Incapacity Benefit "crackdown" begins today

The one-and-a-half million people who claim incapacity benefit will start to receive letters this week asking them to be tested for their ability to work. The new assessments are part of government plans to reduce the number of long-term claimants in a rolling programme through to 2014. Almost 30% of those who took the test during pilot schemes in Burnley and Aberdeen were declared fit to work. However, disability charities say many of the assessments are unfair.

However, the question remains, how many disabled people on benefits are really fit for work? It’s an important question, particularly in light of revelations of unfair assessments being conducted during the pilot phase of this programme. Suggestions that people suffering from cancer and undergoing chemotherapy or individuals with long-term mental health problems all being deemed ‘fit for work’ does not inspire confidence in a system

Nonetheless, the government continue to publicise that just over a quarter of those assessed were “fit for work”

Put like that it sounds as though a large proportion of people on these benefits are swinging the lead – and this is certainly the story newspapers have been telling recently.

But that is entirely the wrong way of looking at it. To understand why, a little explanation is needed. Since the mid 1990s, the main income replacement benefits for disabled people have been Incapacity Benefit and Income Support. The Labour government brought in a new benefit to replace them, called Employment and Support Allowance, with a tougher eligibility test, called the Work Capability Assessment. One of the new government’s priorities has been to move people who currently get the old benefits over to ESA, which means applying the new test to them.

They expect this to take three years and the results are from a pilot project that’s mainly about finding out if there are going to be any operational problems. It was only running in two locations – Aberdeen and Burnley – so the numbers involved are quite small. (This means we have to be a little cautious about the results.)

I understand that about 12 per cent of those found fit for work are appealing. About 40 per cent of WCA appeals are successful; if that holds true the proportion finally found fit for work will come down to about a quarter.

This shouldn’t really come as a surprise – the new test was designed to be tougher and everyone involved assumed that fewer people would be awarded benefit. So, when a test designed to cut the numbers qualifying is applied to a group who passed an easier test the result is that a large minority fail. If that hadn’t happened I should imagine the DWP would have been quite annoyed.
So where do we get this guff about “two in three benefit claimants are fit to work”, to quote the Telegraph? By adding together the group found fit for work and the people in the work-related activity group.
But the people in the work-related activity group aren’t fit to work, if they were they would have been found fit to work. Instead, they’ve been put in a group of people who are going to be helped to get back to work, but who don’t have to apply or look for jobs (which is what the benefits system requires of out-of-work non-disabled people). The fact that they’re going to be able to work at a future point doesn’t mean they are malingering now.

(There’s another sense in which many more of the people on these benefits are capable of work. If you use the social model of disability, then being a disabled person doesn’t mean you’re incapable of employment provided social and economic arrangements are in place to remove the barriers that currently exclude disabled people. But we are a long way from achieving that.)

When you know the history it isn’t just harder to put up with newspaper nonsense – some of the stuff from Ministers get harder to bear too. Chris Grayling once said:

“Too many people were simply abandoned to a life on benefits; we are determined to put a stop to that terrible waste of potential. The welfare state in this country is no longer fit for purpose that’s why our broad range of reforms are so important.”

But this “important” reform is one they inherited from their predecessors! Whether it is the Government or the Opposition that should be most embarrassed about this I’ll leave to readers.

One thing is clear, this morning a lot of people will be worried about their pending assessment – not because they are afraid to work. Nor will it be because they are unwilling to work. Their fear will stem from the fact that
a) The system has been designed in such a way that some of those who are genuinely unfit will be forced back into work.
b) With the demise of Pathways to Work and NDDP, the mechanisms are not in place to fully support those who have been on these benefits back into employment.

Once again this scheme is another example of the government rushing through reforms without thinking them through and without any consideration of people’s lives.

At this rate, Chris Grayling may easily win the award of being the most hateful man in British politics so far this century.

The rich get richer as more redundancies fall

Recently, disturbing information fell into my hands informing me of a training provider who is intending to bring about a mass redundancy programme to their workforce. Over the years, A4e has become one of the leading welfare to work companies in the UK and prior to the introduction of the Work Programme, Emma Harrison, its founder was looking forward to this £100m company said she was "proud that the company has sustained pure organic growth at a phenomenal rate" and forecast an increase in profits to a £500 million turnover by 2014.

