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Cancer poverty is a particular problem for people of working age and their families. Macmillan’s research shows that of those aged 55 or under, seven out of 10 households suffer a loss in income averaging 50 per cent following a cancer diagnosis, making disability benefits extremely important to them.
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Yet a great many people with cancer miss out because they are unaware of benefits to which they are entitled. As the National Audit Office has reported, 77 per cent of cancer patients are not given information about financial support, while Jobcentre Plus staff rarely inform them of disability benefits administered by the Disability and Carers Service. Indeed, the scripts used in Jobcentre Plus call centres do not include any prompts to give information about disability benefits.
In summary, Macmillan wants the agency’s scripts improved so that claimants know about all their benefit entitlements, together with measures to ensure that the focus is more strongly on improving take-up. The charity wants Jobcentre Plus routinely to refer claimants to sources of guidance, information and advice, such as the DWP’s own benefits inquiry line, as well as disability awareness training for front-line staff.
If we are to fulfil the admirable aspiration of helping a million more disabled people into work during the next decade, we must urgently challenge unfounded concerns about employing disabled people and make strongly renewed efforts to publicise the help available to employers.
Parliamentary replies state that the DWP spends £320,000 a year on marketing and publicising its disability services and programmes, of which, such is their number, the sum available for publicising Access to Work is small. For many disability organisations, this explains why the department's message is not reaching most employers. They feel, too, that a Bill such as this could have something to say on the key role of ministries other than the DWP, such as the Department of Trade and Industry, in putting together a cross-departmental strategy for countering employers’ concerns about taking on disabled people. Moreover, they say that without such a strategy,
- “there must be serious concern about achieving the aim of getting a million disabled people off benefits and into work”.
The Commons Public Accounts Committee report on DWP support for disabled people states:
“In 2004—05, the Department for Work and Pensions spent around £320 million funding a number of programmes and schemes to help disabled people find and stay in employment. However, they reach only a minority—160,000—of those who could potentially benefit”.
Unsurprisingly, this prompts disability organisations to query the adequacy of the £360 million promised to roll out Pathways to Work nationally when, as we have seen, the £320 million spent on funding other programmes reached only 160,000 people; perhaps my noble friend could have that seemingly well founded concern looked into urgently.
I turn very briefly now to some other points worthy of attention. The first concerns the Bill's title. It surprises many disabled people that the word “welfare” is itself in the Short Title when the emphasis in this policy area is on rights, not on “welfarism”. Why, I am asked, is the measure not called the “Disabled Persons Employment and Support Bill”?
A further point raised with me by their organisations is that disabled people should be more protected against the popular assumption that fraudulent claiming of disability benefits is rampant whereas, to take just one
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Finally, I am asked also to press the issue of sanctions as dealt with in the Bill. The DWP's analysis last year of the Pathways pilot areas showed the number of sanctions imposed on claimants to be about 0.4 per cent of all benefit starts in Pathways. Is the department convinced that this finding justifies the Bill’s significant powers of sanction, given the widely accepted figure of 1 million disabled people who want to work but are left waiting for the right help and support to enable them to do so? It is put to me:
“We clearly have the carrot in the form of the help and support being offered, but do we really need a stick in the form of sanctions when so many disabled people crave the right to work?”.
I know my noble friend will not be able to respond today to all of the points raised with him in the debate, but I hope that he will at least have time to say more in his winding-up speech about engaging with employers to promote the support available to them and challenge negative attitudes about employing disabled people. No Bill that I have known in all my years in Parliament was incapable of being improved by constructive scrutiny and I hope the points I have raised today will help to ensure the Bill's emergence from parliamentary scrutiny as one that disability organisations, employers and all the departments involved can accept as well worth speeding to the statute book. I wish my noble friend all success.
6.06 pm
Baroness Thomas of Winchester: My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Manchester, who has done so much for disabled people over the years.
