Hostname: page-component-6bf8c574d5-7jkgd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-02-19T03:40:32.889Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Retrenching Incapacity Benefit: Employment Support Allowance and Paid Work

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2009

Linda Piggott  and
Chris Grover
Linda Piggott
Affiliation:
Department of Applied Social Science, Lancaster University E-mail: l.piggott@lancaster.ac.uk
Chris Grover
Affiliation:
Department of Applied Social Science, Lancaster University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In October 2008 in the UK Incapacity Benefit (IB) (the main income replacement benefit for sick and disabled claimants) was replaced by the Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) for new claimants. Drawing upon recent work on the retrenchment of welfare benefits and services this paper examines the context for the changes, the marketisation of the job placement services for ESA claimants and the extension of conditionality to sick and disabled benefit claimants. The paper argues that the introduction of ESA is a good example of the retrenchment of benefits for the majority of sick and disabled people. The paper concludes that ESA can be interpreted as creating a group of disadvantaged people through which the private sector can profit.

Type
Articles
Information
Social Policy and Society , Volume 8 , Issue 2 , April 2009 , pp. 159 - 170
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Age Concern (2006), Age Concern's submission to the Work and Pensions Select Committee inquiry on the Government's Employment Strategy, London: Age Concern.Google Scholar
Barnes, C. (2003), ‘Disability, the organization of work, and the need for change’, in OECD, Transforming DIS[ABILITY] into ABILITY, Vienna: OECD.Google Scholar
British Council of Disabled People (2006), British Council of Disabled People's Welfare Reform Bill 2nd Reading Briefing, Derby: British Council of Disabled People.Google Scholar
Cockett, R. (1995), Thinking the Unthinkable: Think-Tanks and the Economic Counter-Revolution, 1931–1983, London: Harper Collins.Google Scholar
Connor, S. (2007), ‘We're onto you: a critical examination of the Department for Work and Pensions' “Targeting Benefit Fraud” campaign’, Critical Social Policy, 27, 2, 231–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Department of Social Security (1998), Beating Fraud is Everyone's Business: Securing the Future, Cm 4012, London: The Stationery Office.Google Scholar
Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) (2006), A New Deal for Welfare: Empowering People to Work, London: The Stationary Office.Google Scholar
DWP (2007a), ‘Work is good for you: new medical test to assess work capability – Hain’, Press release, 19 November.Google Scholar
DWP (2007b), ‘Enhanced role for the private and voluntary sector – Peter Hain announces pathways contracts’, Press release, 12 September.Google Scholar
DWP (2007c), ‘Pathways on track for national roll out’, Press release, 20 December.Google Scholar
Disability Alliance (2006), Response to the Green Paper – A new Deal for Welfare: Empowering People to Work, London: Disability Alliance.Google Scholar
Disability Benefits Consortium (2006), Parliamentary Briefing Welfare Reform Bill, House of Commons Second Reading, 24 July 2006, London: Disability Benefits Consortium.Google Scholar
Disability Rights Commission (2007), Celebrating the Journey: Impact Report 2000–2007, Stratford Upon Avon: Disability Rights Commission.Google Scholar
Dwyer, P. (2004), ‘Creeping conditionality in the UK: from welfare rights to conditional entitlements?’, Canadian Journal of Sociology/Cahiers Canadiens de sociologie, 29, 2, 265–87.Google Scholar
Farnsworth, K. (2006), ‘Globalisation, business and British public policy’, Contemporary Politics, 12, 1, 79–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fothergill, S. and Wilson, I. (2007), ‘A million of incapacity benefit: how achievable is Labour's target?’, Cambridge Journal of Economics, 31, 6, 1007–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Freud, D. (2007), Reducing Dependency, Increasing Opportunity: Options for the Future of Welfare to Work: An Independent Report to the Department for Work and Pensions, Leeds: Corporate Document Services.Google Scholar
Ginsburg, N. (1979), Class, Capital and Social Policy, London: Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Golding, P. and Middleton, S. (1982), Images of Welfare, Oxford: Martin Robertson.Google Scholar
Grover, C. (2005), ‘Advertising social security fraud’, Benefits: A Journal of Social Security Research Policy and Practice, 13, 3, 199–205.Google Scholar
