Welfare Reform Green Paper

Introduction

The Green Paper on Welfare Reform debates the methods in receiving incapacity benefit and in helping back into work a range of service-users. It exempts those with severe health conditions or disabilities but is not specifically targeted at carers.

Nevertheless there has been some anxiety about the Green Paper amongst carers not least because many of them are receiving Incapacity Benefit in their own right.

In addition many are receiving Housing Benefit which will also be reformed in the legislation. The other benefit, Carers Allowance, is paid when a person, receiving the middle or higher component of Disability Living Allowance (DLA) or Attendance Allowance (AA), is providing care for more than 35 hours a week. Changes to an individual’s Incapacity Benefit does not automatically trigger a review of the DLA or AA.

However because of the anxiety surrounding the new Welfare Reform Green Paper and its peripheral relevance to carers, a summary of the main proposals has been reproduced here. A comprehensive guide, published by the Disability Alliance and available in full with other documents, can be found at

Similarly, the complete Green Paper is available to download from

Summary of main proposals

The paper includes detailed proposals for:

1.Replace Incapacity Benefit (and Income Support paid on the grounds of incapacity) with a new Employment and Support Allowance “ for new claimants" by 2008. This will have an enhanced employment support component.

2.Offering an enhanced support component for those who cannot engage in any activity because of the severity of their condition although they will be given help and support to find work should they wish. People in this group will not necessarily be those from the current exempt categories

Personal Capability Assessment Exemptions: The first three, including receipt of the highest rate care component of Disability Living Allowance, are assessed as 80% disabled (for war pension, industrial injury or Severe Disablement Allowance purposes) or terminally ill ie with six months or less to live. A longer list of exemptions can be found on the Disability Alliance

3.Introduce mandatory work-focused interviews supported by a statutory action plan of return-to-work activity for new and existing claimants. There will be benefit sanctions for those who do not comply. These sanctions would reduce the benefit paid in slices up to and including the level of Jobseeker’s Allowance.

4.Revise the medical assessment (personal capability assessment) focusing upon ability and support needs (capability and capacity) rather than incapacity.

5.Ensuring the new medical assessments will be completed in twelve weeks in the majority of cases. No one will be able to receive more than the level of Jobseeker's Allowance before their personal capacity assessment has been carried out.

6.Provide in-work support to ensure people continue working with a return-to-work credit to ensure that people really are better off in work.

7.Simplify Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) to enable employers to better manage sickness and to address the flow of people from SSP to incapacity benefits.

8.Change the rules for Jobseekers Allowance and increase contact with lone parents to limit the flow of people from other benefits to Incapacity Benefit. (This may affect new carers in the future)

9.Take steps to increase awareness of the opportunities on offer ie through providing information at medical examination centres when claimants attend a review.

10.Place employment advisers in GP surgeries.

11.Financial incentives for local authorities to engage with the private and voluntary sectors to establish local back-to-work schemes, for people claiming benefit on the basis of incapacity.

12.Piloting a new Work Related Activity Premium for Lone Parents on IS whose youngest child is aged at least 11.

13.Increasing the focus of Work Interview from the current once a year to quarterly for those with a child aged at least 11.

14. Several other proposals relating to lone parents.

1.Aligning employment support for those long-term unemployed aged 50-59 with those in their 30s and 40s.

2.Improving back to work support for jobseekers over 50 and their partners.

3.Piloting “face to face” guidance sessions to help people to make decisions about work, training and retirement.

4.Working with employers to extend flexible working arrangements.

1Rolling out an adjusted version of the Local Housing Allowance (LHA) to the deregulated private sector.

This is another area of reform which has caused anxiety to carers. Piloted areas for a new housing benefit scheme called Standard Local Housing Allowance (SLHA) are expected to run for approx two years. Afterwards the new scheme will be rolled out nationally, although as yet there is no date agreed when this might be. The Government has advanced a number of arguments for the introduction of the SLHA scheme as follows:

• fairness
• promotes choice
• transparency
• personal responsibility
• simplicity.

Currently SLHA does not apply to

• council properties
• housing associations
• tenancies that started before 1989
• properties where someone is provided with care support or supervision

Exceptional cases include caravans, mobile homes, houseboats, hostels, B&B establishments and tenancies where a substantial amount of rent is attributable to board and attendance (ie hotel accommodation).

