Welfare Reform and Work Bill

Baroness Lister of Burtersett Excerpts

Wednesday 9th December 2015 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

24: Clause 4, page 4, line 38, at end insert—
“( ) children in low income households where one or both parents are in work.”

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[Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)]

My Lords, in moving Amendment 24 and speaking to Amendment 26, I also make clear my support for Amendments 25 and 46. I may well intervene later in support of maintaining the existing income and deprivation measures.

The purpose of Amendments 24 and 26 is to balance the obligation introduced by Clause 4 to report data on children in workless households with a similar obligation with regard to children in low-income working households. Whether the primary concern is life chances, as in the Bill, or child poverty, which Ministers assure us the Government are still committed to eliminating, it cannot make sense to exclude from reporting obligations the two-thirds of children living in poverty in households where a parent is in paid work. The Resolution Foundation points out that,

“worklessness has become less associated with poverty in recent years”—

which is to be welcomed—but it also warns that measures in the Bill are likely to strengthen the link again. At the same time, it observes that,

“children in poverty have become increasingly likely to come from working households”.

In his letter to your Lordships, the Minister stated that,

“Our evidence review, published in 2014, supports our approach”.

Up to a point—like my noble friend Lady Hollis and the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, I have read the review of the drivers of child poverty, and it continually brackets together parental worklessness and low earnings as the key factors for child poverty now, with implications also for life chances. The review found that childhood poverty itself is one of the factors increasing the risk of a poor child growing up to be a poor adult. The review spells out explicitly that the “main factor” making it harder to exit poverty is,

“lack of sufficient income from parental employment, which restricts the amount of earnings a household has”.

It underlines:

“This is not just about worklessness, but also working insufficient hours and/or low pay”.

Parental worklessness and low earnings are together the key factors in whether children are, as the report puts it,

“likely to be stuck in poverty for longer”,

with implications for outcomes and the,

“risk of becoming poor adults”.

In sum, the review makes clear:

“Long-term worklessness and low-earnings are principal drivers of child poverty and the key transfer mechanism through which the majority of other influential factors act. As would be reasonably expected, results from numerous studies of poverty statistics and dynamics clearly demonstrate a strong link between earnings and poverty levels”.

Forgive me for quoting at such length from the review, but given that the Minister himself has prayed it in aid and given that, I assume, the analysis was commissioned to throw light on what Ministers refer to as the “root causes” of poverty, it does seem bizarre that they now deliberately ignore a root cause or driver, the importance of which is demonstrated by their own analysis.

Moreover, a more recent departmental analysis of child poverty transitions between 2009 and 2012 shows that a rise in earnings or an increase in the number of hours worked are key events related to exiting child poverty, with exit rates virtually the same as those associated with moving from worklessness to full-time work. Given all this, and other evidence, it is not surprising that the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission’s response to the Government’s latest child poverty strategy argued that the strategy should:

“Focus more on tackling in-work poverty”.

Although getting more parents into work is a big step forward, it does not automatically bring reductions in child poverty, because in too many cases it simply moves children from low-income workless households to low-income working households. Too many parents get stuck in working poverty, unable to command sufficient earnings to escape low income, and cycling in and out of insecure, short-term and low-paid employment with limited prospects.

It is also worth making the point that worklessness is not a measure of child poverty as such. A decent social security system would protect children from poverty in households where there is no working parent. Not surprisingly, the analysis by Kitty Stewart and Nick Roberts of CASE at the LSE found that the great majority of those who commented on it in the 2012 consultation on child poverty measures rejected the inclusion of a worklessness measure. Not only did they consider it an inappropriate measure of poverty but many also pointed out that it was misleading, given the high level of poverty where a parent is in paid work—a point also made by some of the minority who supported a worklessness measure.

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[Lord McKenzie of Luton (Lab)]

My Lords, this has been a thoughtful and extensive debate. Amendments 24 and 26 in the name of my noble friend Lady Lister and the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, would cause data on low-income families where one or both parents are in work—that is, in-work poverty—to be reported.

