DWP Update
South Tyneside New Horizons Partnership
Welfare Reforms Workshop
Name: John Moiser
Specialist Partnership Manager
Date: 12th February 2013
Themes
• Welfare Reform Act
• Social Justice
• Employment Support
• Benefits
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Department for Work and Pensions
Welfare Reform Act
The Act
Timelines
Department for Work and Pensions
Welfare Reform Act
• Most fundamental reforms to the social security system for 60 years.
• Aims for a simpler, fairer benefits system and to ensure that work pays.
• Universal Credit.
• Personal Independence Payment.
• Employment Support Allowance (ESA) time-limiting.
• Benefit Cap.
• Fraud and error penalties.
• Industrial Injuries Disablement Benefit (IIDB) amendments.
• Social Fund changes.
• Housing Benefit changes.
• Revised Appeals Process.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Timeline 2013 - 2014
April 2013
• Housing Benefit / Local Housing Allowance linked to Consumer Price
Index and Social Sector ‘Under Occupancy’ Regulations.
• Benefit Cap rollout commences.
• Revised appeals process rollout commences.
• Social Fund reform.
• Universal Credit pathfinder starts.
• Personal Independence Payment (PIP) New Claims controlled start.
• Council Tax Benefit abolished - replaced by local schemes.
June 2013
• PIP new claims introduced nationally.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Timeline 2013 - 2014
October 2013
• Reassessment of Disability Living Allowance (DLA) claims begins.
• Universal Credit (phased roll-out begins).
• Entitlement to work requirement for benefit.
• No new In Work Credit or Return to Work Credit awards.
April 2014
• Universal Credit (new in-work claims, plus start transfer of existing
out of work benefit claims).
• Incapacity Benefit reassessment complete.
October 2014
• Modified Pension Credit.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Social Justice
Department for Work and Pensions
Social Justice
• Social Justice is about giving individuals and families facing multiple
disadvantages the support that they need to turn their lives around.
• The Government published its Social Justice strategy in March 2012.
Social Justice focuses on;
 Prevention and early intervention.
 Concentrating interventions on recovery and independence - not
maintenance.
 Promoting work as the most sustainable route out of poverty - while
offering unconditional support for those who are severely disabled
and cannot work.
 Recognising that the most effective solutions will often be designed
and delivered locally.
 Ensuring that interventions provide a fair deal for the taxpayer.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Service Delivery
Digital Services
Universal Jobmatch
Department for Work and Pensions
Digital Services
• Our aim is for digital to become the main channel to claim benefit and
search for jobs. Universal Credit will be our first digital by default
service.
• GOV.UK has replaced Direct.gov and Business Link websites.
• JSA Online is now easier to claim on GOV.UK – over 2.5 million people
have done so already. 41.9% of all JSA claims were made online in
November.
• Over 3.2 million visits made to the online Benefit Adviser Service by
August 2012.
• 25,000 State Pension claims made online by November 2012.
• Up to 3 million visits a week to the job search tool on GOV.UK.
• My Benefits Online is a new service which will allow claimants to go
online and find answers to common enquiries, check their claims,
awards and payments securely.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Universal Jobmatch
• Launched on 19th November 2012.
• Easier and quicker to search for jobs using the very latest
technology.
Online users can;
 Create and upload their CV.
 Search and apply for jobs 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
 Access their personal account anywhere.
 Tailor their own job preferences and receive job alerts when a
vacancy arises that meets their requirements.
Employers can;
 Upload and manage their own vacancies and receive CVs from
those who match the person specification and job criteria.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Employment Support
Jobcentre Plus Support
Labour Market Benefit Conditionality
Get Britain Working
Youth Contract
Lone Parent Support
Work Programme
Support for Families with Multiple Problems
Specialist Disability Support
Department for Work and Pensions
Jobcentre Plus Support
• Unemployment is falling.
• Most individuals do move off benefits quickly.
• There is now a greater focus on diagnosing customers’ individual
needs and providing them with an appropriate level of support.
• To achieve this our Advisers have been granted more responsibility
and our managers given greater freedoms and flexibilities.
• We want to help people get better at looking for work and ultimately
move them off benefits in to sustainable employment.
• For those who do not need our help, we want them to make use of
our digital services and get the best out of them.
• Advisers can now place some claimants on Mandatory Work Activity.
• New sanctions regime introduced.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Labour Market Benefit Conditionality
• New sanctions regime for JSA claimants began in October 2012.
• Claimant requirements have not changed – the sanctions have.
• Sanction periods increased with some fixed sanction periods.
