The financial crash of 2007 has placed a great burden on the public purse, leading to a fiscal deficit that has provoked arguments and debate nationwide. The coalition government of 2010 has made this a top priority, with Welfare Secretary Iain Duncan Smith tabling a white paper that if implemented will lead to reforms to the welfare system, including cuts in many benefits with the belief that work will lead people out of poverty. It is these reforms that I want to focus on by considering their effects on the disabled population of Great Yarmouth, a town which has its fair share of welfare dependents.
With little manufacturing now remaining in the town, the majority of employed people work in the service sector such as tourism, restaurants and distribution. Hours of work are often irregular and wages low, thus making many workers reliant on welfare payments such as working tax credits. The outer harbour has so far not proved to be the boom to the local economy that was promised. Deprivation levels in areas of the town are amongst the highest in the country. The Local Government 2007 Index of Deprivation rated Great Yarmouth as 58th worst by degree out of 354 local authorities.
In 2010 the Coalition Government, led by David Cameron, introduced changes to the welfare system. The intention is to introduce the concept that work is beneficial and preferable to being unemployed. One of the proposals is designed to reduce the number of claimants receiving DLA by reassessing their claims and putting failed applicants onto JSA instead. Along with other changes to the welfare system this is designed to save the treasury:
• £960m in the financial year 2012/13
• £2,510m in the financial year 2013/14
• £3,870m in the financial year 2014/15
The view of this government is that it wants to encourage responsibility and fairness in the welfare system. That means providing help for those who cannot work and training and targeting support at those deemed fit to work, but sanctions for those who turn down reasonable offers of work or training.
Of course, no one likes to see someone misuse the benefits system, but there is a creeping belief that anyone on benefits is milking the system, and now this belief is extending to the disable community. According to a survey conducted by Scope, a national charity for the disabled, and reported in the Observer newspaper, disabled people are now facing verbal and even physical attacks. The charity stated that:
“37% of people with disabilities claimed they were increasingly being abused on the streets, erroneously reported to the benefits fraud hotline and accosted when trying to use disabled parking spaces.”
The people who have been hardest hit by these major changes to the welfare system are disabled people. To find out how members of the public and disabled people feel about these changes I wrote a short piece to the local newspaper requesting readers to send me their views and opinions on this matter.
Disabled people strongly believe the effect of the cuts and changes in benefits and tax changes imposed by central government and massive cuts to local authority services will disproportionately affect them, their children, families and carers. These have been imposed without proper consultation or equality impact assessments that measure the cumulative effects of these measures. Many people feel these changes are discriminatory and if implemented will result in further isolation, institutionalisation and unprecedented levels of poverty for many disabled people and their families.
As a direct consequence of the changes to benefits and cuts to Norfolk County Council services, the poorest 53% of disabled people in Norfolk, around 100,000 people and their families, will see their living standards decline by a third over the next four years. In Norfolk, registered blind people can no longer travel free on buses before 9.30am, while their carers now have to pay full fare.
Finally one aspiration of the government is the 20% reduction of the “DLA” Disability Living Allowance. This arbitrary reduction is intended to force people off incapacity benefit and into the workplace. Local residents in receipt of DLA are angry about these proposed changes as many feel they will be worse off and will lose their independence and become isolated from the rest of the population. Is the government holding up a mirror showing the harsh reality of the current financial crisis or just seeking out an easy target?
In my own case my needs in 2010 were classified as "critical", meaning that I was eligible for around £8,000 to pay for help getting to college, shopping, travelling to job interviews. This year, as the council made substantial cuts, I was told I was no longer being classified as in critical need, and would therefore not be eligible for any financial assistance.
Shaun McGarry, 47, of Great Yarmouth, who is registered blind and deaf said, “My DLA benefits increases are lower than the retail price index and with the new 20% VAT rate, I am losing money. But I am really concerned over the Government’s plans to replace the DLA (Disability Living Allowance) with the so called PIP (Personal Independent Payments) and especially the changes in the criteria of eligibility and that everyone must be re-assessed, by so called non specialist non-medical experts.”
Ted Herbert, 75 of Great Yarmouth, who also is registered blind said, “I use my DLA to help pay for a house cleaner for two hours per week. However, my biggest expense is paying for taxis which I use very frequently to get to and from local railway stations and to go shopping. I worked out that these taxi fares cost me £40/£50 per week. In addition, when I want any gardening or decorating done, then I have to employ people to do these for me.” So if DLA is reduced he will lose this ability to remain as independent as he is.
On the other hand, Great Yarmouth’s Conservative MP, Brandon Lewis, is a supporter of these changes. On being interviewed (10 June 2011) about why there should be changes to the welfare system his response was:
“The changes to welfare have got two parts to them. One is we do have to reduce the welfare bill. That’s partly a tough decision we have to make because of the deficit and it is one of the departments that has got to make savings because the welfare bill is such a massive part of Government expenditure, we need to get hold of that, but it is also about changing the welfare system. The whole point of the welfare system is to help the people that most need support - vulnerable people, and at the moment too much of the welfare system isn’t being properly focused and guided to help those people. So changes are far more focused about getting it set up where we have a logical system where it will always pay to work, but also making sure that the people that are vulnerable and the people that need support actually get it rather than just being a tick-box category. So the idea is far more supportive for the people that do need that help.”
