Why incapacity benefit is such a scandalous waste of money
Dear James Clappison,
As Shadow Work and Pensions minister, you tread a fine line every day between holding the government to account and sounding like you subscribe to the Daily Mail. In some cases, however, I think you can achieve both to good effect and yesterday was a prime example. There are a lot of myths about benefits and who gets them and what they get them for, but sometimes Labour have to face up to the mess that they have left this country in – such as the fact that in August 2008, there were 2,130 incapacity benefit claimants in Britain whose “primary diagnosis” was obesity - yes, obesity.
I’m sure it did not escape your attention that ‘obesity’ is not an illness – it’s a choice. Bar those unfortunate few who suffer from rare disorders such as Prada-Willi syndrome, people get fat because they eat too much. All this rubbish about ‘oh, my genes made me fat’ is just making excuses for the very simple and inescapable truth that people become fat because they eat more calories than they burn. Weekly incapacity benefit payments start at £63.75 for the first 28 weeks, then go up to £75.40 from weeks 29 to 52 and finally reach £84.50 after 53 weeks for an indefinite period. This means that in their first year, a new claimant will cost £3,519 while an ongoing claimant will cost £4,394 over 12 months. Thus the taxpayer forks out somewhere between £7.5-10 million every year to pay for these lazy, fat slobs to sit on their backsides not doing anything, and that doesn’t begin to take into account the lost productivity in our economy. You rightly went on the attack with this information by saying that “Labour has neglected the ticking obesity time bomb we are facing, and now we are seeing the detrimental effects on our economy …They’ve missed the opportunities they’ve had to make a real difference, and now hard-working taxpayers are paying the consequences.”
2,632,000 people claim incapacity benefit, which is supposed to be given to people who cannot work because of sickness or disability. I know that the government is in the process of replacing it with the new Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) that will apparently mean most people on incapacity benefit will be expected to look for work. Last year, the then government welfare adviser David Freud suggested that fewer than a third of people claiming incapacity benefit were legitimate claimants. While Freud’s calculations were not perfect, if memory serves me correctly, he has clearly spotted an alarming trend in terms of the ease with which people convince a doctor that they are ‘incapable’ of work. A DWP spokesman insisted that “to qualify for incapacity benefits, claimants must take part in a medical assessment which will assess an individual’s ability to carry out a range of activities which are required for the workplace.” Being obese will also certainly render people incapable of performing basic activities, but that doesn’t mean they deserve benefits – it means they have to lose weight and get their lives sorted out. The new ”personal capability assessment” linked to the ESA will focus on what work people could do rather than simply their eligibility for benefits, but that will not solve the problem of some claimants making lifestyle choices that impede their ability to work, only for them to be rewarded with benefit payments.
Please don’t mistake me for one of these people who thinks incapacity benefit shouldn’t exist. There are hundreds of thousands of people who need government support because they have a genuine disability. However, when I hear about people stuffing their faces with food then claiming they are unable to work, I get angry in the same way that I get angry on hearing that in the last 12 months the number of people in England having obesity-related surgery on the NHS rose by 40% to 2,724 operations, including stomach stapling and gastric bypasses – all paid for by my taxes. I know your role isn’t an easy one, but the Conservatives have got to remain strong on these issues and I am totally convinced that if these sorts of figures and headlines reach the voters, they will be just as angry as I am about what Labour have done to our welfare culture.
Yours sincerely.
A.Tory
ESA is useless but not as useless as IB which has been a dumping ground for people since Thatcher as its primary role was in getting people *off* the unemployment register. Like PFI after it, it was an accounting wheeze.
To make matters worse, the new ESA looks very much as though it will actually discriminate against the disabled, the very people it is supposed to help. There is no facillity in this dubious benefit for people who have fluctuating conditions – my multiple sclerosis is fine most of the time but lays me out once in a while, others have the opposite being true and actually a lot of ‘disabilities’ seem to have fluctuating severity. Worse, if you work over 16 hours a week OR earn more than £60-£90 quid (which is just about over the minimum wage), the benefit gets clipped.