We support these amendments. We know, as we have heard, that some two-thirds of children living in poverty are in working families and that whatever the climbdown on tax credits, the Government have in-work support in their sights. If we are concerned with measures that look at the current experience of poverty as well as the risk of poverty, there seems no logic in including out-of-work but not in-work poverty, although the policy levers may be different.

Amendment 25 in the names of the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, and the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, seeks to retain the current income measures in the Child Poverty Act. We, of course, support that. Our Amendment 46 does the same but retains that Act’s targets as well.

The absence of income measures cannot be justified and runs counter to pretty much all the evidence or views of those engaged with child poverty. The Government’s suggestion that income measures are a symptom of poverty, rather than a cause, is too simplistic. My noble friend Lady Blackstone gave us a great example relating to educational attainment. If people are poor they do not have the same opportunity to have the same equipment at home; they do not necessarily have books at home and they do not necessarily go to school with a meal inside them so that they can be more attentive at school. It is simplistic to say that one is looking at the experience of poverty and that it is not a symptom of poverty.

In its July 2015 response to the Government’s child poverty statement—a number of noble Lords referred to this—the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission stated:

“The commission has argued in the past that a more rounded way of measuring poverty—taking … account of causal risk factors—is sensible. The life chances of children, the poorest especially, depend on many things … It is not credible, however, to try to improve the life chances of the poor without acknowledging the most obvious symptom of poverty, lack of money”.

Pretty much every noble Lord who has spoken in this debate, with the possible exception of the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, agreed with that proposition. She asserts that looking at simplistic measures of income contains a number of flaws, but my noble friend Lady Hollis made clear that the Child Poverty Act 2010 had four measures. You need to look at the circumstances in aggregate, not just at one snapshot in time.

CPAG says:

“We believe that poverty is a condition marked by a lack of adequate resources, some of which may not be financial. Nonetheless, an inadequate income remains the decisive characteristic of poverty and must remain central to any poverty measurement”.

A number of noble Lords referred to the Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion at the LSE and the work that it did. It looked at the responses to the DWP’s consultation on child poverty measures, which sought to test the level of support for replacing the existing measures with new dimensions, including those provided for in the Bill. As we have heard, the research shows that there is a very high level of support for the existing measures in the current Act. Most wanted no change and those who countenanced additional dimensions saw this as supplementary information, but not as measures of child poverty itself. Most respondents were of the view that lack of material resources— income—was the very core of child poverty. We agree with that. It is suggested that respondents to the consultation saw the proposals to change the measures as bringing to an end the official measurement of child poverty in the UK. How does the Minister respond to that? He will doubtless tell us that the HBAI figures will still be published as now, but we know from our prior deliberations—the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, made this point—that what gets reported under Clause 4 will be the focus of the Government’s attention. That is why they are approaching it this way.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

I am sorry to intervene, but I wanted to ask the Minister whether he could answer a specific question relating to that. I know that there are some fears about this among academic social scientists and the voluntary sector. I absolutely accept the Minister’s assurances that the households below average income statistics will continue to be published, but will he assure the Committee that they will be really clear and published in an accessible form, not just as a load of Excel tables that some of us will not be able to understand? It is very important that we have that assurance on the record.

[Lord McKenzie of Luton]

I thank my noble friend for that intervention. I doubt there is much that she does not understand or is incapable of understanding, but she asked a highly relevant question. I hope that the Minister will give that assurance.

We have had a number of contributions to this debate. My noble friend Lord Liddle took us back in history but stressed the importance of the work that went into developing these measures in the first instance, enjoining the skills of Tony Atkinson. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham recognised the value of having worklessness and educational attainment as part of a measure. However, he said that that was not sufficient; there needs to be a focus on income if life chances are to be influenced and addressed.

The noble Earl, Lord Listowel, supported the existing measures in legislation. I think that the Child Poverty Act was the first legislation that the Minister worked on in opposition when he joined this place. At the end of the day, I thought that we had pretty much cross-party agreement, although it is fair to say that the Minister said there were other aspects of poverty which he thought should be reported as well. However, I do not believe that is the same as tearing up the Child Poverty Act, which is what this piece of legislation seeks to do. This is a very important issue because, unless we look at income, we will not address the here and now of poverty. It is all very well looking at some of those factors which have medium and long-term effects on people’s life chances, but we also need to address how people without resources exist today. That is why we need these amendments.

