UK Welfare Reform Bill - Essay Example

The rationale for the UK Welfare Reform Bill and its likelihood of success Introduction The UK Welfare Reform Bill was introduced in the UK parliament on January 14, 2009. It was aimed at streamlining the UK social welfare in order to make it more effective and efficient. The bill introduces a number of changes into the already existing social welfare laws (Driver, 2009). Income Support Abolition The bill abolishes income support and in its place requires those on income support to attend interview focused towards work, and embark on work-related activities or sanctions be placed against them. This is aimed at reducing people's dependence on the state for their livelihood. It instead encourages them to work hard and earn their own income (Meyer and Sullivan, 2004). Increased conditionality The bill compels all the people who claim benefits to follow an employment advisor's directions or sanctions be placed on their benefits. This is in order to ensure that any benefits claims are made in the right way. These new conditions are meant to ensure that only deserving people are considered for benefits. Work for your benefit This bill proposes that beneficiaries work for their benefits through some sort of a workfare with a labor rate of about '1.73 hourly for 35 hours every week. This bill further proposes the piloting of this workfare and its subsequent rollout without any further primary legislation. The workfare clause of the bill has attracted a lot of criticism from various quarters who have proposed various amendments to the clause. The UK Department of Welfare and Pensions has refuted any claims of workfare increasing the likelihood to find work. The department particularly notes that workfare is not effective in getting jobs for people, especially in jurisdictions of weak labor markets that have a high rate of unemployment. The department also faults the bill's effectiveness in for individuals who have numerous barriers to work. The bill has further been accused of reducing employment chances since it limits the time for job hunting and also fails to offer the necessary experience and skills needed by the employers. Work-related activity The bill allows Jobcentre Plus and other private contractors to give mandatory directions to single parents as well as disabled and sick claimants. These directions require these claimants to undertake specific activities or risk facing sanctions on their benefits. This move will ensure that the claimants put some effort towards improving themselves rather than waiting on the government to do it for them. Increased conditions for couples This bill introduces two new changes for any couples who claim benefits. First, it removes the disabled or sick people's rights to claim ESA for couples where one of the partners can claim JSA. Second, this bill requires partners of JSA, ESA and IS claimants to participate in work-related activities or face sanctions. This in effect means that these partners have no choice but to work. Contributions for ESA and JSA This bill greatly restricts eligibility to contribute to ESA and JSA. Those working will now be forced to work longer to be able to pay the required contributions to qualify for the benefits. This will go a long way in reducing the number of qualified contributors to JSA and ESA. This will as a result force many of these claimants to means-tested benefits. The means-tested benefits are not only complex, but also suffer low take up. Others will end up not having any entitlement to means-tested benefits. Carers and maternity allowances This bill proposes the abolishment of dependent additions paid with maternity and carers' allowances. Both benefits are not means-tested and its beneficiaries are the poorest of the poor in the country. The removal of these benefits will lead to over-reliance on means-tested benefits. Those who do not pass the means test will be forced to live on a very low level of income (Scott et al, 2003). Offenders' benefit penalties The bill proposes a four-week benefit suspension for those fined, cautioned or convicted of any fraud offences. This change will go a long way in catching those who may have been overpaid as a result of their own misunderstanding or error, or DWP's mistake, but lack the confidence and skills of seeking advice and challenging poor DWP's decisions. The bill does not effectively address the issue of benefit fraud and benefit error and benefit non-take up. Benefit fraud is a very small problem compared to benefit error, and even smaller compared to non-take up. In spite of this, the bill does not say anything about how to help those who miss out on entitlements to claim them. Additionally, the bill's continuous issuance of tough messages only serves to stigmatize the claimants. This is because it instills a wrong stereotype to the effect that claimant fraud occurs frequently. Skills and training of employment advisors The bill vests great responsibility in employment advisors to support people look for jobs and imposes sanctions on those who contravene their directions. Currently, the advisors are not sufficiently trained to work with people in need of more support in looking for work. These people include the disabled and those with mental health problems. Despite this, the bill does not put forward any proposal aimed at increasing training for these employment advisors. The bill clearly brings forward a culture of payment by results. This