Spring migration brings no joy

Following on from our interview with Chris Grayling, the employment minister, Ruth Patrick takes a close and critical look at government back-to-work statistics

The hope and promise usually ushered in by spring seems rather more muted this year, as the Coalition’s welfare reforming, deficit slashing, public service decimating bulldozer rolls forward, leaving as yet uncalculated devastation in its wake.

As Cameron and his gang seek to defend their policies of welfare state retrenchment, the tabloids are provided with juicy sound­bites and supposed “evidence” to support this attack on the “culture” of welfare dependency.

Take the recent announcements on the Aberdeen and Burnley pilot schemes to migrate existing Incapacity Benefit (IB) claimants onto Employment and Support Allowance (ESA). Figures from the Work Capability Assessments (WCAs) conducted in these pilot regions show that as many as 29.6 per cent of claimants were found fit to work, with a further 39 per cent judged as having some capability to work and thus placed on the conditional, employ­ment component of ESA.

Only 31.3 per cent were found to have such severe impairments that they were awarded the ESA support component, which allows them to continue to receive disability benefits unconditionally.

Both the Government and much of the media declared these pilots a resounding success. Indeed, the figures are taken to demonstrate how many welfare dodgers and fraudsters welfare reforms should weed out when the migration goes national and some 1.5 million IB claimants are re-assessed.

“A SHOCKING 1.8 million people claiming incapacity benefit are FIT to work, figures reveal today,” roared The Sun on February 11th, while readers will be unsurprised to learn that the Daily Mail, the Daily Express and the supposedly more thinking Daily Telegraph took a similar stance.

Those of us with anything more than an elementary grasp of the WCA process will know that taking these figures at face value is at best a selective use of evidence, and at worst downright dishonest and manipulative.

Mark Twain’s famous remark about government “lies, damn lies and statistics” seems pertinent here, and the Downing Street spin machine is certainly in overdrive as it justifies plans to press ahead with reassessing some 11,000 people a week from March this year.

Time and time again, shortcomings with the WCA have been revealed, with particular concerns about the number with serious impairments incorrectly being found fit to work.

Indeed, a Government-commissioned review of the WCA reported on problems with almost every stage of the process, while one of the architects of the broader welfare reforms, Professor Paul Gregg, has called for the migration to be halted while the WCA is improved and rethought.

But the Government remains determined to roll out the migratory process. All those currently on IB are likely to be directly affected by these reforms, with the sole exception of those due to reach state pension age during the reassessment period of 2011-2014.

It is thus critical for disability benefit claimants to gen up on the WCA process and be prepared to seek advice and challenge decisions where necessary. Statistics, rather less quoted by the tabloids, also show that some 40 per cent of appeals of WCA decisions are successful, suggesting that it’s worth fighting, given how often the initial process seems to be getting it wrong.

The services of your local Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB) may come in handy here. Indeed, 180,000 people sought advice on ESA from a CAB last year alone, and with the national roll-out, CAB waiting rooms can expect to get even busier!

In an ironic and worrying twist, the future of many CABs now looks rather uncertain as government cuts hit advice services, with a 45 per cent reduction in funding anticipated.

Based on their experiences with benefit claimants, the CAB is currently running a campaign calling on the Coalition to rethink the ESA migration. My advice is to get involved with this campaign, and while you’re at it start campaigning to save CABs, which play a critical role in providing benefit advice and helping challenge bad, unfair and undemocratic welfare decisions.

•For more information on CAB’s ESA activities and how you can get involved, look at CAB’s website (citizensadvice.org.uk) and click on “campaigns”.