Sanctioning of Benefit Recipients
Debate between Andy McDonald and Steve Webb(10 years ago)
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The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)
I congratulate the right hon. Member for Oldham West and Royton (Mr Meacher) and the Members who supported him on securing this debate. This has been a worthwhile discussion and a number of important issues have been raised to which I will try to respond in the brief time available to me.
I think that there might be more common ground between the Government and the Opposition than has been apparent. It is also the Government’s position, as a number of right hon. and hon. Members said, that we want a sanctions system that works and that is effective, proportionate and well communicated to claimants. We are united on that. I was struck during the debate by the overwhelming view—although not the unanimous view, because there was at least one exception—that sanctions have a part to play in the system. Those who sign on and claim benefit take on responsibilities. If those responsibilities are to mean anything, there have to be consequences for not adhering to them.
At the outset, it might be worth my setting out the claimant commitment, which is now central to the benefit system and to the process of rights and responsibilities. People who sign on for jobseeker’s allowance now go through the claimant commitment. When they have a first interview with a work coach, the coach reviews their circumstances and capabilities—that relates to the point that was made by the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Dr Whiteford)—and completes the “My Jobseekers Profile” to capture key information. Reflecting on that, the coach sets out the requirements that the claimant must meet to be entitled to JSA, ensuring that those are right for the individual. That is how the system is intended to work. The work coach must take account of any health conditions, disabilities or caring responsibilities. Those requirements are recorded in the claimant commitment, together with a clear explanation of the consequences of any failure to comply. The commitment must be agreed by the claimant.
The coach then works with the individual to help them construct a detailed plan that sets out what they will do each week to meet their requirements. The process is designed to ensure that our expectations and requirements are reasonable, and that the claimant understands them. It is intended to provide claimants with the support that they need to establish an effective plan of action that, if followed, will ensure that they comply and that they never face a sanction. That is what the Government are trying to achieve. We do not want to sanction anybody. Clearly, there are times when people do not fulfil their requirements. When sanctions are imposed, there are mechanisms in place for challenging them. They can be overturned when people have a good reason why they should be.
I want to clarify some of the points that were raised in the debate. First, Members asked whether 60% of JSA sanctions were overturned. As has been said, the figures appeared, but there was an error in them and they were withdrawn. Revised figures are being prepared, in line with the code of practice for official statistics. Those will be presented as soon as possible. To give the House an order of magnitude, the latest official statistics, which have been published separately by the Ministry of Justice, which deals with the appeals, show that in the third quarter of 2012-13 not 60% but 17% of JSA disputes heard by the tribunal service resulted in a decision in favour of the claimant. That provides a slightly different perspective.
Steve Webb
I will not, if the hon. Lady will forgive me, because I want to respond to the points already made.
There was some discussion of targets—this is a bit of a chestnut—and to be categorical, there are no targets for sanctions; that is not the way it works. The point was made that statistics are gathered at jobcentre level and among advisers on their use of the sanctions system, and again the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan—I am wrecking her credibility here—made exactly the right point. We want consistency, and we cannot know that we have that if we do not gather data on what individual advisers are doing. If people go to a jobcentre and talk to adviser A or adviser B, and adviser A sanctions everyone who walks through the door and adviser B never sanctions anyone, the system is not working.
Steve Webb
No, I will not.
It is not that individual advisers are expected to hit a target or number; we are monitoring because we expect both distribution and consistency. That is what we are trying to do. It should not be interpreted as a target; it is simply about us monitoring what is going on.
A couple of hon. Members suggested that sanctions are about trying to massage the unemployment numbers, which is complete nonsense. Somebody who is looking for work is still counted in the unemployment figures. The figures published every month and headlined on the BBC are the labour force survey numbers, and if people are looking for work, they count as unemployed.