The government's trumpeted initiative to cut the 2.7m people on incapacity benefit - who cost us £12.5bn last year - turns out to be much ado about very little. As we blogged yesterday, they aim to cut the numbers on the benefit by 20,000 people each year.That's because the new system will only apply to new applicants for incapacity benefit. Oh, and the new tests won't be introduced until next October.
The Financial Times provides a useful analysis piece. One expert blames Whitehall resistance for the long delay in starting to tackle the problem.
Civil servants pointed out that notes validating sickness benefit had been signed by patients’ GPs, and then assessed by another doctor reporting directly to the social security department. By questioning the high numbers of people going on to IB, ministers were in effect questioning the very efficiency of the civil service – a big charge for ministers newly in government to make.Ministers also thought the numbers on incapacity benefit would fall as claimants retired. But no, a new generation picked up on it.
As Frank Field has pointed out, people aren't stupid. If they see a free meal ticket that suits them, they're unlikely to turn it down. It's government's job to design the system so that it doesn't operate like that.
Back to the validating process. Just as war is too important to be left to the generals, so society can't leave it to doctors to decide on an individual basis how many adults it is going to have to support financially. Standards have to be set. They have to take account of affordability. And so they are political.
Maybe we have to set a number that we decide to afford. People have to be graded, with physical disabilities taking priority. There should be charities which can help people who don't score enough points to make the cut-off point. Taxpayers could choose to make voluntary donations to them.
There has to be a limit to compulsory funding by taxpayers. The government is still not gripping the problem, only tinkering.
9 comments:
Of course it is only tinkering. How many of those on IB are likely to be Tory voters - close to zero one expects. This is nothing more than a Labour attempt to keep (some of) its voters happy. The dependency culture it so actively promotes undermines the 'market' and self-sufficiency culture promoted by Thatcher.
The problem we have is people masquerading as having mental illnesses. I know a fair few "depressed" people who have been on benefit for years who in my view have nothing wrong with them that wouldn't be cured by a job so that they do not have the time to think so hard about themselves.
They should be graded as needing assistance but that should be practical assistance and not financial.
We also have a big problem with people who do not think they should have to get a job and deliberately look scruffy to avoid getting a job when sent to interview. We need assessors in the dole office who will axe their benefit should they not make an effort with their appearance.
We will always have a big wefare bill but I'd rather than money be spent on administration and assessment then just clerks who rubber stamp any hapless biped who sticks out their hand.
Go down to any city dole office and it's the dog on string pikeys, crusties and chavs who all thing that it's free money and will go out of their way to avoid a job.
The argument is that these people would turn to crime if we didn't pay them. Uhu. Like theyre not ripping off car stereos, squatting and selling drugs as well.
The sooner we devise a written social contract where the consequences of breaking it involve the loss of the vote or deportation if they are from another country, the better off we will be.
Sometimes I think we are way past fixing this. Socialism runs so deep now that people even expect help with their vets bills. We have an entire generation with the mindset that the state can and should pay.
People exploit the benefits of british citizenship, they don't vote they don't vote because the status quo of free money and free everything else from housing to medicare will do just fine. They dont give a sht who pays for it so long as it isnt them.
Funny that we ask Indo-Pakistani muslim immigrants to follow our cultural values. The ones with their hands in the till and sending money back home are doing just that. Rights without responsibilies is now the mainstream culture of britian. The days of Liberty, community and responsibility are long dead.
Hrumph, those on benefits are easy to carp about. Each extra civil service employee taken on to administrate the benefits, with their pension entitlements, probably costs the tax-payer 4 or 5 claimants.
I would how much a 10% reduction in the civil service patroll/pension bill would save the country?
Sandy, I wouldn't mind paying for those civil servants if they did their jobs.
Admittedly they shouldn't have cushy pension schemes but I'm not sure that many do.
How much assistance can we or should we afford to pay for for 2.7m people?
You cant let genuinely disabled people live in poverty and squalor and we should pay whatever it costs and assist them to. Otherwise we might as well abandon our claim to any kind of cultural superiority over that of Say Bulgaria who lets its disabled kids starve to death.
I just demand an assurance that such benefits are not handed out to people who have no legal or moral right to them and I am actually happy to part with more money if the assurance is valid.
2.7m people is but a tiny fraction of our population and if we are going to penny pinch I can think of better ways of doing it than robbing the bottom decile of a basic standard of living befitting a modern civilised democracy and I am quite sure you could also given your blogs area of concern.
2.7m people is not a "tiny fraction" of the adult population available for work. There are about 29m in work. Ministers suggest some 1m of those on incapacity benefit could do some work. More of them could make some unpaid contribution to society. In a society where health is generally improving, it beggars belief that 8-9% of the working age population are too ill to do any work.
And don't forget taxpayers also have to make considerable payments t pensioners and children.
That is indeed a point. Inability to take full time employment does not mean you can't make a contribution and the existing system makes no demands that they do.
For instance, The Bolton News reports that Bolton has 16,100 people out of work and claiming incapacity benefit - 10% of the working age population.
"Salford has the highest rate of people claiming incapacity benefit in Greater Manchester at 11.6 per cent of the working age population.
"Manchester's is next highest at 11.4 per cent, followed by Rochdale at 11.3 per cent, Wigan at 10.8 per cent, Tameside at 10.5 per cent.
"Oldham is below Bolton with 9.9 per cent of people claiming incapacity benefit, followed by Bury with 8.4 per cent, Trafford with 7.1 per cent and Stockport at 6.8 per cent."
This degree of serious illness is frankly incredible.
Post a Comment