I earn £30 an hour.
But that’s not the shit bit.
The really annoying bit is that being a cripple is expensive. Yeah, free bus passes help with getting about and yes Disability Living Allowance also lobs a bit more cash to help with mobility or personal care but the fact remains that everything is just more expensive. More hassle. If you go out, you’re going to need money to go into a pub or bar if you need the loo (unless you want to pee on the street)due to bladder issues (for instance). You’re going to need walking aids or other mobility devices. Perhaps you’ll need adaptations to your home or, heaven forbid, your workplace. You may have dietary requirements that force extra expense and then there’s your prescription charges which, unless you live in a devolved Labour
subsidy zonefringe like Scotland or Wales, become hugely expensive fast.A lot of this could, I suspect, be resolved by streamlining the claim system. To have to get DLA from the DWP, blue badges from one bit of your Council, Bus Passes from another, prescription stuff from a bit of the Health department and so on is ludicrous and would seem ripe for slashing duplicated beaurocracy. Additionally all these bits replicate inadequately health tests/investigations carried out by the DWP on their 40 page DLA form. In fact, I can’t see why ESA isn’t actually tied to the DLA as, lets face it, only cripples should be getting it and if you’re a cripple you’re 99% likely to get DLA…
Sometimes I can’t be bothered to get up in the morning. Is there a medical term for that?
USDA figures show that out of 10000 (tenthousand) people who diet in earnest(without surgery), 15 manage to reach and hold their target weight after 5 years.
When those figures improve (pun intended), then you can start to talk about ‘lifestyle choice’
Besides that, gastric band, dentures, hip replacement, what’s the difference? It’s part of the human condition to get old and sick.
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Lots of people languish on IB when actually the NHS is not doing their job and just lets them fester in pain, and by putting people with acute issues that can turn chronic if not seen to ASAP on a waiting list, more people are crippled than is necessary.
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Finally, the IB claimant is totally hindered in any attempt to work — a lot of sick people can work but not keep times due to their issues (no point in working on a bad day and ending up in bed for 10 instead of 5 days) and so, they need to find somewhere flexible. But when they do, the IB rules make it impossible because of the irregularity of payment and the ensuing paperwork mountain, but also, the restrictions that stop people from working when well.
Long-term sickness is often a rollercoaster affair, with good and bad days and so-so days when one has to take it easy. There is no help or support for any disabled people who run small businesses either.
Not all businesses are run for profit, some are just run to keep the owner going with something worthwhile to do, there is more to work than just making money.
Thanks Shaun and Cinnamon for a useful insight, I didn’t appreciate the problems with flexibility and paperwork. Thanks Patently for your sarcasm as always.
The ESA reforms did strike me as a little vague, but perhaps this could be a good thing? Could the issue of ‘assessing people’s ability to work’ be used to target support at those who need it rather than an all-or-nothing tick box exercise?
Sometimes I can’t be bothered to get up in the morning. Is there a medical term for that?
Labourvoteritis. You’ll find it expanding to epidemic levels as we approach the next election at which point, Labour strategists will struggle to explain why their voters have stayed away from the polls…
I have got decidedly mixed feelings on this.
I agree that the obese should be given a good kicking rather than benefits, but I don’t really think fraud is that big an issue. I meet many IB claimants & all the ones I’ve seen so far were genuinely disabled. I’ve also known genuine people who got nothing.
Of course, even though they are truly disabled, it is wrong to assume that they can’t work. More should be done to encourage people to work as a lot are capable of it. This should especially be in the form of voluntary work as, in honesty, many disabled people won’t turn a profit for an amployer, or won’t without months of training that no private-sector firm should be obliged to provide. If they refuse to employ people who won’t benefit them, that’s a perfectly reasonable decision.