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[Lord Freud]

I actually think the difference between us here is not as great as it might look. The division is between the income measures and targets. A legal target is, as I said, financially terrifying but we will publish income measures. This issue was raised by—

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

Given what the Minister just said, will he now accept the case for keeping the income measures in the Bill even if he abandons the targets? As my noble friend said, the argument has really been purely about targets. I thought targets were quite helpful for the same reason as the noble Lord—my noble friend—Lord Kirkwood, but if that is what frightens the Government and there is really not much difference between us, then okay. What is stopping the Government keeping the measures supported by 99% or whatever of the scientific community that responded to their earlier consultation on child poverty that they seem to have completely ignored?

[The Earl of Listowel]

Before the Minister replies, it might be helpful to remind him that the amendment on targets is in the next group. I quite understand why he might choose to address it here but the amendment he is addressing that I and my noble friend tabled is simply about the measurement. I think the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, began the argument on targets but my amendment was intended to be strictly on the measurements.

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[Lord Freud]

I will write, because the issues that the noble Earl raises are genuinely important and difficult. We are all struggling with them. As we develop the life chances suite, we need to bear in mind the particular problems for those people, because as a group they have much poorer outcomes than they should.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

I am very grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken. It has been a remarkably well-informed and genuine debate, where Peers have responded to what others have said. Sometimes it does not work like that. I think the message that has gone to the Minister has been pretty overwhelming. I thank him for genuinely engaging with noble Lords in his speech. However, I have not heard one convincing argument from him about why income and deprivation measures should not remain statutory. I heard his arguments for why targets should not be statutory; I do not agree with them, but he made an argument, and that is fair enough, but he has not responded convincingly to my noble friend Lady Blackstone or anyone else who made that case. We have heard such strong argument on that, but I have not heard one convincing reason why an in-work poverty measure should not be in the Bill. We can trade statistics until the cows come home. I have seen the recent transition statistics, and they support my case as well as the Minister’s, and actually they are irrelevant. The point is that we need to know what is happening to those in work as well as to those out of work. There has been no convincing argument from the Minister in response to the very well-informed points that have been put by noble Lords.

I remind the Minister and the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, that when the Prime Minister was leader of the Conservative Party he welcomed this. He said:

“We need to think of poverty in relative terms—the fact that some people lack those things which others in society take for granted. So I want this message to go out loud and clear: the Conservative Party recognises, will measure and will act on relative poverty”.

How can it if it does not have the measures in the statutes as they now exist?

I will withdraw the amendment, but I think we will want to come back to this issue on Report because it is so important. Perhaps by then, the Minister will have come up with some rather more convincing arguments than he has done hitherto. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 24 withdrawn.

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Moved by

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

31: Clause 4, page 5, line 16, at end insert—
“A1AD Improving children’s life chances
The Secretary of State must publish and lay before Parliament a report setting out the measures that the Secretary of State proposes to take to improve children’s life chances, as understood with reference to section A1A(1).”

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

My Lords, it is me again. I shall speak also to Amendments 36 to 45, 47 and 48 and make clear my support for Amendment 32, which makes explicit mention of child poverty. I shall also oppose Clause 5 standing part of the Bill.

I am grateful to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation for help with the amendments. In its Second Reading briefing, it pointed out that the requirement in the Child Poverty Act 2010 for the Secretary of State to consult on, review, lay and publish a triennial child poverty strategy is one of the casualties of Clause 6. It therefore called for a new statutory requirement for the Secretary of State to develop a regular life- chances strategy. Amendments 31 and 32 are alternative ways of implementing that recommendation. I prefer Amendments 47 and 48 because they are closer to the original and make explicit reference to the effect of socioeconomic disadvantage on children’s life chances while decoupling the strategy from the income-related targets—the Minister will be pleased to hear that—which the Government have unfortunately abandoned. They are clearly decoupled.

At present, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions is required to work with the Department for Education and the Child Poverty Unit to produce a child poverty strategy. The publication of the strategy provided a very useful focus for civil society and academic engagement with the Government in developing their thinking on child poverty. Among the many helpful and illuminating responses to the last document published after a period of consultation were those from the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission, the Office of the Children’s Commissioner and the JRF. All three were pretty critical, and I cannot help wondering whether the Government are trying to avoid such criticism by repealing the duty to produce any sort of strategy.

