ESA Support group in for a ROUGH ride 2017 (Support group to be CRUSHED!)

Sixer

Bogalot wrote: »

That level of support should not be beyond any employer, and would fall within the requirement to provide reasonable adjustments. What they are providing would provide more benefit to the business than cost, it's far more beneficial to have a long term employee with an occasional absence than a high turnover of staff who move on for feeling unvalued.

What your example highlights is a need for better understanding of the true costs of employing disabled people. The average cost of reasonable adjustments is less than £100 per year (I can search out the research on that point if needed), which is far outweighed by the benefits of employee loyalty. What we essentially need is a change in perception, from one of disability to ability, what the person can do rather than what they cannot.

I agree. I should perhaps have made it more clear that her employer is the one with the occupational therapy department and assigns an occupation therapist that they pay for to all employees with ongoing health issues, physical or mental. And, so far as I am aware, whatever the occupational therapist says, basically goes. So that might be an extension to the usual sick pay limits (although not entirely unlimited), a requirement for the employer to give less work to the employee for a specified period, a requirement for the employer to purchase aids for the workplace, etc etc etc.

We live in a country in which employers tell us they'll all relocate to a cheaper country and/or suspend recruitment if we put up the minimum wage by tuppence and government repeats their mantra not only as perfectly acceptable but also as the way it is and should be.

My general point is that we can't put all these obligations onto employed or jobseeking ill or disabled people UNLESS we also put them onto employers and potential employers. Because as it stands at present, some people need an alignment of stars so perfect to get and maintain a job, the odds of it happening are about the same as winning the Euromillions. A few more requirements on employers would get many more disabled people into work than yet more coercion and testing and coaching and fake-independent therapy and all the rest of it. We know how to enable disabled people to work. But we're only interested in mandating to the disabled people themselves, not the employers who could actually make it happen.

surveyqueenuk

Do you really need TWO scaremongering threads on this?

belinda1960

This post is almost one year out of date.

Ames

belinda1960 wrote: »

This post is almost one year out of date.

No, it's about the consultation that was announced last week.

missapril75

TELLIT01 wrote: »

...not be effectively dumped on the scrapheap as was basically the situation with Incapacity Benefit.....

To be fair, that wasn't really a problem with Incapacity Benefit so much as how the government used it as a dumping ground for long term unemployed so they didn't count in the unemployment stats.

There were always safeguards in the previous system and they continued in the IB system when it changed. It was just that DWP staff never had the time (nor training or know-how) to follow the official procedures and the government wasn't bothered because they moment someone was found fit for work, there was no job for them and they were back in the unemployment stats.

It doesn't matter so much now because of all the other cuts plus lots of people have been taken out of the unemployment stats again with the bribes of the other benefits for doing a few hours work instead.

Sixer wrote: »

We live in a country in which employers tell us they'll all relocate to a cheaper country and/or suspend recruitment if we put up the minimum wage by tuppence and government repeats their mantra not only as perfectly acceptable but also as the way it is and should be.

:T

surveyqueenuk wrote: »

Do you really need TWO scaremongering threads on this?

You can never be scared enough by Conservative governments and their attacks on the less well off.

sangie595

belinda1960 wrote: »

This post is almost one year out of date.

Scary. I have lost a whole year then. Where did most of 2017 go, because the last time I looked it was November 2016 - exactly when this thread was started...

Gpod

sangie595 wrote: »

Scary. I have lost a whole year then. Where did most of 2017 go, because the last time I looked it was November 2016 - exactly when this thread was started...

The poster probably doesn't realise this is another further cut on top of a cut which already happened.

belinda1960

As I said the general principles behind this post are almost one year out of date ; e.g see the link below.

ESA Support Group claimants have been under scrutiny since late 2015 - and in some cases I believe such scrutiny is justified:

https://inews.co.uk/essentials/news/politics/government-rule-change-shuts-thousands-disability-benefits/

sangie595

belinda1960 wrote: »

As I said the general principles behind this post are almost one year out of date ; e.g see the link below.

ESA Support Group claimants have been under scrutiny since late 2015 - and in some cases I beleive such scrutiny is justified:

https://inews.co.uk/essentials/news/politics/government-rule-change-shuts-thousands-disability-benefits/

No. As stated previously, there was an announcement about a consultation on supporting people with long term health problems to enter or remain in employment. That is what the OP was posting about. The consultation is not simply about ESA, and is potentially more far ranging.

sangie595

Gpod wrote: »

The poster probably doesn't realise this is another further cut on top of a cut which already happened.

Whilst I do have worries that this will lead to greater cuts in the future, because I wouldn't trust the government at all, this consultation is about an awful lot more than that. I think people need to keep that in mind. And everyone, including the public, will have a chance to submit their opinions on a range of subjects. If we don't, we may miss some real opportunities. If, for example, we can get better support for employers to keep people in employment, that will be fewer people on ESA. That's a "cut" that many would welcome.

I don't have high hopes of the outcome. But we need to ensure that voices are heard, and maybe something will come out of it for some people.