What is Brandon Lewis suggesting here? It sounds as if he is saying that the vulnerable members of our society should have their welfare reduced as a means of reducing the budget deficit. He should, though, remember that it was not DLA claimants who caused the recession. It was caused by the UK economy being over-reliant on the financial services, a booming house market and tax revenues.
When asked if he thought that disabled people were being unfairly treated and seen as an easy target he replied: “No and I have to say I don’t actually agree with the premise of the question. What the Government is doing is bringing in a new system and we have just been looking at this as part of the work I do on the select committee. We took evidence to the Minister just this week actually on this and what we were talking about was this issue about the assessment process and the idea of what we were looking at is there are a large number of people who are on disability benefit or incapacity benefit who don’t necessarily need to be there. They have been there a long time, and they’ve not been reassessed when actually they want to work. They have some capability of working in one description or another even if it’s not necessarily nine to five in an office or factory, whatever they can do or want to, but have not been given the right support to find that work and to be prepared to find that work and get into it. So it is about that and that helps their own self-esteem, but also because of the way the system works. What the new system will do is assess them so that first of all if someone needs support they get it and if they improve they don’t need so much. But just as much there are people whose condition deteriorate and actually get worse, so by being reassessed we can actually continually make sure that they are getting the right support they need.”
While there may be an element of truth in what Brandon Lewis says, he is also suggesting that their benefits should be cut before any changes are tried and tested. But, with five people chasing each job vacancy, what hope is there for DLA claimants finding suitable employment? He has failed to answer the problem of unemployment and the availability of suitable jobs. He is also not taking into consideration the tests that disabled people will now have to undertake to continue receiving welfare. As pointed out by Poly Toynbee in the Guardian (17 June 2011) there are many difficulties faced by disabled people when taking these tests. She wrote:
“Here is a common catch-22: with faraway test centres, if you can get to a centre you're fit enough to work, but those who can't are struck off for failing to attend. One demonstrator said his cramped flat is too small to fit his wheelchair, so he hangs on to the furniture to get around – but because he doesn't use a wheelchair at home, he was judged fit to work. A social worker emails me about her stick-thin, sick client living on pureed food yet rejected for disability living allowance, but she died last week waiting for her appeal. That's what it takes to cut £18bn from the welfare budget. Expect an avalanche of such stories, and not just in the Guardian.”
Over the past decade there has been a steeper rise in the number of Disability Living Allowance claimants in Great Yarmouth compared to the number claiming Jobseekers Allowance (JSA).
Other seaside towns with similar population sizes are experiencing increasing levels of JSA and DLA claimants too. What are the reasons behind this steep rise in DLA claimants? Probable factors include:
• Ageing population requiring extra support
• Injury, illness or disability
• Willingness of Jobcentre staff to put people onto DLA
• Fraudulent claims
Does this mean that the government has justified its changes to the welfare system? I think not when it comes to DLA claimants. These are vulnerable people, who feel they are being victimised by the state, certain elements of the press and bigoted people. Just because a handful of people may have misused the system, does not mean that all disabled people should be tarred with the same brush.
As well as removing the independence and dignity that DLA claimants now have, the reduction of DLA will also have an unwanted twin affect, namely the removal of the Carer’s allowance. This will play havoc with household incomes and may force families into poverty.
Carers UK research has consistently shown that most carers are financially worse off as a result of caring, and many are already struggling to make ends meet. The Carers in Crisis study from 2008 found that 74% of carers were struggling to pay essential utility bills, over half were cutting back on food to make ends meet (52%), two thirds were spending their own income or savings to pay for care for the person they looked after and 54% were in debt as a result of caring.
So for a town like Great Yarmouth with all the problems it faces, placing more people into poverty will not help its economic development. Unemployment levels in Great Yarmouth are generally above the national average, reaching 15% of the working population during the winter months. Therefore moving DLA claimants from DLA to JSA will surely just increase the unemployment total. The government could potentially be shooting itself in the foot.
In conclusion, the belief that by moving disabled people off DLA and onto JSA with the intention they will seek useful employment and thus make them financially better off has no evidence of truth to it. For a start there needs to be suitable and substantial number of job vacancies. Without these the government will only be moving claimants from one benefit to another, thus abandoning them to a lifetime of joblessness. Also, employers may not want to hire workers with disabilities, knowing that there may be hidden costs which they may have to bear. There is still time for the government to rethink its plans and to meet its legal obligations of carrying out an impact assessment of the cuts. It should abandon its plans to use the flawed work capability assessment and instead commit to ensuring that disabled people received the tailored support they need to move into work.
These are not expensive commitments but they will go a long way to helping disabled people participate in our society and contribute to the economy.
Siobham Meade
Volunteer Community Reporter
