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DWP adviser David Freud said in a recent newspaper article (The Telegraph 2 February 2008) that “up to two thirds of people claiming incapacity benefit are not entitled to the state handout”.
David Freud, is an investment banker hired by the Government to advise on the long term review its Welfare to Work strategy.
His ideas on this were published in Reducing dependency, increasing opportunity: options for the future of welfare to work.
In the article Mr Freud suggested that less than a third of incapacity benefits claimants were “credible recipients while several hundred thousand work illegally on the black market”, suggesting that 1.9 million people who are able to work are claiming the benefit.
"The people who are really disabled are often the ones who are really desperate to work, but there are then a whole load of people who say they don't want to be made to work regardless."
You can read the full article by clicking on the link below.
Disability Alliance, together with Child Poverty Action Group, Mind, Rethink, RNID and Skill: National Bureau for Students with Disabilities have jointly written to the Telegraph as follows.
Sir - We strongly dispute the claims made by the Government's new welfare adviser David Freud (report, February 2).
Mr Freud seems to think that incapacity benefit claimants are simply signed off by their GPs and forgotten about, but there are a number of stages to the benefit application process and claimants are checked regularly to ensure they are still entitled to their benefits.
In fact, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, our eligibility test for incapacity benefit is one of the most stringent in the world.
Mr Freud's estimates regarding people claiming incapacity benefit when they should be working are incorrect and not backed up by any evidence. The most recent official figure for incapacity benefit fraud suggests it is below half a per cent.
More than a million disabled people on incapacity benefits want to work and need support to be able to do that.
The Government has a role to provide that support. In Denmark, where over 25 per cent of the budget for supporting people back into work is spent on disabled people, the employment rate for former claimants is 70 per cent.
In Britain, where the spend on disabled people is less than four per cent of the whole back to work budget, the employment rate for disabled people is less than 33 per cent.
The Government will only reach its objective of 80 per cent employment if it fully supports people back into work.
Kate Green, Chief Executive, Child Poverty Action Group
Vanessa Stanislas, Chief Executive, Disability Alliance
Paul Farmer, Chief Executive, Mind
Paul Jenkins, Chief Executive, Rethink
Jackie Ballard, Chief Executive, RNID
Barbara Waters, Chief Executive, Skill: National Bureau for Students with Disabilities
This was published in the Telegraph on 8 February 2008.
Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) has also published a press release (Government welfare reform adviser’s basic errors call into question proposal for £167bn privatisation spend) about this article. You can read this by clicking on the link below.
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