(paragraph 57).
(n) Jobcentre Plus should work more closely
with employers to ensure the retention and rehabilitation of employees.
The Committee welcomes the rehabilitation pilots outlined in the
Green Paper but is concerned that no mention is made of support
to ensure job retention for employees who become disabled. We
believe that much more support should be available to prevent
disabled people from dropping out of the labour force (paragraph
61).
(o) We strongly recommend that the Government
ensure that half of the pilots are provided by the private and
voluntary sectors, to allow a much greater range of approaches
to be tested (paragraph 61).
(p) The funding for New Deal for Disabled
People is not in proportion to the numbers of people targetted
and does not reflect the level of support required by participants.
The Committee agrees with evidence from a range of organisations
calling for an increase in the funding allocation of NDDP
in relation to the other New Deal programmes (paragraph 64).
(q) We believe that a payment at the beginning
of a contract with New Deal for Disabled People job brokers should
be made to assist with local marketing. We believe New Deal for
Disabled People should remain voluntary (paragraph 67).
(r) The Committee recommends that more resources
should be channelled into helping those disabled people who are
further from the labour market by the use of 'soft skills' enhancement
and helping those with greater support needs. In our report on
the ONE pilots and in the Employment Strategy report, the Committee
recommended that the Government should review the use of targets
dependent on job outcomes and develop targets based upon 'distance
travelled'. We are pleased that these recommendations have
been taken on board and look forward to hearing how these measures
will be implemented (paragraph 71).
(s) The Committee recommends three changes
to the funding structure of NDDP. First, the initial payment at
registration of clients should be increased from £100 to
£500 in acknowledgement of the costs of work preparation.
Second, the funding structure which penalises contractors when
clients move into part-time rather than full-time work should
be reformed to recognise that finding, and retaining, part-time
work is a big achievement for many disabled people, which involves
just as great an amount of resourcing by the broker as moving
them into full-time work. Third, we believe Jobcentre Plus offices
should have a discretionary budget to provide rehabilitation services
for claimants who have been on incapacity-related benefits, or
economically inactive through illness or disability but not claiming
benefits. This would not be funded according to job outcomes (paragraph
76).
(t) We recommend that this approach be piloted
in the areas of the country with high Incapacity Benefit levels,
in particular those which suffered economic dislocation from the
closure of mining and shipbuilding businesses, as highlighted
in paragraphs 20 and 21 (paragraph 76).
(u) Having listened to their arguments, the
Committee believes that the Jobcentre Plus model is the most effective
administrative format and that any separation would be a step
backwards (paragraph 78).
(v) The Committee is concerned that disabled
people still face considerable financial barriers in the move
from benefits to work and recommends the Government introduce
a four week complete benefit run-on for disabled people moving
into work (paragraph 83).
(w) The Committee supports the idea of a 'back
to work diary' and urges the Department to consider how this might
be implemented (paragraph 86).
(x) The Committee welcomes the Return to Work
Credit. We do not believe it needs piloting and believe that it
should be extended nationally as soon as possible. We also recommend
that the credit should be excluded from the Housing and Council
Tax Benefits income calculation and would welcome clarification
on how the Department plans to deal with claimants once they reach
the end of their claiming period (paragraph 88).
(y) The Committee recommends that the earnings
disregard should be raised to £35 per week. This would enable
a full day's work at minimum wage levels and would help to reduce
the financial leap between living on benefits and moving into
work of more than 16 hours a week, supported by tax credits (paragraph
90).
(z) We therefore recommend reducing the qualifying
hours to 12 hours per week for those with disabilities while (as
recommended above) raising the disregard to £35 per week
(paragraph 92).
(aa) We recommend that entitlement to the
52 Week Linking Rule should be automatic (paragraph 94).
(bb) The Committee recommends the Department
explore further the extent to which Disability Living Allowance
reviews act as a financial disincentive to work and consider establishing
a fixedterm Disability Living Allowance 'moratorium' when
a claimant first moves into work to enable them to adjust to their
new financial situation (paragraph 96).
(cc) We recommend that the DWP work with the
DfES and Government Information Service to ensure that a positive
perception of disabled people is widely promoted (paragraph 106).
(dd) We recommend greater effort is put into
promoting the business case for employing disabled people, especially
for small and medium sized businesses (paragraph 110).
(ee) The Committee is concerned that the definition
of disability under the Disability Discrimination Act could be
preventing many people from using the provisions of the Act. We
urge the Government to work with the Disability Rights Commission
and other disability organisations to review the definition to
ensure that people who are genuinely disabled can be protected
by the Disability Discrimination Act (paragraph 115).
(ff) The Committee welcomes the Government's
commitment to civil rights for disabled people and hopes that
the momentum continues apace. The next few years will bring several
key legislative changes, including the planned Disability Bill,
which we hope will make a real difference to the employment opportunities
of disabled people. The ending of the small employer exemption
and the exemption of excluded occupations is welcome, as is the
intention to place a duty on public bodies to promote equality
of opportunity for disabled people. We strongly urge the Government
to ensure that all of these extensions of rights for disabled
people will be widely publicised to employers and the general
public. Awareness-raising is crucial to their success (paragraph
116).
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