Welfare Reform and Work Bill — House of Lords, 2015-12-14
Topic: Mixed Topics
Natalie Evans (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, the amendment, moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, and supported by the noble Baroness, Lady Manzoor, the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, and the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, would put into statute an independent review of the sanctions system. However, we are not sure that that is necessary, as the Government already keep the operation of the sanctions system under constant review to ensure that it continues to function fairly and effectively There is clear evidence that sanctions are effective with more than 70% of JSA and more than 60% of ESA recipients saying that sanctions make it more likely that they will follow the rules, but, where we identify that there is an issue, we act to put it right. This is clearly shown in the improvements already made to the JSA and ESA sanction system following the recommendations of Matthew Oakley’s independent review last year. However, as I said, we do not stop reviewing the process to ensure that it is fair and effective. That is why we have accepted, or accepted in principle, many of the recommendations made by the Work and Pensions Select Committee’s recent report into sanctions The chair of the Work and Pensions Select Committee, the right honourable Member for Birkenhead, has welcomed our response and our willingness to work with the committee to ensure that the conditionality system works as it should. In our response to the committee, we announced that we will trial a sanctions warning system giving claimants a further two weeks to provide evidence of good reason before a decision is made. We believe that this will help to strike the right balance between conditionality and fairness I can confirm to the House that it is our intention that the trial will operate in Scotland from March 2016, running for approximately five months. A full evaluation of the trial will be undertaken, and findings will be available from autumn 2016 The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, asked about the monitoring of the destinations of sanctioned claimants. DWP officials are currently quality-assuring the data for universal credit official statistics. As part of this review process, we will carefully consider the option of including destination data. We are not yet in a position to confirm which statistics will be provided in future We are also considering extending the list of JSA vulnerable groups for hardship payment purposes to include those with mental health conditions and those who are homeless. This will mean that these claimants can receive hardship payments from day one of their sanction, provided that they also meet the other criteria The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, also asked about sanctions being applied fairly. Any decision to sanction a claimant is not taken lightly, and there is a full and proper process that includes the claimant from the start. At the start of the claim, as noble Lords will know, all claimants receive a tailored claimant commitment, and the requirements take into account mental health conditions, disabilities or caring responsibilities. Any failure to meet a requirement is always thoroughly considered and claimants are given the opportunity to provide good reason for not complying before any decision to sanction is made by the decision-maker, but I will need to come back to the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, on the timescales that she asked about, because I do not have that information to hand The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, also mentioned the Crisis report. We absolutely understand that homelessness is a complex issue, and our priority is to ensure that individuals affected get the right support. That is why we have made more than £1 billion available to prevent and tackle homelessness and support vulnerable households since 2010, and we will continue to work closely with organisations such as Crisis to make sure that support is provided where it is needed most On the question of the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, about lone parents being required to come to jobcentres without a toddler, no, requirements to attend appointments at the jobcentre should be tailored to take into account individual claimants’ caring responsibilities, and work coaches should be able to help to make appropriate arrangements, including helping to arrange appointments around childcare. I cannot speak about the range of facilities within jobcentres, but it is within the gift of the work coaches to be flexible in working with lone parents.