The JRF argues that a statutory strategy would help to focus the Government’s action on their stated desire to improve the life chances of households and give the Secretary of State the impetus to drive this agenda across government and to challenge other departments to commit resources to this end. I would have thought that would have been quite attractive to the Secretary of State. But the most important reason it gives for writing such a strategy into legislation is that it would increase the opportunity for scrutiny of the Government.

The process of drafting a strategy would require public consultation followed by the publication of a clear plan for the improvement of life chances over a three-year period. This document would therefore be a means by which the Government could be held to account by the electorate, opposition parties and other interested organisations. In case the Minister refers to the reporting duty in Clause 4 and the commitment to report on further non-statutory life chances indicators, I point out that reporting on data does not constitute a strategy. Reporting on data, important as it is, is backward-looking. Publishing a strategy is forward-looking and provides a framework within which and a benchmark against which to assess the data.

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[Lord Freud]

I apologise to the noble Baroness for not dealing with the matter earlier, and I am pleased with the outcome.

Amendments 47 and 48, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, would prevent the repeal of the duty to publish and lay a triennial UK strategy. In practice, I dealt with that when I was describing in an earlier amendment what our approach would be. Amendment 49, tabled by the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, would place a statutory duty on local authorities in England to,

“prepare a joint child poverty and life chances strategy”.

While commending the noble Earl for his focus in this area, the Government do not believe that burdening local authorities with a one-size-fits-all strategy requirement would help to transform children’s lives on the ground. Local authorities will have the freedom to determine the approach they want to take in their area, building on the partnerships already in place. The Government will look to local authorities to use this freedom to take effective action to tackle the root causes of child poverty and improve children’s life chances. We will continue to support local authorities in tackling child poverty and improving life chances in their areas by providing data to inform them of their progress and where best they can focus their resources. This includes publishing local level life-chances data on children and workless households and educational attainment for all children, particularly disadvantaged children.

Local authorities can make decisions at the local level to ensure that actions are complementary and fit with local timetables and circumstances to deliver maximum effect. That is something that the centre cannot do. When looking at low-income measures in relation to local authorities, their unpredictability, which as I said is so difficult for central government, has the same volatility for local government, making it spend money on action that does not produce the best outcomes.

Clause 5 will reform the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission to become the Social Mobility Commission. Some noble Lords have indicated that they do not want Clause 5 to stand part of the Bill. The Government want to galvanise action on social mobility which calls for concerted effort by the Government, business and the third sector, operating alongside our focus on improving children’s life chances. The Government’s reforms to the commission will add impetus to its efforts to promote and improve social mobility and strengthen and expand its remit in this important area. The reformed commission will perform a key role in ensuring independent scrutiny of progress to improve social mobility in the UK. It will promote social mobility in England and, on request, provide advice to Ministers—I am not quite sure whether I can blame the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, for this, but I am checking—on how to provide social mobility in England. The commission will be an integral part of the Government’s drive to promote opportunity and remove barriers to progress towards a society where everyone is able to play their full part and realise their potential regardless of their background.

The reformed commission will no longer be tasked with tracking progress against the current set of income-based measures, and will instead be able to focus single mindedly on the crucial role of improving social mobility. The commission will build on its history of insightful work and continue to publish robust evidence-rich publications not only for the Government but for employers, schools, parliamentarians, parents, families and citizens of this country. Its publications have been instrumental in moving forward the debate on social mobility in this country, and I look forward to it continuing to do so. I particularly want to thank the commissioners who have volunteered their time freely to carry out this vital role, and the leadership of the commission’s chair, the right honourable Alan Milburn and its deputy chair, the noble Baroness, Lady Shephard of Northwold.

Amendments 36 to 45 seek to rename the commission as the life-chances commission rather than the Social Mobility Commission. They would also amend the duties placed on the commission, including placing a statutory duty on it to provide advice to Ministers on social mobility in England, whether or not at Ministers’ requests. I shall turn to Amendments 36 to 40 and 42 to 45 tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister and the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, which would rename the commission and amend the duties placed on it to promote and improve life chances instead of social mobility.

