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| TX: 19.01.06 - Incapacity Benefit - Appeal Process PRESENTER: LIZ BARCLAY |
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| Downloaded from www.bbc.co.uk/radio4 THE ATTACHED TRANSCRIPT WAS TYPED FROM A RECORDING AND NOT COPIED FROM AN ORIGINAL SCRIPT. BECAUSE OF THE RISK OF MISHEARING AND THE DIFFICULTY IN SOME CASES OF IDENTIFYING INDIVIDUAL SPEAKERS, THE BBC CANNOT VOUCH FOR ITS COMPLETE ACCURACY. BARCLAY Last year almost 50,000 people were refused incapacity benefit and went on to an appeal hearing to try to get that decision overturned. The whole process has been described as overly elaborate and ministers want it overhauled. The long awaited Green Paper on incapacity benefit is expected next week, so will it shake up the way people claim and appeal? Today in the latest of our reports on incapacity benefit we look at the current process for claiming and how people are medically assessed to how the appeals process works. Our disability issues reporter Carolyn Atkinson is here. Carolyn, why are ministers saying the process for claiming incapacity benefit needs overhauled? ATKINSON Well first of all one thing to remember is that Alan Johnson, the former Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, famously said it's one of the three toughest benefits' tests to pass in the whole world. Now 2.7 million people claim incapacity benefit every year but only 1.7 million get it, so of course that means 1 million people are turned down. Now there are a number of reasons for that, firstly to qualify most people must have paid national insurance contributions for two or three years and secondly most people have to pass a medical assessment called a personal capability assessment, a PCA. BARCLAY You say most, who doesn't? ATKINSON Well there is a group of people, for example, people who are blind, people who are severely disabled or have conditions like dementia, they automatically get the benefit. BARCLAY So if you are not one of those people how do you go about claiming? ATKINSON Well lots of dreaded form filling. First - I've got them here in fact - the SC1 form, a big wodge, it's 40 pages long. Then there's this second form - the IB50 - that's 20 pages long. There are lots of physical questions here, I can look through - Can you bend or kneel as if to pick up a piece of paper from the floor? Plus other questions about walking, about continence, sight, hearing etc. etc.. And there's a section for mental health questions, room to explain what your problem is if you have a mental health problem. Then they assess your answers and they award you points. BARCLAY Welfare benefits advisors often say that people can be turned down because of how they fill in these forms, rather than because they aren't ill enough to qualify. ATKINSON Well that's right. What happens is people's pride often gets in the way, they write about their best days instead of concentrating on their average or even worse days. And they say what they can do rather than what they can't do. Now welfare rights officers, who can be found in many hospitals or at organisations like Citizens Advice, are excellent at giving advice on the best way to fill in this form because there is a technique. And their services of course are free but there's evidence that an industry is emerging at the moment with companies charging people a percentage of any win, including backdated money. So there is a question mark over the quality of any evidence they present to say an appeals tribunal, how accurate is that information if money could be a motivating factor and of course the money that the companies get, if they do win, comes from the wallets of people on already low incomes. BARLCAY So once you've filled in the first form and the second form, then there's the medical assessment, for the majority of claimants. ATKINSON Well as we were hearing in yesterday's programme these are done by GPs generally. They're employed by a company called Atos Origin, they work on behalf of the Department of Work and Pensions. Now if you are assessed as eligible then that's it, end of process, you start receiving £57 a week, that will rise to £68 after about six months and almost £80 after a year. Now to put all that in context. The Job Seekers Allowance, for example, that's the dole, that is fixed at £56 a week, so incapacity benefit can be higher. There's some concern that this increase over time could actually dissuade people from trying to get back to work, so that's something to look out for in the Green Paper, it may be in there. BARCLAY What happens if you have a personal capability assessment and are told that you can't have incapacity benefit? ATKINSON Well there's three things basically. You can accept that decision, you can write and ask for, what they call, a review or you could decide to go to appeal - go to an appeals tribunal. Now they operate all across England, Scotland and Wales, they hear incapacity benefit cases as well as other things like child support. If it's incapacity benefit there's a panel of two people - a doctor and a lawyer - and you can either go in person and be questioned in person or you can make, what they call, a paper appeal - you don't go, they just look at the evidence you submit and then make a decision. Now I've been speaking to somebody called Alison Deakin from Middlesbrough, she has osteoarthritis and irritable bowel syndrome and after working all her life she was forced to give up work. She was initially turned down for incapacity benefit but she won her case at appeal. DEAKIN I was very nervous, it seemed all rather official, only really because it's daunting because it's all unknown to you but they did put me at ease - the doctor and the representatives that were in the room. And they just asked me different questions, wanted to know about my conditions, which I told them, then I just went - they asked me to go outside and wait for about five minutes and they called me in and just said that I'd won my appeal. BARCLAY Carolyn, is Alison Deakin unusual in winning her appeal? ATKINSON Well Alison was represented at the appeal by an officer from Citizens Advice and when people get an expert to present their case almost three quarters of them are successful. People who turn up and just - who don't turn up and the appeal is on paper only 14% of them win. BARCLAY But overall nearly half of the people who appeal win. So clearly mistakes are being made and many of those people who are refused incapacity benefit shouldn't be. ATKINSON Well that certainly appears to be the case. Welfare experts are worried that assumptions may be made during say the assessments, for example, somebody told me just because someone's asked are you mentally ill, for example, if they're asked - Do you speak to your mum on the phone - that doesn't mean that they could cope with a job answering phones and taking accurate messages in say an office situation. Mike Robinson from Stockton's Citizens Advice says he's come across many other similar situations. ROBINSON In one case, for example, one of our clients who had quite serious throat cancer and lost his voice box also had one arm. The medical assessor failed to relate these two things together and although, yes, clearly he could sometimes hold his throat to speak he couldn't do this at the same time as being able to undertake normal activities. And that's one of the problems possibly with the current system, it takes no real account of real life ability to work. BARCLAY Mike Robinson from Citizens Advice. So the key question Carolyn is will the Green Paper affect the way people make claims and appeal? ATKINSON Well quite possibly. Ministers have said they want to simplify the whole system, the last but one Work and Pensions Secretary Alan Johnson said he wants to see an overhaul because he says it's too elaborate. What we do know is the principle behind any chances though - they want as many people who can work to go back to work but offer long term support for those who can't and won't ever be able to work. BARCLAY Carolyn, thanks. Back to the You and Yours homepage The BBC is not responsible for external websites |
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