Tories Harsh Crackdown on Benefits

Welcome to Reality Check. Today I’m taking a close look at the Conservative pledge to cut billions from the welfare bill.

Tory 3-strikes Policy
First-time offenders would lose benefits for three months
Second-time offenders would lose benefits for six months
Third-time offenders would lose benefits for up to three years

The party says that benefit fraud and error has cost £80 every second under Labour.

Their answer is what they call a “crackdown” on cheats. Anyone who is cautioned or convicted of benefit fraud three times will have their payments stopped for up to three years.

So how much will their “three strikes and you’re out” policy actually save?

We asked the Conservatives and they said “We can’t say”, so I have attempted to do the sums instead.

How many people have been convicted of benefit fraud three times? The Department for Work and Pensions tells me the answer is… zero. No-one. Ever.

How many have had their benefits stopped after two convictions? Last year the figure was 69 people.

Stopping their benefits for twice as long, as the Tories propose, would save roughly £100,000 a year or less than one penny a second. Thus reducing the cost from £80 a second to £79.99.

Even if we include those people cautioned as well as convicted, it is clear that this proposal is not going to save much money.

Theresa May was asked if she knew there was no record of anyone being convicted three times for such an offence

The shadow work and pensions secretary, Theresa May, was asked by Reality Check if she knew there was no record of anyone being convicted three times for benefit fraud.

She declined to give a direct answer, but said the policy was intended to send out a clear message to benefit fraudsters.

More savings

The Conservatives’ bigger promises on welfare rely on saving £600m within three years. Not by targeting cheats, but getting people off Incapacity Benefit (IB).

Basically, the Tories argue that one in five of the 2.6 million people currently on IB is fit for work. That’s just over half-a-million claimants.

They would be moved onto Jobseekers Allowance which gives them about £1,300 a year less.

The government is already planning to do the same thing and last month calculated moving people off IB would save £300m a year over the next five years.

The Conservatives’ figures suggest a saving of £200m a year – significantly less than Labour.

But there’s a problem with both figures.

They are based on an assumption that significant numbers can be moved off IB. But no-one knows if that is right because it’s not been tried.

We do know that with new claimants, a quarter of those told they were fit to work appealed against the decision, and of those, more than a third had their appeal upheld.

Neil Coyle of the Disability Alliance prefers to get benefits right the first time

And Neil Coyle, of the Disability Alliance, believes the policy would hit the vulnerable. He prefers to get benefits right first time

Both Labour and the Conservatives believe that getting tough with benefit claimants goes down well with voters.

But if the consequence of reform is thousands of vulnerable individuals with long-term health conditions being treated unfairly, it’s a policy with built-in dangers.

Taken from BBC News

Disability: A Claimant’s View

According to a recent OECD report, the UK already has one of the most stringent tests for assessing disability in the world. However, that has not stopped Labour introducing the ‘Employment and Support Allowance’, yet another ‘get-tough’ initiative aimed at reducing the 2.6 million claimants currently receiving Incapacity Benefit (IB). Labour have blamed the Tories for this state of affairs, but have achieved little themselves – apart from enraging the disability lobby.

I first got into trouble with my back in 1993, through working in libraries with work stations poorly adapted for computer use. My GP prescribed anti-inflammatory tablets and advised me to carry on working – advice which was subsequently reversed. Then I tried physiotherapy, which made the pain worse, and acupuncture, which achieved little. I had x-ray, MRI and ultrasound scans, all of which showed no problem, but by now rest days were used merely to recover and get my pain down to tolerable levels. The best advice, which did bear some fruit when followed, came from the GP’s receptionist(!), when she told me sotto voce, “Alan you will get no further with the NHS, you need to see an osteopath”. We are now well into 1994.

I worked spasmodically until 1996, then gave up. I still, 13 years later, have pain every day, which gets worse through repeated stooping, sitting on firm chairs, lifting heavy shopping, or even key-boarding for more than, say, 15 minutes. I thought them weird, but it soon became clear that symptoms like mine are not uncommon. Besides my GP, I also saw two Benefit Agency Doctors, and had no trouble claiming long-term benefits. In 1996 Invalidity Benefit, as it was then called, paid just over £100 per week – not bad – until Major’s government slashed it to just over £60 per week, made it taxable and renamed it Incapacity Benefit. When Labour took over in 1997, there was talk of reducing IB to the level of Job Seekers Allowance (JSA), but instead dramatically raised Council Tax, which effectively cut all benefits and pushed claimants towards means-testing. I received a flyer inviting me to a ‘work-focused interview’, but ignored it since there was no mention of a medical input. Nothing has changed, but Labour’s propaganda, coupled with my inability to prove that I have real physical problems, makes me feel vulnerable.

Things didn’t turn really nasty until 2007, when I was sent a hefty form to fill out. Ominously the word ‘pain’ did not appear on it – until added by me on each page. Another ‘medical’ followed, but this time, while I answered his questions, the doctor was typing away on a lap-top. As became clear later, he was trying to put together a case against my claim. I was shocked when told in a letter that I had scored only two points, my benefit was stopped and my P45 enclosed. The offer of a loan followed soon after, an offer I was fortunately able to ignore.