• Individuals need to engage with our support and do all they can to look
for and prepare for moving off benefits and into work.
• The sanctions are designed as a deterrent.
• We will apply them consistently and with commonsense. Anyone not
complying with mandatory activity should be sanctioned unless they
have a genuinely good reason for not doing so.
• ESA Work Related Activity Group sanctions were introduced in
December 2012.
• Access to hardship provision is still available.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Get Britain Working
Provides a menu of flexible support options to encourage;
• Sharing of skills and experience through Work Clubs.
• Volunteering as a way of developing work skills through Work
Together.
• Self-employment as a route off benefits through the New Enterprise
Allowance and via Enterprise Clubs offering community based and
locally led support for unemployed people.
• Greater insight into the world of work through Work Experience.
• Pre-employment training and work placements through sectorbased work academies.
• Partnership between voluntary sector, colleges, employers and
Government.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Support for Young Unemployed (Aged 16 – 17)
• Early access to the Work Programme (at 3 months) for 18 year olds
who claimed JSA when they were aged 16-17.
• Voluntary work experience available to 16-17 year old JSA claimants.
• Increased adviser support for 16-17 year olds on JSA.
• Signposting advice available to 16-17 year olds who are Not in
Education, Employment or Training (NEET).
• Work Clubs extended to 16-24 year olds.
• Additional funding available to help 16-17 year olds develop job
seeking skills.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Youth Contract
• £1 billion package of support to help young people prepare for work
and find a job.
• Offers a voluntary work experience or sector based work academy
place for every unemployed 18-24 year old who wants one (after they
have been on JSA for 3 months) before they enter the Work
Programme.
• Extra Jobcentre Plus support for all 18-24 year olds.
• Wage incentives to make it easier for employers to take on young
people.
• Additional funding to support the growth of 16-24 year old
apprenticeships.
• A new programme for persistently NEET 16 and 17 year olds to get
them learning, on an apprenticeship or in a job with training.
• Expand the current Mandatory Work Activity programme.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Lone Parent Support
• Job seeking support extended to more lone parents.
• From May 2012 lone parents with a youngest child aged 5 or older
are no longer eligible to claim solely on the grounds of being a lone
parent.
• For existing Income Support claimants the changes were phased in;
 From May 2012 lone parents with a youngest child aged 6, or who
turns 6, and;
 From August 2012, lone parents with a youngest child aged 5, or
who turns 5.
• In line with earlier changes some lone parents retain their entitlement
to Income Support.
• Work Focused support also available for those on Income Support.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Work Programme
• Designed to help those in danger of becoming long term unemployed.
• Provides tailored support for claimants who need more help to
undertake active and effective job seeking.
• Local provision designed and delivered by providers with complete
autonomy which encourages innovation.
• Payment by results - with higher payments made for supporting the
hardest to help in to sustained employment.
• Support based on individual needs to help overcome barriers that
prevent people finding and staying in work.
• Not only supports people into work but aims to keep them there.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Work Programme Eligibility - JSA
Customer Group
Time of Referral
Basis for Referral
Jobseekers Allowance
(JSA) claimants aged 25+
From 12 months
Mandatory
JSA claimants aged 18-24
From 9 months
Mandatory
JSA either NEET, Repeat
claimant or ex-Incapacity
Benefit
From 3 months
Mandatory
JSA claimants who are
seriously disadvantaged by
one or more factors
From 3 months
Voluntary
JSA former prisoners
Immediately on release
from prison
Mandatory
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Department for Work and Pensions
Work Programme Eligibility – Other Benefit Groups
Customer Group
Time of Referral
Basis for referral
All Employment and
Support Allowance (ESA)
claimants
At any time
Voluntary
New claimants ESA
(income related) Work
Related Activity Group
With a 3, 6 or 12 month prognosis (how
long the Department believes should
pass before the claimant has another
Work Capability Assessment)
Mandatory
If their youngest child is under five years
old or they are a full time carer.
Optional
Pension Credit claimants
From 12 months after claim or from day
1 if have a health condition
Voluntary
Income Support claimants
At any time (England only)
Voluntary
Incapacity Benefit
claimants
At any time (England only)
Voluntary
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Department for Work and Pensions
Support for Families with Multiple Problems
• In December 2011, DWP launched the ESF Provision for Families
with Multiple Problems. Families are referred by local authorities to
provision that is delivered by local welfare to work providers.
• In March 2012 the Troubled Families Programme led by the
Department for Communities and Local Government was launched.
It is delivered through local authorities.
