Unlocking benefits: Tackling barriers for disabled people wanting to work
Think tank: Joseph Rowntree Foundation
Author(s): Iain Porter
November 14, 2024
This report from UK think tank the Joseph Rowntree Foundation looks at tackling barriers for disabled people wanting to work.
This report focuses on reforms to support disabled people who can work into the labour market. It proposes several reforms to work-related disability benefits and related employment support, informed by new joint research by JRF and Scope. This involved in-depth discussions and surveys with disabled people, and analysis of hardship levels amongst people receiving health-related Universal Credit.
The Government has committed to £3 billion of cuts to health/disability benefits. But targeting arbitrary savings (set by the previous Government) won’t lead to effective reforms that unlock work, and risks deeper hardship for disabled people. Tackling hardship must involve improving circumstances for people receiving work-related disability benefits. With so many people being held back from participating in good jobs, this is also crucial to the Government’s objectives around economic growth and to ensure everyone has the same opportunities to access work and economic security. Policy must focus on improving population health and healthcare. It needs to ensure jobs are designed to be much more viable for disabled people and more supportive when employees become ill.
There are also three big barriers to work in the benefit system that must be addressed. The previous Government’s plans risked worsening these barriers and increasing hardship. The new Government must not repeat the failed approaches of the past. Instead, it needs a fresh approach, working alongside disabled people to put forward an alternative reform agenda. Such an approach would reduce risk for disabled people who engage with employment support, move towards work or into work; it would improve trust in DWP, fix assessments and change the culture of fear and negativity; and it would bring a step-change in early, voluntary-based engagement, and effective employment support.
