Examination of Witnesses (Questions 660
- 679)
TUESDAY 12 JUNE 2007
REVEREND GRAHAM
K BLOUNT AND
MRS EILEEN
BAXENDALE
Q660 Mr Walker:
And this is from a Conservative for crying out loud! Miracles
can happen!
Reverend Blount: The sense from
the media is that people are to be valued not by their bank balance
or by their credit rating but by the amount of wealth that they
have and that automatically somebody who has vast amounts of wealth
is a far more valuable person than somebody from Easterhouse.
Mr Walker: At the risk of sounding churlish,
sometimes I find it deeply annoying when you see pop stars, not
perhaps of the Bono category or Bob Geldof, who have made a little
bit of money and suddenly they are pontificating on everything
as if their view, because they are famous and have a bit of money,
is more valuable than the view of someone living on your estate
who has no money at all but does a huge amount of good work for
his or her community year-on-year-on-year for little reward or
recognition. If there is a story breaking in the press, it is
some pop star that gets the coverage and it is the person in your
community whose voice is not heard and I think that is wrong as
well. It is this superstardom—
Mr Davidson: I think we have a Bolshevik
here!
Q661 Mr McGovern:
We have heard some evidence that those in most severe poverty
are sometimes the hardest to reach and some of the programmes
that are meant to help them miss them. Could you say what you
feel could be done to reach those who are in the severest poverty
in our communities?
Mrs Baxendale: Personally, from
my experience, where a number of these programmes struggle is
because they do not connect with the person they are trying to
help. It would be no more labour intensive if people who are struggling
to enter the labour market and so on were actually mentored in
some sort of way in that there was an identified person who aided
and assisted them and kept an eye on them. That is not a terribly
expensive thing to put into place. I am thinking of a young lad
I am aware of just now who is being mentored by somebody in our
church and that has made a huge difference to him. He has gone
from very difficult circumstances where you would have thought
there was no hope to being well on the way to completing a college
course and becoming responsible and sustaining a tenancy, all
sorts of things and that was by a fairly simple mentoring process.
A lot of the schemes miss that part of what they need to do. I
think that is certainly a gap and where the difference could be
made.
Reverend Blount: One dimension
of that, to go back to the recurrent theme, is about listening
on the ground. The gap between what the policy aspiration is and
the actual delivery of it on the ground is almost inevitable if
the process is top-down. There needs to be much more rootedness
of the delivery at local level and therefore sensitivity to what
is happening at a local level so that at the very least the people
at the frontline are feeding back to the centre that this policy
is not reaching the right people, instead of deliver, deliver,
deliver without much thought of whether it is reaching the people
that it is meant to reach.
Q662 Mr McGovern:
Would you agree also that perhaps in some cases one person's support
is perceived by another person as harassment? For example, where
Jobcentre Plus call people in maybe on a monthly basis to interview
them to see if there are any training courses that could help
them, unfortunately a lot of people perceive that as harassment
rather than support.
Reverend Blount: I have to say
that one of the things that to an extent surprised me in our work
with people experiencing poverty was people with very bad experiences
of government and local government services and of how they were
treated there. It is partly about how you are treated; it is not
about what the policy is, it is about how it is presented to you,
and it is not hard to imagine the kind of thing that Eileen spoke
about in terms of mentoring being presented to somebody as "you
need this" and provoking the kind of resentment that you
are talking about, so it is about people-friendly, user-friendly
delivery of things that actually can make a difference.
Q663 Mr MacNeil:
How do you think the Westminster Government and the new Scottish
Government could poverty-proof policies so that new initiatives
do not exacerbate poverty or undermine current efforts to tackle
poverty or indeed wealth?
Reverend Blount: I think that
is quite a crucial challenge. One of the positive things that
was built into the Scotland Act was the provision that in presenting
any kind of legislation there had to be comment about the equal
opportunities impact and sustainable development impact which
is now routinely part of things, but any provision like that can
become a matter of ticking a box and the difficulty is to write
something in that is not just a matter of ticking the box and
saying, "We have talked for five minutes about whether this
will have any impact and we are basically saying it won't",
to seriously think hard about policies and ensure that there is
proper consideration of how they will impact on the poorest.
