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Updated BRIEFING on the Welfare Reform Bill 2009
By Legal Action for Women, Single Mothers’ Self-Defence and
WinVisible (women with visible and invisible disabilities)
Tel: 020 7482 2496 Email:
centre@crossroadswomen.net
Dear Members of the Lords,
as more people become aware of the Welfare Reform Bill there
is increasing concern for its implications, especially given
the present economic crisis. We hope you will consider
favourably the following amendments.
Delete
Clause 1: No one should be expected to “work for your
benefits”, i.e. for £1.73 an hour.
We condemn the requirement
that claimants must work for their benefits, that is, for
£1.73 an hour if they have been unemployed for more than two
years. This is a shocking attack on the minimum wage which
would drive all wages down. Single mothers, people with
disabilities, people over 60, people of colour, and others
whom employers already discriminate against, will be
disproportionately affected.
Clause 2:
Amend: No
parent of a child under school age should be forced into
“work-related activity” or to “progress towards work”.
We reject this disregard of
children’s need for mothers’ caring work and mothers’ right
to choose what is best for their children and themselves.
The government has indicated that it will amend the Bill at
Report stage to exempt single parents of children under
three from “work-related activity”. But “work-focussed
interviews” and “action plans”, the steps before that,
remain a condition of receiving benefit. It is not clear
what exemption would apply to couples with very young
children.
We agree with exemption from
work-related activity for parents of a disabled child under
seven receiving lower rate of Disability Living Allowance.
We believe all parents and carers of disabled children of
any age should be exempted.
Insert:
Child’s welfare to be paramount. We
support Lord Northbourne’s proposals on the well-being and
welfare of the child, and that the decision-maker on whether
childcare is suitable should be qualified.
Amend:
Carers are not specified as exempt from job seeking. They
should be. Their unwaged work saves the
government £87bn a year (“Valuing and supporting carers”,
Work and Pensions Committee Report 2008). They are assured
that rules will be softened for them, but no such assurance
is written into the Bill. Forcing carers into work has a
wide impact on those they care for: children, people with
disabilities, older people and people who have an addiction
to drink or drugs. Attacking carers takes away care for
people with health problems and disabilities.
Amend:
Traumatised women escaping domestic violence should not be
given a deadline by when they are to be ready to look for
work.
The Bill
abolishes Income Support, women’s lifeline when leaving a
violent man. Women fleeing domestic violence, with
their children, would be treated as job seekers, with only a
three-month exemption from job seeking.
This is a token response to
the stark warnings from anti-violence groups – that
distressed women who are unable to keep “work-focussed
interview” appointments may be cut off benefit and lose
Housing Benefit. Without income, women would be driven back
to violent men or into self-harm and suicide.
The government, which claims to be so concerned for victims
of violence, had previously ruled out any specific benefits
protection (Hansard, 22 June 09). Many victims of domestic
violence have survived horrendous experiences, and are
deeply traumatised, living in a refuge or other temporary
accommodation, and still at risk from their ex-partner.
They must not be given a deadline by which they are to have
recovered. A woman from Women Against Rape described how
she felt after she escaped: “I was a nervous wreck. You
don’t know who you are anymore; you are like a beaten dog in
a corner. It took me three months to find somewhere to live.
No way could I have got a job . . . They would have looked
at me like I was a nutter.”
Delete
Clause 7: Stop the abolition of Income Support
Mothers are the first carers.
The Welfare Reform Bill ignores this survival work for
society and the economy, and treats mothers as “workless”.
Income Support is a crucial entitlement ensuring the basic
human right to survive – deprive mothers, and children are
the first to suffer; deprive carers who can’t get Carers’
Allowance, and those they care for are the first to suffer,
so are victims of domestic violence and other vulnerable
people, young and old. In the Lords debate (29 April)
Baroness Hollis acknowledged this:
“[Income Support] is ...
largely for women and recognises that their unwaged work
counts too… sanction the lone parent and inevitably you
sanction the child.
The government has
misrepresented the flood of objections, mainly from women.
They claim that we mistakenly fear being left without
benefit, as JSA or Employment and Support Allowance will
replace Income Support. We know exactly what that means:
entitlement will become conditional so benefits can be
stopped, regardless of their effect on carers and those we
care for. This is already happening. Under existing rules,
women and children unable to attend work-focussed interviews
for health and caring reasons, are being cut off. We know
of mothers whose five-month-old children are still
breastfeeding being called in – their caring
responsibilities are ignored and demeaned.
Delete
Clause 8: No compulsion or sanctions on work-related
activity for people with disabilities on Employment and
Support Allowance.
People with mental health
problems are among those suffering under current rules. So
much for Minister Jim Murphy’s assurance, pre-Welfare Reform
Act 2007, that voluntary participation would not be changed
to force.
Delete
Clause 46:
Joint birth registration
grants violent ex-partners greater rights over the child and
unwanted involvement with the mother.
30% of women have suffered
domestic violence. Yet joint registration of births is being
made compulsory – giving all fathers a say in decisions
about the child, and access to records which could reveal
the mother’s address. Fathers could independently register
their paternity. This is the latest attack on mothers’ and
children’s safety. Though exceptions would be allowed if a
mother fears for her and her baby’s safety, most
domestic violence goes unreported, so relatively few women
can prove violence or mental cruelty. The registrar will
decide. The government says registrars should not accept
solely the mother’s word on not knowing the father’s
whereabouts. Mothers who refuse to name the father if “good
cause” is not accepted could be fined, or
imprisoned for seven years
under the perjury law for deliberately giving false
information. These powers are worse than the notorious
Child Support Act which impoverished and terrorised many
single mother families until it was abolished.
Other
amendments we support:
-
Delete Clause 14 which
freezes, then abolishes the addition for the spouse,
etc., of someone on Carers’ Allowance or Maternity
Allowance
-
Disability Living
Allowance mobility component extended to severely
disabled children under three
-
Safeguards before
sanctions are imposed
-
Delete Clause 9 on forced
drug-testing and treatment. Consent to treatment, other
amendments on drink and drugs
-
Work-related activity must
be reasonable for someone with a fluctuating condition.
Providers must be trained
-
A person placed in work
should get a wage, not JSA
Other
proposals we support:
-
Minimum income level for
persons subject to sanctions so that an inquiry before
sanctions is imposed. No sanction where someone refuses
a job which would leave them worse off than JSA level
(proposed by Rev Paul Nicolson, Zacchaeus 2000)
-
No sanction for alleged
benefit fraud for anyone not convicted of fraud, who has
accepted a caution or penalty under threat of going to
court (CPAG)
2
July 2009 |