• Both programmes aim to reducing worklessness amongst the most
troubled families in England through a whole family approach.
• The two programmes complement one another - common goals.
• Multiple disadvantages might include entrenched worklessness,
debt, criminal or anti-social behaviour, school attendance issues,
youth crime, housing problems and low educational attainment.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Specialist Disability Employment Support
• Resources for supporting disabled people into employment are
being focussed on disabled people themselves rather than on
specific institutions.
• The Government wants to give disabled people the opportunity to
realise their aspirations and to get into and progress in work.
• Spending on specialist disability employment programmes will be
protected over this Spending Review.
• The Government has implemented the Sayce recommendations on
reforming Remploy and accepted those on Access to Work.
• All disabled Remploy employees affected by the changes to the
Remploy factories are receiving a comprehensive package of
personalised support.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Access to Work (AtW)
• AtW helps support disabled people and people with long term
health conditions into mainstream jobs – the same as everyone
else.
• AtW helps employers meet the cost of employing a person with
disabilities or long term health conditions by providing specially
adapted equipment, support workers and interpreters.
• We are spending more than ever before on AtW. We currently
spend around £100m on it to support over 30,000 people in work.
• The Government has also announced that an extra £15m is
available for Access to Work in this Spending Review.
• For the first time we are giving young disabled jobseekers the
support they need to gain vital work experience through AtW.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Benefits
Social Fund Reform
Benefit Uprating
Benefit Cap
Employment Support Allowance and Work Capability Assessment
Personal Independence Payment
Universal Credit
Bereavement Benefit
Department for Work and Pensions
Social Fund Reform
From April 2013
• Community Care Grants and Crisis Loans will be abolished with
funding transferred to Upper Tier local authorities in England and to the
Scottish and Welsh Governments to introduce new Local Welfare
Provision.
• Crisis Loans for alignment to benefit and Interim payments of benefit
will be replaced by Short Term Benefit Advances (DWP administered)
From October 2013
• Budgeting Loans will be replaced by Budgeting Advances and be paid
as part of Universal Credit. (From April 2013 in UC Pathfinder areas).
• Regulated Social Fund (Funeral Payments, Sure Start Maternity
Grants and Cold Weather Payments) will continue with Universal
Credit as a qualifying benefit.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Benefit Uprating
• An announcement about DWP benefits was made in the 2012 Autumn
Statement.
• The announcement was that most DWP benefits, except those for
disabled people, carers and pensioners, would be increased by 1% for
three years from 2013/14.
• It was subject to parliamentary approval.
• Legislation to make the change for 2014/15 and 2015/16 was debated
and voted on. This took place on 8th January 2013.
Claimants will be told by letter of the changes to benefits by:
 April 2013 - for working-age and pension claimants
 May 2013 - for disability and carers claimants
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Department for Work and Pensions
Benefit Cap
• Limits benefit payments to a household to no more than average
household earnings – equivalent to a gross salary of £35,000. Cap
excludes one-off payments and non-cash benefits.
• Exemptions for households include recipients of Disability Living
Allowance, Attendance Allowance or Industrial Injuries Disability
Benefit. War widows / widowers and those in ESA Support Group also
exempt.
• Housing benefit paid to households in supported exempt
accommodation is being disregarded for the Benefit Cap. Those
entitled to Working Tax Credit exempt.
• Roll-out starts in April 2013 in four Local Authority areas with full
national roll-out by the end of September 2013. DWP has contacted
individual claimants likely to be affected offering support to find work.
• An online calculator is available at www.gov.uk/benefit-cap.
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Department for Work and Pensions
ESA Changes
• Limits time people can receive contribution-based ESA to 365 days if
in the Work Related Activity Group or assessment phase.
• Removed special contribution conditions allowing some young
people to qualify for contribution-based ESA without paying National
Insurance contributions.
• Time-limit does not include any time spent in the Support
Group or time spent in the assessment phase – if immediately
followed by placement in Support Group.
• Came into effect on 1st May 2012.
• The 104 week linking rule abolished through separate regulations.
• More consistent with contribution-based JSA and its 6 month time
limit.
• ESA claimants in work related activity group subject to a new
sanctions regime.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Work Capability Assessment (WCA) Improvements
• Government committed to a 5 year independent review of the WCA to
ensure it is a fair and effective assessment.
• First independent Harrington review reported in November 2010. All
recommendations for DWP and Atos Healthcare delivered and impacts
continue to be monitored to identify further improvements.
• Second review reported November 2011. Year 2 improvements build on
recommendations from first review of the Work Capability Assessment.