Q664 Mr MacNeil:
In the answer you gave to Mr McGovern a while ago about support
becoming harassment fairly quickly, is that a loss of seeing people
as people and a ticking-the-box mentality almost?
Reverend Blount: Yes, I think
so. It is characteristic of many large organisations and—and
if I whisper it very quietly so that it will not be heard—I
might say that churches are not entirely immune from it now and
again themselves. It is something that we need constantly to be
vigilant about. I—and a lot of other people in the churches—am
very attracted by the idea of consistently poverty-proofing policies
for their impact, but even doing that quite rigorously you still
then need to look at how it is going to be delivered on the ground.
Q665 Mr Davidson:
Can I follow up this question of delivery, there have been some
big efforts recently in Scotland through SIPs and CPPs and all
the rest of it to try and bring decision-making closer to people
and to take account of the local needs. My own experience as a
Member is that all that has happened is that basically Edinburgh
officials have set the guidelines and they are then followed by
local officials and taken out of the hands of locally elected
members, community councillors, and all the rest of it. Is that
the churches' view of how this has been working or do you have
a much more positive view of all these efforts?
Mrs Baxendale: I hear where you
are coming from—and I have been involved in SIP and all
sorts of things in my past life—and it has not entirely
succeeded in engaging with the local community. It has to an extent
but there have been times when, yes, it seems people are setting
down rules and regulations "You have to do it this way."
Balance that with the fact that a lot of money has gone into deprived
communities in Glasgow (I know about Glasgow because I dealt with
that in the past) and it has been well spent. But there does seem
to be still an on-going struggle to get people's voices heard.
Again in areas of Glasgow where I work if you said to people,
"Do you feel you are heard?" they will say "No,"
but that is a briefer version of, "Yes, we have been heard
about some things but not entirely and the system does not always
listen", and somehow we need to get into the structure of
things that they must listen to local communities and listen to
everybody. This is the basic theme we come back to as the churches;
everybody is valuable so everybody's views are valuable, if we
get that into our mindset.
Q666 Mr Davidson:
Following that through, how can we have mechanisms that help those
in poverty have their voices better heard? One of the difficulties
is that it often has been said if we solved unemployment there
would be a lot of people losing their jobs because there is a
whole industry built upon trying to resolve unemployment and there
would be a lot of people a lot poorer if we abolished poverty
similarly because there is a great number of mediators and so
on. How do we overcome that, given that on the one hand there
are lots of people who are poor who are not articulate and are
not able to communicate adequately never mind any strategic vision
but very much at all, but on the other hand there are people trying
to be helpful and you need to have things aggregated in a way?
How do we strike that balance?
Reverend Blount: I think there
are generations of not being listened to to overcome and there
are generations from the point of view of decision-makers of not
feeling any need to listen, so there are a lot of barriers to
communication to overcome and I think some of the difficulties
with SIPs and Community Planning Partnerships actually are rooted
in that. The experience of the Scottish Parliament is that both
the Parliament and the Executive, in their very early days, set
up mechanisms that were designed to do this. The Churches' Social
Inclusion Network in its early day almost mirrored the body set
up by the Scottish Executive as a social inclusion network to
do just this kind of thing, and it found, as did an attempt by
the Communities Committee of the Parliament to engage on a regular
basis with people experiencing poverty, it is not an easy thing
to do. It is not going to produce instant results. You are not
going to get the new policy wheeze that will sort out poverty
from sitting down in a room for half an hour together and there
will clearly be tensions. Part of the reason why you can describe
people as being "inarticulate" is actually because they
have never been asked to do this before, they have never had the
opportunity to take part in this kind of discussion before, and
I think perseverance with it through all the difficulties is part
of it, and it makes life very difficult for some very well-intentioned
people who are determined to try and deliver things that are the
right things to be delivering.
Q667 Mr Davidson:
Do the churches potentially have a role in this or are you just
another group that gets in the road?
Reverend Blount: I think what
Eileen says about social capital is important there. Actually
churches are one of the places where people learn to be articulate.