I support the principle behind ESA in that being disabled does not make someone useless. My preferred response, as with the non-disabled unemployed, would be to allow them to work in the third sector without their benefits being affected. I am not ideologically against state support for such projects, as it works very well in the case of organisations such as the Citizens’ Advice Bureau, but from a pragmatic view it’s quite clear that there are a lot of pitfalls so I would hesitate before funding such activities.
Shaun Pilkington, you’re an interesting case as you receive DLA while continuing to work. This is, in my view, why DLA is such an effective benefit as it contains no disincentive to get out there & earn more money. This is preferable by far to out of work benefits. My contact with DLA recipients is what makes me warm to universal, non-means tested benefits as they slash bureaucracy.
Cinnamon has got it right in that there are pointless barriers to work, such as the benefits trap. But it should be stressed at all times that David Freud’s views are wholly worthless. I can’t stand the man & I think Cameron has made a mistake by allowing him to become a Tory. (All the Labour voters I know said something along the lines of “good riddance to him”, & maybe that’s just Labour voters but it’s quite an understandable response.
Although I see quite clearly the problems with the welfare state, I am not a radical reformer because any benefit I’ve ever known: IB, income support for single parents, Jobseekers’ Allowance, has had decent people & lowlife claiming it. The state can’t tell the difference. I can, but the state can’t & cany given crackdown will hurt blameless people who are having hard times.
There are two decisions here:
1. Should we have any sort of redistribution or welfare whatsoever, yes or no (no need to justify your answer)?
2. If ‘yes’, should it be simple, flat-rate, non-means tested. non-taxable and low level (say £60 a week for starters) without any discincentives to work part time, short term, low paid, OR should it be hypercomplicated, with perverse incentives, poverty trap and corrosive effect on stable family life?
Mark Wadsworth, if a Citizens’ Basic Income were to exist, would you support something along the lines of DLA? Disability is expensive financially & often leads to people being unemployed or in lower-paid jobs than they might otherwise be.
A non-means tested benefit for anyone who is disabled, as defined by a medical professional who is not beholden to the state (as admittedly they are now), will not be bureaucratic, or stop anyone from getting a job as they won’t worry about losing their benefits.
There are probably flaws with DLA as it now is, but the same goes for any system, & it strikes me as a whole load better than any alternative that’s on the table.
I agree that lifestyle choices such as having massive families shouldn’t be funded. But being unemployed isn’t generally a choice & being disabled certainly isn’t.
“Sometimes I can’t be bothered to get up in the morning. Is there a medical term for that?”
‘Public sector worker’…
There are probably flaws with DLA as it now is
The flaw is that its a very detailed, socially awkward 40 page form. You need to have contact details for all your physicians and lists of medications and so on. A grounding in the science of your illness helps.
I’ve spoken to many people, some of whom have or experience cognitive impairments, who just find the paperwork difficult to handle. I trained as a lawyer (yeah yeah boo hiss) – but I don’t practice – so I can eat long forms for breakfast. In fact, longer forms are better because they give you more opportunities to make your case (incidentally the same info which got me DLA mobility component was rejected initially by the council for a blue badge – the difference was a 40page a4 form as against a 3 page a5 form for the council…). Most people aren’t like that and I’d be wary of things that require a semi-professional approach to paperwork while obviously recognising that some fraud checking is required.
Oh Julia, you never fail to amuse.
I may be going slightly off topic here, but as a non-disabled person the whole issue of ‘disability’ seems far too big to cover under one allowance. I would have thought it would make sense to have the ESA cover all non-disabled people, then have a few ‘grades’ of additional payments depending on the level of disability. Shaun’s accounts of living with MS are fascinating not just because of their personal nature but also because he understands the impact that it has on his life while still appreciating that he is able to work. I wish that many more people shared that particular philosophy.
Mark presented the two extremes but I think something in the middle is actually quite achievable and might look like what I mentioned above.
I’m lucky – I’m a web developer so I can do that from home and frankly it would take a lot of personal hygiene slippage before I was noticeable worse for wear than most of my peers…
Surely we just need honest assessments by honest doctors?
