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The Employment and Support Allowance (Transitional Provisions) (Existing Awards) Regulations 2010 and The Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit (Employment and Support Allowance) Amendment Regulations 2010.
The Social Security Advisory Committee (SSAC) was asked by the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions to consider proposals for the introduction of the above regulations.
The proposed regulations provided for the movement of benefit claims from incapacity benefit (IB), income support (IS) paid on grounds of incapacity and severe disablement allowance (SDA) to employment and support allowance (ESA) and associated changes to housing benefit (HB) and council tax benefit (CTB).
In the Government White Paper, Raising expectations and increasing support, it was announced that the Government intended to migrate people on existing incapacity benefits (incapacity benefit, severe disablement allowance and income support on disability grounds) and transfer them to ESA from 2010-2013.
It has now been decided that migration will start gradually from 1 October 2010, with full national implementation from February 2011 and a planned completion date by the end of March 2014.
It was intended to convert customers to ESA in the following order:
Customers who receive National Insurance credits only (people who receive neither IB nor IS but are incapable of work) will be transferred to ESA "credits only" after the end of the planned conversion period. Conversion for these customers may affect the rates of HB and CTB they receive but they are not required to engage with support to help them return to work.
No claims will be required for migration to ESA. The process will be triggered by a notice to the customer.
The date of a customer's re-assessment will be based on the review date of their Personal Capability Assessment. The Regulations provide that a Work Capability Assessment will be completed once a notice has been issued, to determine eligibility for ESA.
Claimants who are eligible for ESA will, on conversion, be able to benefit from, and become subject to, ESA rules (e.g. permitted work rules, sanctions).
Where people who are eligible for ESA receive more on existing incapacity benefits than the appropriate ESA rate, their existing rate of benefit will be frozen (transitionally protected) at the point of conversion and eroded by annual uprating. The regulations also provide details of how transitional additions will end on a change of circumstance.
Transitional protection will not extend beyond April 2020.
Where people who are eligible for ESA receive less on incapacity benefits than the appropriate ESA rate, their benefit will immediately be increased to the ESA rate on conversion.
Income-related child allowances paid with IS will be transferred to child tax credit before customers are migrated to ESA.
All claims to incapacity benefits after 31 January 2011 will be treated as new ESA claims. There will be no link to earlier claims for incapacity benefits.
The Government is also taking steps to amend HB/CTB to ensure that no one sees a reduction in their overall benefit income solely because of the migration process.
The closing date for responses was 8 February 2010.
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