– All year two recommendations accepted either fully or in principle.
– A pilot to smooth the transition between the WCA and work for ESA
claimants which began in Handsworth Benefit Centre extended and
now includes Sussex and Surrey district and its linked Jobcentres.
• Professor Harrington's 3rd review (and the Government's response)
published in November 2012. The report included 4 further
recommendations - 1 accepted in principle and all others accepted.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Personal Independence Payment Overview
• Disability Living Allowance (DLA) will be replaced by a new benefit
for eligible working age people (16-64) called the Personal
Independence Payment (PIP).
• It retains the key features of DLA. It is non means tested and non
taxable and payable whether in or out of work.
• More objective assessment process, including a face to face
consultation with a health professional for most claimants.
• Regular reviews and an objective assessment will help ensure that
support goes to those who most need it.
• Public consultations and input from support organisations helped
shape the design and criteria for PIP.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Personal Independence Payment Timetable
April
2013
June
2013
October
2013
October
2015
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• New Claims to PIP from controlled start area
• National rollout of new claims to PIP. DLA will no longer
be available to new working age claimants
• Reassessment to PIP starts for fixed period DLA awards
coming up for renewal, young people turning 16 or
where DLA claimants report a change in their condition.
• DWP will begin selecting existing DLA claimants and tell
them what they need to do to claim PIP. We will prioritise
DLA claimants who have turned 65 after 8 April 2013,
when PIP was first introduced.
Department for Work and Pensions
Universal Credit – Making Work Pay
• Simplifies a complex system.
• Designed to ensure that work will always pay.
• Tackles welfare dependency, poverty and worklessness.
• More help for low income working families.
• Financial security for the most vulnerable in society.
• Improves incentives to increase hours of work.
• Will transform lives and society through work.
• Personalised conditions according to capability and circumstance.
• Introduced in phases from April 2013 through to 2017.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Universal Credit Migration - Key Dates
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APRIL 2013
Pathfinder Go-Live
OCT 2013
New claims from unemployed claimants start
APRIL 2014
New claims from in-work claimants start
Managed migrations start
2017
Managed migration activity completed
Department for Work and Pensions
Bereavement Benefit
• A public consultation preceded announcement of future changes.
• The new Bereavement Support Payment will be introduced after the
next General Election.
• It will provide a lump sum followed by smaller instalments for up to a
year.
• There will be a uniform rate unless the claimant has dependent
children.
• It will provide new simplified conditions of entitlement.
• It will meet the immediate financial needs.
• Existing claimants at the time of the change will be unaffected.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Pensions
Changes to State Pension Age
State Pension Reform
Auto-Enrolment
Department for Work and Pensions
Changes to State Pension Age
• State Pension Age will rise to keep pace with life expectancy changes.
• Pensions Act puts into law changes to the State Pension age timetable.
• From April 2016, women's State Pension age will rise faster than
originally planned, equalising with men's at 65 by November 2018.
• Between December 2018 and October 2020, men and women's State
Pension ages will be increased from 65 to 66.
Under the current law State Pension age will already increase to:
– 67 between 2034 and 2036
– 68 between 2044 and 2046
• Government considering how the State Pension age should be changed
in the future and have announced that State Pension age will now
increase to 67 sooner between 2026 and 2028. This is not yet law and
will be subject to Parliamentary scrutiny when legislation is introduced.
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Department for Work and Pensions
State Pension Reform
• Single Tier White Paper was published on 14th January 2013.
• The Single Tier pension will deliver a simple, clear and fair state
pension. It will support saving for retirement.
• The reforms aim to modernise our state pension system to reflect the
lives and contributions of today’s working age people.
• At the point of introduction, people will have their contributions to the
existing pensions system recognised.
• The new rules will apply to future pensioners only.
• Anyone reaching State Pension age before the reforms are
introduced will continue to receive their State Pension in line with
current rules.
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Department for Work and Pensions
Auto-Enrolment
• Around 7 million people are not currently saving enough for their
retirement and many face significant barriers to starting to save.
• Millions of workers started to get enrolled on a workplace pension
from October 2012.
• Those working for the largest employers are being enrolled first.
• The aim is that all firms will have implemented a workplace pension
by 1st April 2017.
• DWP has launched a campaign to give people support and
information about automatic enrolment to help them understand the
benefits and what it means for them.
• Individuals looking for information on what automatic enrolment
means for them should go to gov.uk/workplacepensions.
• There is a call centre available for those without internet access.
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Department for Work and Pensions
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Department for Work and Pensions