Given certain guidelines to work by they should be intelligent enough to make a professional decision as to how disabled someone generally is and what their capabilities are?
Too many people on incapacity are actually “cheating” the system, they claim the benefit and work on the side (I used to know of a couple of offenders when I lived in the UK and it made me very angry)…
My mum had great difficulty in getting it when she got ill with M.E. She couldn’t walk or take care of herself at all during her “bad episodes” yet they denied her any benefits for a number of years as they said that M.E. was psychological.
It wasn’t until she was bedridden that she got any help at all.
Asquith, fair question.
I can see the point of paying extra money to people who need wheelchairs or a guide dog and all the other costs, but we already have this. Disability Living Allowance is a completely separate type of benefit to IB (which is disguised unemployment benefit). DLA is not means tested or taxable or even contributory (much like Child Benefit). A CBI system would probably have these extra payments as well.
It is only stuff like IB, ESA, IS, JSA, student grants/loans, statutory maternity pay etc that should be rolled into CBI (to the extent that we want to have a welfare system at all).
I’ll admit I’ve not read the differences between the old IB and the new ESA and I’m sure Shaun will put me right. I was led to understand that the people who ultimately decided who got what under IB was not down to qualified clinicians but to a person in the Job Centre.
Oops, I missed ‘Tax credits’ off the list of stuff that will go straight in the bin.
NOt sure, tizzy – I’ve never claimed IB (thankfully) – but the DLA is, for sure, decided by a beaurocrat who is supposed to take opinions from clinicians which is why the claims take 2 or 3 months to process (but are backdated to the date of reciept).
As an example of how shit the DWP is, though, bear in mind that today is the 6th March and I’ve just had a letter from them telling me that Gorgon’s £60 Xmas bonus (for 2008) will be paid to me ’soon’. Aww bless.
I thought that was the case, Mark Wadsworth. I do quite like DLA for the reasons you cite. I don’t like the claiming & checking process much (especially these decision maker jobsworths), but it could be improved, & the payment structure is second to none, especially when you look at those other benefits you mention.
DLA is good in that it doesn’t involve the means test.
As for “honest doctors”, I believe that under the current regime doctors are under political pressure to pronounce as few people as possible disabled, regardless of what state they’re in. I honestly, in all my time meeting IB recipients, have never known one who wasn’t genuinely affected. Some could have worked in one way or another, but that’s a different matter & one which ESA is at least trying to sort out.
I’ve also only ever encountered this illicit work everyone talks about once: most of the benefit claimants I’ve known have either done nothing at all or voluntary/educational activities that they were allowed to do under the regime. I don’t think fraud per se happens on a wide scale.
The question is whether disabled people can work, in what capacity, & whether the state or other agencies need to support them in the workplace. Someone who is on the autistic spectrum, for example, will take quite a lot of accomodation. I’ve seen it happen. But if the employer doesn’t want to adapt, they won’t & shouldn’t have to.
Which, of course, leads straight to problems gaining employment for some.
“Surely we just need honest assessments by honest doctors?”
I think Sue has the answer, frankly. This wouldn’t be a problem if the system of assessment were robust, and that has to start with GPs, surely?
has to start with GPs, surely?
Its a lovely thought but if a blue badge for parking goes for £500 quid in the pub, how much could a bent GP make in a year?
Personally, I’d look at tying the notion of ‘disability’ to consultant-clinician’s formal assesment. So if you’re rendered paraplegic in an RTA, the neuro guys certify you and bang, bus pass, blue badge, DLA and ESA. Same with MS. Opthalmic doctors for blindness and stuff. While this sounds elitist and ‘anti local’ (down at the back, pro GP mob!) the fact is that if you are disabled you WILL see Consultants. Eventually. And because there are fewer of them, they are easier to police for corruption/sytemic abuse.
A very interesting discussion.
I suffer from vertigo on occasion and ought to rest more than I do – the DLA in my case is nearly £18 a week and is a “passport” to a few other things.
DLA in my case is nearly £18 a week and is a “passport” to a few other things.