in effect raises the likelihood of employment offered being generalist. This means that those with support needs may not receive the necessary assistance since supporting them into work is much more expensive. This raises the risk of these people's benefits being cut when the new sanctions come into effect. Despite all these, the bill does not say anything about protection of claimants from unfair application of these new sanctions (Slack et al, 2007). Mandatory drug testing The bill introduces mandatory drug testing for all those claiming benefits. Failure to comply with this requirement will lead to the claimants forfeiting their benefits for 26 weeks. This is also the case for those found to be drug-affected and in need of rehabilitation. Access to medical treatment The bill allows employment advisors to decide on the appropriate activities to be undertaken by claimants to prepare themselves for work. These activities include those to manage their own health. This power can force a claimant to access psychological therapies, take medication or to access healthcare provision. This will distort any boundaries between social control and health provision. This might mean that people are forced to access mental or physical health treatment for them to get their benefits. Data sharing The bill makes a proposal whereby any information regarding the claimants will be shared among various government agencies. These agencies include employment agencies, health services, prison services and the police. This will greatly help the agencies to have as much information as possible about the claimants (Lichter and Jayakody, 2002). On the other hand, this will undermine the claimants' privacy since every aspect about them becomes general knowledge among the government agencies. The disabled people's right to control The bill proposes the setting up of a pilot aimed at finding out whether or not people need to be given the opportunity to control their social care support. However, it does not promise that this will be the case for everyone. The government seems to have no idea about the type of support and funding whose control should be given to people. Moreover, the government has little idea on how to implement individual budgets and how give more control to people who are not interested in individual budgets. Community care grants and social fund The bill does not seem to have clear plans for the social fund's future. It mainly proposes partial administration of the fund by private loan providers. These providers will charge interest on these loans despite there being no rationale about the improvement of the fund's operation. This bill will also make it possible for applicants of Community Care Grant to be given the items applied for as opposed to money (Volden, 2006). Birth registration The bill makes it mandatory for unmarried parents to be registered together with their child upon the child's birth. It further proposes sanctions should the child's mother not disclose her child's father. This will go a long way in making the children's fathers more responsible (Wells and Guo, 2006; London et al, 2004)). Child maintenance The bill introduces compliance and collection arrangements for the maintenance of children. They include withdrawal of passports and driving licenses of non-resident parents who default payment of child maintenance. This will greatly assist in ensuring the child's security (Waldfogel, 2007; Slack et al, 2003). Conclusion The UK Welfare Reform Bill 2009 has very many good proposals that will greatly the UK welfare. Some aspects of the bill such as those regarding child maintenance, birth registration, data sharing, access to medical treatment, mandatory drug testing and work-related activity will go a long way in improving the welfare of the claimants. Other clauses such as those regarding income support abolition, increased conditionality and contributions for ESA and JSA seem to make the lives of the claimants very difficult. The bill cannot succeed in its current form since it has many flaws that need amendment. Some sections of the bill have shown open discrimination against those with disability, such as the clause that talks about skills and training of employment advisors. Some other clauses clearly discriminate against the poorest people in the society. The Carers and maternity allowances is one such clause. This should be done in consultation with the stakeholders to make it acceptable among them all. References Driver, S (2009) Work to be done-Welfare reform from Blair to Brown, Journal of Policy Studies, London Lichter, D and Jayakody, R (2002) Welfare reform, Annual Review of Sociology London, A et al (2004) Welfare Reform, Work-Family Tradeoffs, and Child Well-Being, Family Relations Meyer, B and Sullivan, B (2004) The Effects of Welfare and Tax Reform, Journal of Public Economics Scott, E et al (2003) Out of Their Hands- Patching Together Care for Children, MDRC Slack, K et al (2007) Do Welfare Sanctions Increase Child Protective Services Involvement' Social Service Review Slack, K et al (2003) Child protection intervention in the context of welfare reform, Journal of Policy Analysis and Management Volden, C (2006) Experimenting with Welfare Reform, Social Science Quarterly Waldfogel, J (2007) Welfare Reforms and Child Well-Being in the US and UK, London School of Economics Wells, K and Guo, S (2006) Welfare reform and child welfare outcomes, Youth Services Review Read More