Maybe I am biased by belonging to a Presbyterian pseudo-democratic
organisation where people are encouraged to play a part in the
governance of the institution and where we do recognise the value
and the contribution of everybody, but that often is how people's
commitment to the community and their articulateness, if you like,
in expressing that is nurtured. It cuts both ways. I had a kirk
session in my first parish many of whom learnt their way of operating
in committees because they had been heavily involved in trade
unions affairs. There are a number of such organisations in which
people have traditionally built up that kind of experience and
social capital, so I think there is a very positive role there.
Q668 Mr McGovern:
As regards to child benefit one of your submissions mentions delays
in processing child benefit applications.
Mrs Baxendale: That was my submission.
I was not able to check today if that situation has improved and
that is just based on having known people who were having difficulties
at the time I was writing it. I apologise, I have not updated
that.
Q669 Mr McGovern:
The question I did intend to ask is—and if you are not able
to answer that is fine—what is the impact of these delays
on families and is it widespread or is it localised?
Mrs Baxendale: I think it is very
difficult when you have a three-week-old baby, it is very expensive
having a new baby because they need all the things and then they
keep needing nappies and so on and people—this is anecdotal—frequently
say to me, "I had no idea how expensive it was going to be,"
or, "The bulk of my money, whatever it is I am getting on
a Friday, is going on stuff for the baby and I haven't had new
shoes for months," and so on so it is putting people under
pressure and it is an unnecessary pressure in that I do not see
why it would be more difficult to assess the child benefit quicker;
I just do not.
Reverend Blount: I think what
is statistically in terms of the whole amount of money being distributed
is a very small matter can have a huge impact on people whose
means of keeping themselves going is very, very close to the bit,
so that a relatively small delay that on one side of the table
looks a relatively trivial matter is actually a huge matter on
the other side of the table. I was reading something this week
through Citizens' Advice Scotland which I am involved with as
their Chair, and that was about people in the Highlands who basically
find themselves dependent on charitable food parcels because of
benefit delays and that can also mean that one way in which people
respond is by taking out costly credit to get them over this period
and that sticks it further and gets them further embedded.
Q670 Mr Davidson:
Surely this comes back to the role of the churches as mediators?
If you are aware of cases like that then surely either you should
be picking these up with the locally elected member or with the
Department? Delays in individual cases are not actions of policy,
there is no policy that says these things should be delivered
and delayed. If there are hiccoughs I can see how yourselves,
knowing your way through the channels, would be able to help people
take it up either with their MP or somebody else. I can see a
remedy to that as an issue.
Reverend Blount: Absolutely, but
there is also a related issue where there do seem to be significant
problems in the transition from benefit to work in terms of a
gap between when the benefits run out and when the wages kick
in. To most of us who are comfortably off that might seem a very
minor thing but it is actually a huge barrier in their switches,
which is again about a delay but it is much more a matter of policy
as you say.
Q671 Mr McGovern:
If I could just comment on what you said there. I am a comparatively
new MP, I was just elected at the last general election, and at
every surgery I do have people come to my surgery with child tax
credits and Child Support Agency cases but I have to say I cannot
recall anybody coming to me and saying their child benefit application
had been delayed.
Mrs Baxendale: My understanding
at the time I wrote this was that this was not a particular issue
for particular people, because they are all done at Newcastle,
but that Newcastle took six or eight weeks to process a child
benefit application.
Q672 Mr McGovern:
I certainly do not disbelieve you. I am just surprised that no-one
has ever come to my surgery and said, "I have been waiting
eight weeks for my child benefit, what can you do about it?"
unless the churches pick it up in Dundee. The supplementary question
was to be about Child Trust Funds. Again, since I have been elected,
no-one has ever come to me and said they have got a problem or
do I have information about the Child Trust Fund. I do not know
if that means it is so simple that everybody gets it without a
problem or if nobody bothers to apply for it. Do you think there
is adequate support and guidance for parents to apply for the
Child Trust Fund?
Reverend Blount: I would have
to say that my experience is very similar to your own. I have
not been aware of anybody having problems with it.
Q673 Mr McGovern:
And you think that implies everybody gets it without a problem?
Reverend Blount: There are no
obvious problems.
Q674 Mr Walker:
I do not mean to be controversial but we cannot always avoid it.