The Pathways to Work pilot schemes have demonstrated that a great many disabled people of working age want paid employment. Being out of work is alienating, unsociable and, for many, begins an inevitable slide into poverty. Being out of work for a long time is even worse, as confidence levels plummet, with unemployed disabled people quickly believing that they are completely unemployable, leading to feelings of worthlessness. So I welcome the purpose of the Bill, which has the ambitious aim of trying to reduce the numbers of disabled people on incapacity benefit by helping them enter the workplace. I very much hope that the Government have allocated enough resources to this ambition—£360 million over two years does not sound very much—and that they are still listening not just to Parliament but to all the expertise in the specialist voluntary organisations that work tirelessly for their client groups.
Those suffering mental health conditions, who, as we have heard, account for about 40 per cent of those on IB, are among the most vulnerable people that the whole scheme must try to help. If more help was available to deal with mental health problems in the early stages, perhaps there would be fewer people with that problem on benefits. After all, more money spent
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It is especially important that personal advisers at jobcentres are trained properly in helping vulnerable people who are trying to overcome their problems and enter or re-enter the workplace. Here I am particularly concerned about the sanctions regime in the Bill which, as others have said, could add to the stress and intimidation felt by those prone to mental illness. Will the Minister confirm that decision-makers have some discretion in the imposition of a sanction if a claimant falling into this category misses, for example, a work-focused interview without necessarily giving a “good cause”?
Employers also need to be especially understanding with employees suffering from fluctuating conditions such as clinical depression, and there is a strong view amongst specialist groups that not enough attention has been paid to the vital role and responsibility that employers have in ensuring the success of what the Government are attempting to do. Although employers of disabled people are very positive about the experience, there is no question that most employers continue to discriminate against disabled employees. That fact is borne out by the statistics reported in the Joseph Rowntree Foundation report Monitoring Poverty and Social Exclusion2005. The Minister for Employment and Welfare Reform, Mr Jim Murphy, said in a debate on 29 November in the other place that the Government needed to do more to engage employers, and I wonder what they have in mind. Unless there are stronger requirements for employers to assist employment in the future, many disabled people in the employment group are going to be condemned to engage in endless work-focused activities with no prospect of a job.
No one can say that the Bill is making the whole disability benefits field simpler, as the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, said. A complex web of procedures is set out in the Bill, starting with the familiar personal capacity assessment although, of course, in a new form. We have not yet seen the draft regulations for this test—they are promised tomorrow—which does not give us much time to examine them properly before the Committee stage. However, the specialist groups have seen the draft proposals and there is great concern about the proposed withdrawal of several low-scoring physical descriptors. I do not think the noble Lord said that they have been restored, so I assume they are still withdrawn at present. The point of having descriptors such as, “Can only walk up and down a flight of stairs if he goes sideways or one step at a time”—I can identify with this—is that those people who fall into such a category need help and support with work. They are not necessarily seeking exemption from work, but they need physical obstacles to be taken into account lest they get forgotten. However, I welcome the announcement made by the noble Lord that the physical function and mental health function will be added together, which shows that there is now movement towards a social rather than just a medical model of disability; that is very welcome.
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Still on the subject of the personal capacity assessment, presumably there will still be a request for information from the claimant’s doctor. I urge that this process is closely monitored. The claimant should be given an up-to-date assessment before the report is sent in, and then it should be sent in as soon as possible thereafter. We hear that many doctors do not submit a report in time for the claimant’s PCA. The up-to-date doctor’s report at the outset would surely save a lot of time wasted in later appeals, the majority of which are successful.
My last word at this point on the PCA comes from my experience of claiming disability living allowance, which was only granted on appeal, and here I must declare that particular interest. The form asked how far I could walk outside unaided. This is a difficult question and the form seemed well designed to take a range of answers into account, yet I was marked down because I was not VUTW. I had to phone up to ask what that meant. It means virtually unable to walk. None of my comments had been taken into account at all. Was it anything to do with a computer only understanding black and white answers, I wondered? In which case, God preserve all claimants from what a Member of the other place cited as, “Computer says ‘No’”. Watchers of “Little Britain” will recognise the phrase. What is the role of the computer is in this particular assessment? Is it the case that if pre-coded answers are not given, any non-standard responses on the form will not be attached to any particular descriptor and might just as well not have been written? Does that not make the case for having an independent assessment of the whole PCA process, and many dummy runs, before national roll-out?