However, this will not save the 460 frontline staff who will shortly go onto redundancy notice. In a letter to affected personnel, Executive Director Nigel Lemmon wrote:

Colleagues, We know that we have a caring, driven and passionate team. We have a team that has helped us to develop our business over the years and we have ambitious plans to continue that growth. However, we currently face a very difficult situation with some existing Welfare to Work contracts formally ending before the new Work Programme begins. This is far from ideal. We passionately want to do the right thing for our employees and our customers, but on this occasion we have had to start the formal process of collective redundancy consultations with all our New Deal for Disabled People (NDDP) and our Pathways to Work employees. This decision has not been taken lightly, we have thought long and hard about the options available to us, but regrettably have had to start this process. Whilst some providers have already started these consultations, we made the decision to wait until we had received final confirmation from DWP, ensuring that we could retain our excellent team throughout this period and well past the time that we would have clarity around the Work Programme contracts. Our focus in the coming weeks will be on securing the best possible outcome for our employees and our customers. We want the best team, we know we have got great people and your skills will be vital to the delivery of our own Work Programme and those where we hope to secure subcontractor work. We will do everything possible to secure opportunities for our team going forward. However, you will be aware that the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) only last week advised us that the contracts to deliver New Deal for Disabled People and Pathways to Work will not be extended beyond 31st March 2011 and 27th April (Pathways to Work Phase 2) and that a new initiative will be offered to customers by Jobcentre Plus from 1st April until the Work Programme starts. Since we were notified last week, we have been working extremely hard to challenge this position with DWP. However, senior DWP representatives have now confirmed that it is their view that TUPE (the regulations that allow for the transfer of employees from one provider to another) does not apply, either to Jobcentre Plus when the new service starts on 1st April, or to other service providers when the Work Programme goes live (between 1st June and 31st July). This is hugely disappointing and we have now had to take the decision to start formal collective redundancy consultations. This decision only affects our New Deal for Disabled People and Pathways to Work employees. Once we have been informed of the outcome of our Work Programme bids for prime and sub-contracts, we will be able to understand the wider implications across the rest of our Welfare Division. We will continue to provide you with information as and when it becomes available By starting a lengthy 90 day redundancy consultation process, we have been able to secure your colleagues employment with A4e for the next three months. Our commitment and investment reflects our passion to support our team as much as possible and the enormous value and trust we place our team. It is our absolute intention to get the best outcomes for our people and our customers and have the best team going forward. This arrangement will take us into June and importantly, well after the Work Programme contract award announcements. This approach will give us the greatest opportunities once we know where we will be delivering the Work Programme going forward. We know that A4e has the best teams in the industry with extraordinary employees. It is as a result of the friendly and caring service that you have delivered to customers over the years that has enabled us to build A4e into what it is today. I know that we will continue to live our by DNA and to passionately provide excellent service to customers. If you have any queries regarding this announcement or the process, please speak to you manager in person, the HR Shared Services Team by telephone on *************** and we will get back to you as soon as possible. Nigel Lemmon

By implication, the letter implies some kind of genuine care for its workforces, but let’s face it – a redundancy consultation period is seldom a time to renegotiate your job. These people will almost certainly find themselves unemployed within the next few weeks, unless by some stroke of good fortune they are able to find alternate employment. Most will not be so lucky and will be forced to ‘sign on’ and claim Jobseekers Allowance. In the meantime, Emma Harrison can sit in her luxury home, swanning around with her friend, Citizen Dave, the people’s toff. They are a pair well met. Harrison, like Cameron is also a millionaire, with a personal wealth estimated at £40m – not much chance Emma will be joining her colleagues on the dole then.

Interestingly, if you go to the "MyA4e" website, you will see that Emma Harrison gave Anna Gaunt the opportunity of a 12-month secondment as her assistant. prior to this, Anna had been an employment advisor on their NDDP contract. It rather begs the question of whether has a job to go to once her placement expires. For her sake, I hope she has the chance of redeployment within the company, but the promotion of this posting on their website remains a rather fine example of Emma's team shooting her in the foot.

Now, is it just me, or are there others out there who find it pretty obscene that Some people have profited from welfare to work programmes, whilst other, like the 460 at A4e are cast aside when they have served their usefulness. Because the new programme to be implemented by Jobcentre Plus is so different from Pathways to Work and New Deal for Disabled People, these folk will not be TUPE’d over to the new programme.

Over the coming weeks, as announcements are made on who are the ‘winners’ of contracts for the Work Programme, more will follow. Soon we can expect those hundreds will turn into thousands as companies ‘rationalise’ or even close.

It is a disgrace that workers who have given years to supporting unemployed people back into work should now find themselves in a position where they also face joblessness. The shame is not exclusive to A4e – other companies have profited equally well. Seetec has become one of the largest and most experienced providers of government-funded welfare to work and skills-training programmes. The company employs more than 500 people across a national network of 50 employment and training centres, and helps thousands of people each year to find work or gain qualifications through a diverse portfolio of employability or skills contracts. Last year, Seetec pulled in £21.2m in sales and profits of £2.112m. This enabled the company, which is 56 per cent owned by founder Peter Cooper, to pay total dividends of £990,608.

Or take the example of Maximus, profits in the first nine months of 2010 shot up by 19.4 percent—to £131 million. And its top boss, Richard A Montoni, grabbed a pay package worth £2 million last year.

Perhaps instead of paying out such vast dividends to a selected bunch of money-grabbing shareholders, the company should have been establishing a welfare programme to support these workers if and when contracts come to an end. But of course that is hardly an option for these commercial giants – since when does capitalism look after the working class?