I have already set out the importance that the Government place on social mobility and the commission’s role in its scrutiny and advancement. It is the Government’s view that the reformed commission should have the single-minded focus on social mobility. Our proposals will strengthen and expand its remit on this important issue. The commission’s independent scrutiny of social mobility will help to build a society where someone’s starting point does not determine their end point. Our proposals will give the commission a clear remit and focus that will enable it to fulfil these new duties effectively.

Alongside the commission’s scrutiny role, our new statutory measures on worklessness and educational attainment will bring greater transparency to the Government’s actions to improve children’s life chances. As I have explained, we will have an annual report on progress in that area, which will allow anyone to scrutinise and hold the Government to account.

Amendment 41 tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Sherlock, and the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, would require the Social Mobility Commission to give advice to a Minister of the Crown about how to improve social mobility in England rather than to do so on request. The commission already has a statutory duty to publish a report setting out its views on the progress made towards improving social mobility in the UK. It is implicit that such reports can provide and offer advice about areas for future action as well as assessing past progress. That is certainly the way in which the commission has interpreted its remit in the past. It is not appropriate for the Government to start dictating to the commission as an independent body how it should discharge its functions in future.

Every year the commission undertakes a number of research projects, publishing reports and recommendations and developing the evidence, based on a range of subjects relating to social mobility. Through these research projects and its annual report, the commission provides a wide range of evidence-based analysis, all of which is published and available for anyone to see which can speak powerfully to government and other players.

The provision for the commission to provide advice to a Minister of the Crown on request serves an important purpose. It enables the Government to draw on the commission’s expertise in areas that particularly matter to it beyond those already covered in the commission’s reports, and it is important that we do not lose this provision. Noble Lords should note that the current provisions relating to the commission are amended as a result of repeals set out in Clause 6 and amendments to its name and functions set out in Clause 5. Should Clause 5 not stand part of the Bill —some have indicated that they intend to vote against it—the commission would cease to exist entirely. I look forward to working with the reformed commission in the coming years to make further progress in transforming social mobility.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

I asked a specific question about the future of the Child Poverty Unit. Would the Minister answer that before I wind up?

[Lord Freud]

We will ensure that there is a full range of Civil Service support to drive forward the agenda. We will set out arrangements for the Child Poverty Unit in due course. With that, I urge the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment, and other noble Lords not to press theirs.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken, particularly the right reverend Prelate, whose argument was far better than mine on life chances. What better argument is there than using terms that children themselves can understand? Starting at the end, I am desperately disappointed by the Minister’s response. He simply has not addressed the arguments as to why “life chances” would be a better title for the commission than “social mobility”. I am very disappointed by that. I thought he might be able to go away and say, “Yes, perhaps there’s something to be said for that”. Instead, he has said that they will expand the remit of the commission, but he is actually narrowing it. Which is it: expansion or narrowing? It is not at all clear. Why drive on social mobility rather than on life chances, which still allows you to talk about social mobility but has the advantages that I set out and as the right reverend Prelate did in his killer argument—if he does not mind me calling it that? We have had no answer to those. As I say, I am desperately disappointed.

The Minister kindly said that he thought he would please me with his response on strategy. I appreciate that, but I am afraid I am not that easily pleased. Again, there is that key word, “statutory”. On the previous group of amendments my noble friend Lady Blackstone explained why that word is important: Governments and Ministers change. Given that the intention is to produce a life chances strategy, why not make it statutory? There is no argument about targets. We are agreed on it. Again, I am rather disappointed that the Minister has been unable to say that the Government will think about it and that it would perhaps be good to have a statutory duty. I am talking not about tick-boxes or anything like that, but about the kind of strategy that he is talking about.

Again, we may have to come back to these questions on Report because we have not heard convincing arguments in response to a very strong set of arguments from a number of noble Lords. Having said that, I of course beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 31 withdrawn.