I turn now to the subject of the work-focused health assessment. First, it is very important that assessors are able to call on specialist knowledge of certain conditions, and my noble friend Lord Addington will expand on this point. The second matter is the understandable concern that by undertaking this assessment at the same time as the main PCA, claimants will have to focus on what they cannot do and what they can do almost simultaneously. It is quite likely to be in the disabled person’s interest that they do not have to make two trips to the medical centre for these two tests, and quite a few claimants obviously will not need to take the second one, but it does raise questions. Will the two tests be entirely separate and will the decision-maker be the same person on each occasion, or will the answers to one test influence the other? Perhaps the Minister can enlighten us as this is a worry to several specialist groups.
Before leaving this part of the Bill, why will no benefit entitlement except for those with a terminal illness be backdated to the start of a claim; that is, roughly the 13-week assessment phase when the benefit is at the lower jobseeker’s allowance level? I know this is not the not the first time that the question has been put this afternoon, but it seems unjust, particularly for those in the support group. Is this the only benefit which will not be backdated to the start of the claim?
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I should like to look at the whole question of passported benefits, an issue also raised by the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale. I refer to benefits such as free school meals and prescriptions, housing and council tax benefits. This was hardly touched on during the Bill’s scrutiny in the other place. Will the Minister set out at some point just where the triggers are with the new employment and support allowance? However, there are almost certainly too many variables for a simple explanation now. A question involving passported benefits was put to me the other day in relation to the help and support a disabled person needs when they start work, and it is one which goes to the heart of the Bill. If a severely disabled wheelchair user whose circumstances mean that she is currently on income support and who is at present entitled to passported benefits wishes to seek a proper job—that is, a job with more hours than the permitted work rules allow—using her new skills acquired at an FE college, will there be adequate support available? A person such as this is unlikely to take the plunge into the world of work without such support in case they had seriously misjudged their ability to cope. Will there be enough flexibility in the system for such a person, after completing the transitional period, to go back on to benefits if necessary without starting from scratch? The phrase, “What if I find it all too much?”, is one which must be familiar to personal advisers. I should be grateful for the Minister’s comments on such a case.
This brings me to the Access to Work scheme, which has been described as one of the best kept of all Government secrets. One of my disabled friends is a highly gifted primary school teacher in a north London borough who can only do her job thanks to an Access to Work scheme helper who writes on the blackboard, carries books, photocopies and does all the practical tasks my friend cannot manage. Are there any plans to make this excellent scheme better known? When Pathways to Work is rolled out nationally, it must surely be the case that the Access to Work scheme will have to be expanded, and I hope this has been taken into account in its budget, particularly in the number of staff engaged in administering the scheme. Perhaps we could have a reassurance on this point.
Finally, I wish this Bill had had pre-legislative scrutiny, given that it is a carryover Bill. The Government may say that the Green Paper and the successful pilot schemes carried out so far are enough, but they are no substitute for detailed parliamentary scrutiny. The problem is that the regulations which will have to be made under the Bill are just as important as the Bill itself, and they cannot be amended. Obviously all social security Bills have to contain detailed regulation-making powers, but sooner or later Parliament is going to want a better way of having its say about what is in these important regulations. The Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee can warn all it can and the Merits of Statutory Instruments Committee can play its part after Bills become law, but when all is said and down, the balance is still heavily tilted towards ministerial fiat becoming law. We in this House can seek to make the most important regulations come under the
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6.18 pm
Lord Low of Dalston: My Lords, this Bill has the potential to greatly improve the support and opportunities available to disabled people, who have for many years not been sufficiently seen as able to move towards or engage in work. I therefore welcome the recognition by the Government that disabled people on incapacity benefit should not be written off and sidelined for the rest of their working lives and that those who have left work because of illness or disability should be assisted to move back towards the labour market. I should also like to pay tribute to the way the Minister and his department have, like his predecessor, been anxious to engage in dialogue with noble Lords over the Bill. I look forward to approaching its passage through your Lordships’ House in the same spirit of dialogue, which is the surest way to achieve the best outcome for those the Bill seeks to help.