There is this general view from everybody who has given evidence
that those living in poverty are universally righteous and they
are the wronged, and that cannot always be the case. It is like
saying that all those who are wealthy are universally selfish
and mean, and they are not, we know that is not the case. We have
not asked this question through all the evidence sessions, but
there must be examples when you see people who are just not very
good or are not willing to help themselves, they are offered help,
they are given every opportunity and they do not take those opportunities
for whatever reason. It must be exasperating for you. Often these
are the hardest-to-reach people because often they do not want
to be reached. What do you think we could do to actually say,
right, you have had enough chances, we are going to have to intervene
more forcibly to break this cycle of poverty because ultimately
it is going to be your children and their children and their children
that will suffer as a result. Do you see what I mean?
Mrs Baxendale: I see what you
mean, yes, I do indeed. That is a hard question. As churches we
are committed to continuing to try to help people but we are not
committed to being foolish about it. Some people need a great
deal of support and then they do make it and they do change. That
is probably not what you are talking about. You are talking about
people who however much support you give them are just not willing
to change.
Q675 Mr Walker:
The ultimate sanction the state can take against families is to
take their children away, which is appalling and horrible but
sometimes the state feels for the benefit of those children it
has to take them away. For the hardest to reach people perhaps
who do not want to be reached who have the greatest problems I
think that maybe we need to be looking at new methods of breaking
the cycle, maybe it is taking them out of their existing environment
and supporting them in a new environment and allowing them to
make a fresh start. I do not know what it is but you have got
to break the cycle. You said at the very beginning if you get
mums and dads and suddenly you can change their whole life opportunities,
and not their life opportunities solely but those of their children
and grandchildren and so on and so forth. Do you see what I am
saying? It is a very difficult question and I do not have any
answer.
Mrs Baxendale: A couple of responses
to that. I worked as a social work manager for many years and
it is indeed the case that sometimes children had to be removed
from their families for their own safety and well-being, but we
have to be aware at the time if we do that that does not necessarily
increase the children's chances of doing well. We all know that
children in social work care do not do so well in exams, employment
and all sorts of things because they have already got the disadvantages
that they had as they came into care.
Q676 Mr Walker:
So you are just entrenching the next cycle potentially?
Mrs Baxendale: Not necessarily,
a proportion of children that come into care do very well, educationally
and employment wise. I know that the Committee have already heard
from the Dundee NCH people. I am not sure if that is the project
that does exactly what you were talking about—it takes families
right out of their environment—and that is a project that
does that successfully.
Q677 Mr Walker:
Here is a question: what do you think the Government should be
doing that it is not doing now to help the hardest-to-reach families,
the ones that cause you the greatest amount of exasperation because
you can see it all going wrong and right now you do not believe
there are any resources in place to stop it from going wrong?
Reverend Blount: My instinct would
be that with a lot of these the kind of project that Eileen was
talking about, some projects that are church-based some that are
not, where it is not the state making a direct impact on somebody,
it is groups from within the community and voluntary sector groups
working with people, with the state in its funding sense recognising
that this is hugely time and people expensive to do but that there
is an urgency to break the cycle, and that with a lot of people
while they seem very resistant to carrot or stick, if you like,
then you have got to ask yourself why is this happening, and that
will not be the same answer for everyone. It is not that there
is a magic bullet that says if you just switch this on it will
sort it, but it is working intensively with people.
Q678 Mr Walker:
You are right, we saw the Dundee project and there troubled families
are actually taken out of their environment, housed within that
project and almost re-educated, it sounds Orwellian, but given
a lot of love, a lot of support and parameters which they may
never have had before. The cost of this is vast but actually when
you compare that six months to a year-long cost to the cost of
that family continuing to be dysfunctional in the community, actually
it is one of the best investments that you are ever going to get.
Reverend Blount: Absolutely.
Q679 Mr Walker:
I suppose, yes, that is what I was referring to—very radical
thinking.
Mrs Baxendale: I do not know that
you would do better than that. I think it is a very good project.
I do not think we can help everyone. I do not think there are
new magic formulas that we should be applying. There is a lot
of stuff in place—Surestart and all these sorts of things—all
sorts of projects already in place and maybe we are not going
to win over everybody.
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