Grover, C. (2007), ‘The Freud Report on the Future of Welfare to Work: some critical reflections’, Critical Social Policy, 27, 4, 534–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grover, C. and Piggott, L. (2005), Disabled people, the reserve army of labour and welfare reform', Disability and Society, 20, 7, 707–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grover, C. and Piggott, L. (2007), ‘Social security, employment and incapacity benefit: critical reflections on A New Deal for Welfare’, Disability and Society, 22, 7, 733–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hacker, J. (2004), ‘Privatizing risk without privatizing the welfare state: the hidden politics of social policy retrenchment in the United States’, American Political Science Review, 98, 2, 243–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hay, C. (2005), ‘Too important to leave to the economists? The political economy of welfare retrenchment’, Social Policy and Society, 4, 2, 197–205.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Henderson, M. (2007), Transformation of the Personal Capability Assessment: DWP Technical Working Groups Phase 2 Evaluation Report, London: Department for Work and Pensions.Google Scholar
Kemp, P. (2000), ‘Housing benefit and welfare retrenchment in Britain’, Journal of Social Policy, 29, 2, 236–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lilley, P. and Hartwich, O. (2008), ‘Executive summary’, in Lilley, P. and Hartwich, O. (eds.), Paying for Success: How to Make Contracting Out Work in Employment Services, London: Policy Exchange.Google Scholar
McKeever, G. (2000), ‘Welfare to Work for the (in)capacitated – the reform of incapacity benefit’, Industrial Law Journal, 29, 2, 145–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Messere, T. and Stenger, J. (2007), ‘Employment and support allowance: testing times ahead?’, Benefits: The Journal of Poverty and Social Justice, 15, 3, 329–31.Google Scholar
Millar, J. (2003), ‘From wage replacement to wage supplement: benefits and tax credits’, in Millar, J. (ed.), Understanding Social Security: Issues for Policy and Practice, Bristol: Policy Press.Google Scholar
MIND (2006), Welfare Reform Bill 2006: Commons Second Reading Debate Briefing from MIND, London: MIND.Google Scholar
Mitchell, M. and Woodfield, K. (2008), Qualitative Research Exploring the Pathways to Work Sanction Regime, Research report no. 475, London: DWP.Google Scholar
Palier, B. (2006, originally published 2003), ‘Beyond retrenchment: four problems in current welfare state research and one suggestion on how to overcome them’, in Pierson, C. and Castles, F. (eds.), The Welfare State Reader, 2nd edn, Cambridge: Polity.Google Scholar
Physical Function and Mental Health Technical Working Groups (2006), Transformation of the Personal Capability Assessment, London: Department for Work and Pensions.Google Scholar
Pierson, P. (1994), Dismantling the Welfare State? Reagan, Thatcher, and the Politics of Retrenchment, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pierson, P. (2006, originally published 1996), ‘The new politics of welfare’, in Pierson, C. and Castles, F. (eds.), The Welfare State Reader, 2nd edn, Cambridge: Polity.Google Scholar
Prime Minister's Strategy Unit (2005), ‘Improving the life chances disabled people’, Final report.Google Scholar
Puttick, K. (2007), ‘Empowering the incapacitated worker? The Employment and Support Allowance and Pathways to Work’, Industrial Law Journal, 36, 3, 388–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
RADAR (2006), http://www.radar.org.uk/radarwebsite/3/Mar/03. accessed 28 feb 2008Google Scholar
Raftopoulou, C. (2004) ‘Targeting benefit fraud: discourses of government advertising’, Paper presented to the Political Studies Association, University of Lincoln.Google Scholar
Roulstone, A. (2000), ‘Disability, dependency and the new deal for disabled people’, Disability and Society, 15, 3, 427–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sapey, B. (2000), ‘Disablement in the informational age’, Disability and Society, 15, 4, 619–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Saunders, P. (2008), ‘The experience of contracting out employment services in Australia’, in Lilley, P. and Hartwich, O. (eds.), Paying for Success: How to Make Contracting Out Work in Employment Services, London: Policy Exchange.Google Scholar
Scarbrough, E. (2000), ‘West European welfare states: the old politics of retrenchment’, European Journal of Political Research, 38, 225–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (2006), A New Deal for Welfare: Empowering People to Work, Cm 6730, London: The Stationery Office.Google Scholar
Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (2007), Department for Work and Pensions Commissioning Strategy, Cm 7330, London: The Stationery Office.Google Scholar
Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (2008), DWP Commissioning Strategy, Cm 7330, London: The Stationery Office.Google Scholar
SWAN (2006), http://www.swansheffield.org.uk/3/Mar/03.Google Scholar
Stafford, B. (2003), ‘In search of a welfare-to-work solution: the New Deal for Disabled People’, Benefits: A Journal of Social Security Research Policy and Practice, 11, 3, 181–6.Google Scholar
Weber, H. (2006), ‘Providing access to the internet for people with disabilities: short and medium term research demands’, Theoretical Issues in Ergonomics Science, 7, 5, 491–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Webster, D. (2006), ‘Welfare reform: facing up to the geography of worklessness’, Local Economy, 21, 2. 107–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Work and Pensions Select Committee (2006), Incapacity Benefits and Pathways to Work, Third Report of Session 2005–06, Volume I, HC 616–1, London: The Stationery Office.Google Scholar