The amount of LHA is dependant on a number of factors

• the number of rooms a claimant or their family needs
• the area where he or she lives
• their income and savings
• whether someone lives with them who is not a dependant

Although the current proposals for SLHA contains many exemptions which will encompass the majority of carers and those living with people that they care for, there is a possibility that in the future a few may be affected by changes from Housing Benefit to Standard Local Housing Allowance.

This will need to be monitored - and expert advice taken - if a Carers Centre receives a request for specific guidance where someone has been caught by the changes to Housing Benefit.

While the majority of this Green Paper does not have specific reference to carers, in the areas where carers may be affected, mention is made.

A great many carers expressed concern relating to whether or not their Carers' Allowance would be affected if in the future the person they cared for needed to attend job interviews and if in doing so then had their Incapacity Benefits reduced if they refused.

This would of course mean a reduction in family income but not automatically in Carers Allowance as this is triggered by Disability Living Allowance which is not automatically reviewed by changes to Incapacity Benefit.

Indeed many people receive DLA whilst not receiving Incapacity Benefit because they are employed. However, there are exemptions in the Green Paper for certain categories of person, and the majority of people who have a family carer will fall into one of the Exempted Person’s categories.

Many carers have also expressed anxiety about their own Incapacity Benefit which they claim for their own disabilities. There is no provision for someone who is assessed to attend job interviews (and who is then required to take steps in returning to work) to remain out of work on Incapacity benefit whilst continuing their caring role. Following discussions with the Department of Work & Pensions (DWP), we have been informed that this would require the carer to change from Incapacity Benefit to Carers' Allowance.

As Carers' Allowance is paid at the lowest benefit rate and is considerably less than the current Incapacity Benefit this would mean a substantial reduction in income. The answer does suggest the continual lobbying of Government in order to increase the rate at which Carers' Allowance is paid so that it is in line with other rates for income replacement benefits.

Chapter 8 - Consultation arrangements and contact details

Publication of the Green Paper has signalled the start of a formal consultation period which will continue for twelve weeks from 24th January to 21st April 2006. To facilitate the consultation process a series of key questions have been posed throughout the paper

Consultation Questions

1.What else should we consider to give the right incentives to employers to provide increased health support to their workforce?

2.How can we best share the evidence for the role of work in recuperation and good practice regarding sickness certification to health professionals?

3.Does the simplification package for Statutory Sick Pay provide incentives for improved absence management and meet the need for reduced bureaucracy? How could the re-directed sums of the percentage threshold scheme be most effectively utilised?

4.Do the types of “suitable activity” set out provide a sensible range of activities that could be undertaken in order to fulfill an acceptable action plan?

5.Is the combination of Disability Living Allowance plus the Enhanced Disability Premium/Severe Disability Premium (not claimable if someone in the household is being paid Carers' Allowance) for those on a low income, the right way to target support towards disabled people with the greatest needs?

6.Do you agree that these proposed simplifications more accurately reflect the principles underpinning our modern society?

7.How do you think that we can best improve work incentives within the new Employment and Support Allowance so that individuals have the opportunity to try out periods of work and progress to full-time work where possible?

8.Would it be reasonable to extend the Work-Related Activity Premium (and the associated requirement to take steps back to employment) to lone parents with children younger than eleven? If so what age should be the cut-off point?

9.In what circumstances do you think it would be reasonable to extend the six month Work-Related Activity Premium period?

10.Des utilising voluntary sector and private providers in this way sound sensible? Would outcome-based payments incentives providers to meet the challenges of delivering Pathways to Work and the new arrangements described in Chapter 4?

11.Will this proposal provide an effective mechanism to join up the work of different agencies and make better use of existing funding to tackle the problems in cities?

12.How should Housing Benefit be adapted to meet our welfare reform objectives for tenants in the social housing sector?

The deadline for responses is 21st April 2006.

The Trust will be making a response on behalf of ourselves, the Network and carers and we welcome your views. Please send your response for inclusion to Peter Tihanyi at The Trust on . by 7th April 2004.

Please note that our response is only like to include matters which are of direct relevance to carers.

However, you can as always respond directly writing to:

The Welfare Reform Team, Level 2, The Adelphi, 1-11 John Adam Street,

London WC2N 6HT. Phone 020 7712-2521, Fax 020 7962 8524

Email:

Peter Tihanyi, Head of Policy Conferences and Funds

The Princess Royal Trust for Carers

27.2.06