That’s my point. My initial Blue Badge app was turned down, fundamentally, because I applied at the same time as I applied for DLA and thus, on the BB form, had to tick the ‘no’ box to the ‘do you recieve DLA’ question. Oddly enough, I was declined. When I reapplied 6 months later, after my DLA app (based on the same data) had been approved *at a higher rate for mobility*, it was granted.
THAT is what people mean by a passport, lest anyone is thinking its what scroungers seek. I, privately, refer to DLA as ‘the keys to the kingdom’ as its the closest thing in the UK to being an ‘official’ cripple at which point, if you persevere with the forms, other ‘benefits’ open up. Like bus passes or no-VAT on mobility equipment.
So what to do? Most people’s brains blank off as you try and explain the Kafkaesque hoops disabled people have to jump trough to get assistance, paltry assistance, due to the fear of scroungers. Duplication evidently the result of accretion-layers of beaurocracy dominates the system which means that because walking isn’t easy for me, I have to apply separately for Mobility allowance, a cripple’s bus pass and a blue parking badge. I’m a stubborn c*nt who likes playing beaurocracy at its own game and am fortunate that my MS hasn’t (to my subjective knowledge) affected my cognitive ability (although I have started watching Dancing on Ice with the wife which may mean something!) which means I can get through this. But then equally I can earn £30 an hour as a web developer. Most cripples aren’t that fortunate in terms of opportunites, education or cognition. I’m saying that I find this easy.
In my experience, most people don’t find it easy. That’s why a lot don’t bother. That and pride – remember the figures about the elderly not uptaking benefits becuase of the percieved shame in accepting ‘charity’? The people who do find it easy are either weirdos like me – genuinely spazzed, trained as a lawyer, retooled as a web dev, veteran of anti-Islamist actions in the 90s – or are fraudulent. This is why, despite the grief it causes some genuine cripples, I am a fan of the DLA form. I have offered (and am/will) help people through the MS Society to complete their forms. It doesn’t take many people to do that to make the system work. And you are unlikely to find a scammer’s story believable if you yourself suffer from the condition in that PCT area.
And THAT is why I feel that, despite the inherent cost-saving impetus to set the barrier to entry for any benefit high enough to discourage people, I believe that money would be saved by just tying all the related benefits together. If the DLA boys decide you can walk poorly enough to get mobility allowance, surely its logical to automatically granbt that person a blue badge and a bus pass. Why should taxpayers support 3 different beaurocracies to administer disperate, inadequate systems?
Another issue is that IB should be payed as a basic income, not as a means-tested alm.
Not having an income puts disabled people very much at the complete mercy of their partner.
It also makes marrying or living with a disabled partner a very expensive proposition, since you’re committing to maintain a stay-at-home person, who most likely doesn’t really want to sponge of you but has no other choice. There are not many people who are willing to live in poverty voluntarily either, and realistically, keeping someone at home costs about 10k per year if you live frugally. Who has this sort of money spare nowadays?
So, disabled people often are also literally priced out of a normal family life unless they hook up with another pauper.
It really is an exquisite mess, isn’t it!
“..if you are disabled you WILL see Consultants. Eventually. And because there are fewer of them, they are easier to police for corruption/sytemic abuse.”
And presumably, less susceptible to bribery or corruption, not being local and ‘known’ like a family GP..?
Hmmm, could work!
Quite right, Shaun Pilkington, about DLA being “the keys to the kingdom” & pretty much an official statement of having problems, without which one struggles to access services.
The biggest problem I see is that decisions on whether to award it are fairly arbitrary & often, it takes several requests for reconsideration/appeal to get an award. But those who are most likely to just give up & get daunted by it all, & won’t feel strong enough to fight, & won’t go to a Citizens Advice Bureau or whatever else, are often those who are the very worst off.
PS- Update your own blog
Hmmm. People on benefits waste an awful lot less ‘taxpayers money’ than thieving and mis-spending politicians, don’t you think?