Having decided to appeal against the decision, my GP provided me with a support­ing letter. When it came, the appeal was heard by an independent doctor and a lawyer, and took about 40 minutes. I had two witnesses; no one appeared for the DWP, but this, it seems, is normal. The verdict, in my favour, came in writing for me to take away: amazing! The DWP’s miserly two points had been increased to 10. I got back all of the benefit which had been stopped, but the whole process took six months, and had done my developing anxiety and depression no good at all.

I had been encouraged to appeal by an ex-DWP employee, who told me that most of the DWP’s doctors would never make it in a hospital or general practice.

Six months passed when I was dismayed to receive yet another form, with another follow-on medical, but this time there was no lap-top and no further trouble. But, I was now quite paranoid about receiving any more brown A5 envelopes from Belfast. This is the reality of ‘welfare reform’.

A. Claimant

Taken from Freedom

Seriously ill patients ‘told to work’

A BBC investigation has heard claims of seriously ill patients being told they are fit enough to work and denied benefit payments.

Two former doctors for the private healthcare company Atos, which carries out the medical assessments have expressed concerns that the checks are being done too quickly and that the system is biased towards declaring people fit for work.

BBC Scotland’s Social Affairs Reporter, Fiona Walker, has been investigating why some of those who had high hopes for ESA say it has been a failure

Employment Support Allowance, or ESA, is replacing Incapacity Benefit. It’s supposed to support the very sick, and as people get better, help them get back into the workplace.

The government said it wanted to get a million people back to work by 2015 but more that one year after introducing ESA, it says it can’t measure how many people the scheme has got back into the workplace.

During the investigation, we’ve heard claims that terminally ill patients are being told to attend back-to-work interviews while they apply for the new benefit.

We also heard concerns that the medicals are declaring seriously ill people as fit enough to go to work.

One of the patients we spoke to was Maureen Leitch. She says she was called in for a medical assessment just a few weeks after undergoing chemotherapy and radiotherapy for vulval cancer.

She was declared fit for work and told she wasn’t entitled to ESA.

She said: “I was struggling terribly with the whole cancer. I was in extreme pain… It was a whole load of hassle, and aggravation that I didn’t need at the time I was going through the journey of the cancer… I feel insulted and badly let down, with the system.”

Maureen appealed the decision and it was overturned, meaning she was eventually awarded the benefit.

Currently, there are 44, 000 people waiting for their appeals to be heard. More than a third of people are winning their appeals.

Charities and organisations including Citizens’ Advice Bureau, say they’re worried that thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ money is being wasted because of the number of people going to appeal.

Everyone we’ve interviewed for this investigation agrees that getting people back to work can be good for them.

Frequent appraisals

What they’re concerned about is the way the system is working in practice.

Dr Chris Johnstone is a GP in Paisley. His work to help his patients back to work helped shape the ESA policy.

He said: “I have no problem with a rigorous medical assessment done in a supportive fashion.

“But I think if you have a slipshod one done, as it appears to be anecdotally, that’s unfair for the people going through the system. It feels like some of it is done inappropriately and it’s almost being done to save money rather than to look after people.”

Ultimately the decision on whether you get benefit or not is down to the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP), but they have contracted a private healthcare company called Atos to carry out the initial medical assessments.

I’ve spoken to two doctors who used to work for Atos. They say they are concerned about the way checks are being done. They both say they are worried that speaking out will affect their medical careers so we’ve agreed not to reveal their names.

This is what one of the doctors told me: “We would frequently have appraisals. They were all about how many clients you had seen and the average length of time it took to complete each assessment and write the reports.

“I wanted to know if they were happy with the quality of the reports I’d done but they hadn’t even looked at my reports, only at the time it had taken. It’s really tough to qualify for ESA.

“When doctors go in for the day’s assessments, they pretty much know the clients are going to be turned down.”

The other doctor I spoke to backed up those claims.

We asked to do an interview with Atos, but they refused.

Gaining skills

Instead they gave us a statement saying: “We are continually monitored and audited by the government to ensure that it completes the highest standard of assessment and that medical advice is correct.

“Atos Healthcare and its employees are not advised of the result of the assessment and the outcome has no bearing on Atos Healthcare targets or remuneration.”

Helping people back to work is one of the key aims of ESA. But the government can’t tell us how many people this new scheme has got back into work.

The minister for Disabled People at Westminster is Jonathan Shaw, MP. I asked him why his department couldn’t tell us how many people ESA had successfully got back to work.

He said: “What’s essential is that we are providing a programme, across the board, not just for ESA claimants but for youngsters, for disabled people for elderly people, to try and gain the skills that they can to stay in the labour market and return to work.

“We’ve got the pathways to work programme, which as I say is helping thousands of people who I’ve met up and down the country… this is early days, for the Employment Support Allowance.”

Mr Shaw also said he would be looking into the way cancer patients are treated.

Taken from BBC News