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I hope that the Government look at this in next year’s White Paper, announced at the spending review, and choose to focus on better support, rather than simply cutting benefits, which are a lifeline to many.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

The noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, has made a very powerful case as to why cutting benefits actually makes it harder for people, particularly disabled people, to find work. That has also come out in other research. For example, Community Links has said that if you push people into survival mode, then they just have to focus on surviving.

I want briefly to respond to the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, who talked about the incentive structure. We have heard a lot about the famous OECD quote, which has been bandied back and forth. I thought it might be worth reading out the paragraph from which that quote came:

“A policy of no welfare would be the best solution to maximise labour supply, if equity issues were not a concern”.

I shall miss out the next sentence, but it does not change the meaning:

“distributional issues are a primary concern when designing policies to help people return to self-sufficiency through work and, in this context, studies show that in-work benefits can maximise social welfare”.

The message coming from the OECD report that has been quoted so often is in fact that the answer lies in improving support for those in work—which, of course, the Government are making worse—rather than cutting benefits for those out of work.

Another OECD report that came out only two years earlier, on incapacity benefits—so I am surprised the Government have not mentioned it—called Transforming Disability into Ability, refers to the benefit traps and incentive problems that the noble Lord talked about. However, it said:

“The evidence concerning such types of benefit traps is inconclusive”.

I suggest that it remains inconclusive, and the evidence prayed in aid by the Government does not support the case for this really quite savage cut in benefits for disabled people.

[Lord Freud]

Clauses 13 and 14 remove the work-related activity component and limited capability for work element for new claims for ESA and universal credit. These clauses do not affect the support group component, the UC equivalent or the premiums that form part of income-related ESA.

ESA was introduced by Labour in 2008, and the work-related activity component was originally intended to act as an incentive to encourage people to participate in work-related activity and therefore return to work quicker.

The original estimates were that far more claimants would move into work. Indeed, the White Paper Raising Expectations and Increasing Support: Reforming Welfare for the Future, published in 2008, stated that the then Labour Government aimed to reduce the number of people on incapacity benefits by 1 million by 2015. However, only around 1% of people in the work-related activity group leave the benefit each month, so clearly the existing policy is not working as intended and is failing claimants.

While financial incentives are only part of the answer on what impacts on claimant behaviour, they are an important part. This has been recognised for a long time. Going even further back, a Green Paper, A New Deal for Welfare: Empowering People to Work, published in 2006, highlighted that most people who came on to incapacity benefit expected to work again but many never did; that the longer a person remained on benefit, the less chance they had of leaving; and that incapacity benefit reinforced this by offering more money the longer that someone was on benefit. I am sorry to say that although that Green Paper was talking about incapacity benefit, a similar sentiment could now be expressed about ESA. Too many people with disabilities and health conditions are still being excluded from the world of work and not fulfilling their ambitions. I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Lansley for pinpointing this issue.

I turn to the international evidence on incentives that we have been bandying around. The OECD report argued:

“Financial incentives to work can be improved by either cutting welfare benefit levels, or introducing in-work benefits while leaving benefit levels unchanged”.

The findings cover the whole population, and although not specifically focused on the disabled population, do not indicate that such incentives would not apply.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

I just read out the whole paragraph that that quote is taken from, which makes it quite clear that it sees the answer as lying in improved in-work benefits, not in cutting out-of-work benefits.

[Lord Freud]

I am not now looking at recommendations for action. I am just looking at what evidence we have that incentives either way work for the disabled community because that is the issue that noble Lords are querying. Let me go on. A paper by Barr et al, published by the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health in 2010, asks:

“To what extent have relaxed eligibility requirements and increased generosity of disability benefits acted as disincentives for employment?”.

It finds that eight out of 11 studies reported that benefit levels had a significant negative association with employment. To pick up the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Low, about the level of the evidence, while they state that they cannot quantify the size of the effect, they conclude that there definitely is one. The most robust study in that paper, by Hesselius and Persson from 2007, demonstrated a small but significant negative association. The final paper, by Kostøl and Mogstad from 2012, is about evidence from Norway regarding a positive incentive structure allowing disabled claimants to retain more of their benefits when moving into work, which resulted in more claimants starting work. The study shows the impact of financial incentives on disabled people able to undertake preparation for work or work itself, which is a group synonymous with our WRAG population.