The Disability Rights Commission has produced statistics of the employment disadvantage experienced by disabled people which are too numerous for me to catalogue in full but which are frightening in their import. Whilst the number of working age disabled people in employment has increased over the past decade, 48 per cent remain outside employment. For people with a mental illness or a learning disability the percentages are 80 per cent and 90 per cent respectively. Due to stigma and discrimination, fewer than four in 10 employers would consider employing someone with a history of mental health problems, compared to more than six in 10 for candidates with physical disability. As the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Manchester, has reminded us, as many as 90 per cent of employers say that someone with a visual disability would be difficult or impossible to employ. On average, disabled people earn 10 per cent less than non-disabled people at every level of qualification, and 40 per cent of people on incapacity benefit have no formal qualifications at all.
The DRC welcomes the opportunity presented by the Bill to create an alternative future where, in return for taking steps towards work, disabled people can anticipate high-quality personalised support, wider employment opportunities, a labour market in which disability discrimination is eradicated, equal pay and prospects for advancement which make work pay both for them and their families. For this to be realised, the right conditions must be in place before conditionality is applied. The DRC fully accepts that with rights come responsibilities and that, as disabled people's employment rights and opportunities increase, so should society's expectation that more disabled people will make moves from benefits into work. Indeed, it is low
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The DRC has a number of proposals for delivering its alternative vision. These are too numerous to list here but may perhaps be summarised in the following way. Entitlement to employment and support allowance should be based on work-related disadvantage, not limited capability. During the Bill's passage in another place, there were proposals to change the conceptual basis from “limited capability for work” to “work-related disadvantage” in an effort to highlight the external, non-medical dimensions which shape disabled people's employment opportunities, and through doing so, ensure greater consistency with developments such as the Disability Discrimination Act. This would provide a clearer picture of the specific challenges, both for particular individuals and structurally within the labour market, which need to be addressed to promote and widen employment opportunities for disabled people.
Your Lordships will be aware that concerns have been expressed by disabled people's organisations about a number of aspects of the Bill. One concern is the relationship between the work-focused health-related assessment, which is intended to explore what abilities a claimant has and what support might enable them to move towards work. As I understand it, this assessment is to be carried out immediately after the claimant has undergone the personal capability assessment interview, where they are interviewed about their application for employment and support allowance and how their impairment impacts on their ability to work. I am concerned that to have a discussion about what abilities a claimant has and what support might enable them to move towards work immediately after they have undergone the PCA interview, which focuses on what they are unable to do because of their disability or health condition, is potentially confusing and a cause of anxiety amongst claimants.
Disabled people have spoken to us most movingly of their desire to work, but also the pressure they feel themselves under at the prospect of being faced with these two contrasting assessments. After all, how are they to know that what they say when discussing their abilities could not be used to further inform whether they pass the personal capability assessment? At the very least, there is a tension between the objectives of the two assessments. Without knowing the rates at which benefit will ultimately be paid, it is impossible to say that there is not a disincentive for claimants to embrace wholeheartedly the idea of work-related activity which will operate at the point of the work-focused health-related assessment.
In another place, the Minister for Employment and Welfare Reform undertook to reflect further on the timing of the personal capability assessment and work-focused health-related assessment interviews. I would be grateful if the Minister could tell us whether he and
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The Government have set themselves an ambitious aspiration of getting 1 million disabled people off incapacity benefit and into work over the next 10 years. This is a laudable aim, but one concern I have is that the Bill does not introduce specific measures to help people who are at risk of leaving work due to a disability or health condition. It is estimated that, just in relation to people who experience sight loss, 3,000 leave work each year because they feel unable to continue in work, with more than 25,000 people in total leaving the labour force each year as a result of work-related injury and illness. Enabling such people to remain in work could do more to get people off benefit and into work than any measures designed to get people into work in the first place.
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