Chapter Sixteen - New Blood

Thursday 16th November

The IT clinic Toby had set up, with the old computers from Wave Housing, was one of his proudest achievements.  Since Universal Credit had been unleashed on this unsuspecting town, it was also one of the Project's best-used services.  There were other places where people without access to their own computers could get online, make and manage their claims, but the combination of tech tutoring and benefits advice offered here made it unique and invaluable.

Taking on the clinic project forced Toby to become the team's Universal Credit specialist.  For a part-timer, as he now was, that was a tall order.  Considering that it had been pitched as something which simplified the benefits system, Universal Credit had some oddly complicated features.  This morning, Toby was sharing his thought on a few of these with Ashley, their new worker.  He had three people already settled at their screens, logged in and coping, so now seemed a quiet time to swap notes.

Ashley had come in for her first day at the beginning of the week.  She opted to work mornings every day for the time being, enabling her to make her cycle journeys in daylight.  Prior to her arrival, the team had planned a quiet induction week, allowing her plenty of time to settle before starting to meet clients or formal training in the areas where she lacked knowledge or confidence.  After a welcome 'second breakfast' with cakes from the café, she spent most of her first half day with Deepak, getting a tour of their offices and the foodbank projects, an introduction to how they kept records and monitoring information and a look at a few case files.  Allocating these tasks to a relative newcomer was Hilary's plan, both to make Deepak feel valued and more central to the team and to avoid giving Ashley the impression that she, Hilary, was in any way 'the boss'.

After Tuesday morning team meeting, which Toby had chaired, Ashley sat in on interviews with both Martin and Hilary.  On Wednesday, having spent the morning working solo through a training pack on Housing Benefit and equivalent restrictions on UC housing element, she was offered the opportunity to go on the road with Father Cornelius's outreach foodbank, and a lift home from Hilary and Tom when they had finished.  She had set off in the van with the priest and Terry Walker, expecting a quiet afternoon.

According to Terry's report on their return, it was 'a bloody good job' she had been there, as she had hung on the Universal Credit helpline for two guests, chasing up their delayed claims while Father Cornelius and his local helpers took care of the food parcels, tea and biscuits.

She might look as if she'd had an interview with a vampire since they'd first met her, without the black clothing and Goth make-up that was evidently her preferred apparel, and her style might turn heads in the café, but Toby thought she was a good catch for the Project and would fit right in.

'You've seen what a problem the six-week minimum run-in is,' he said to her, as he explained the workings of the clinic and how it tried to make the digital element of UC manageable.  'There's a chance we'll see that cut, even if they don't tackle all the rest of the glitches.'

'I thought there was a debate in Parliament about it a couple of weeks ago,' Ashley said, referencing the fact that Universal Credit had found its way onto the order papers again that afternoon.  'How come it's up again?'

'Because its been getting a lot of negative press and, at last, our elected representatives finally understand it's not all it's cracked up to be,' Toby explained.  'Much as I like Corbyn's gang, it's a pity a few more of them didn't look at the small print when the Coalition first proposed it.  They were afraid of being seen as soft on so-called benefit scroungers, weren't they?' 

'That's what I thought, until I read this.'  Ashley searched on the screen in front of her until she found the item she was looking for.  'What do you think of that?'

Toby, half expecting a piece of hard-left shock journalism, instead skimmed an academic article concluding that, rather than hardened public attitudes driving politicians to cut benefits, unsympathetic political discourse, from Thatcher's day, through New Labour and up to the present day, had set out to change opinion, and had succeeded.

'Maybe this is the start of the tide turning,' Ashley said.  'A lot of people seem to think the seven waiting days will go too.'

'That's where most of the budgeting problems start,' Toby agreed.  'It wasn't much fun missing out on a week's worth of JSA or ESA, but seven unpaid days at the start of UC means no money for the kids and no money for the rent either.  They have to live on something, so they borrow - either from a friend, a loan shark or the DWP themselves.'

'An SBA?'

'That's right.  Short-term benefit advances,' Toby said.  'Aren't they a headache?  A UC advance payment looks like a good plan, but it's a loan with a seriously steep payback rate.'

'I know people who borrow from payday lenders, even though they have to pay more back in total, because it's less per month,' Ashley told him.  'It's easy to tell someone that's stupid, just like it's easy to point out how much extra you pay at Brighthouse, but until you're the one trying to manage on it...'

Toby guessed Ashley herself was possibly in that position.  They had agreed with the Management Committee that she could have an advance on her wages.

'Then, at the end of six weeks, they only get a month's money,' he continued.  'And only then if they're lucky and aren't benefit capped or otherwise short-changed.  Of course, they've then got someone to pay back, another month to get through and a minimum of six week's rent arrears.  Two more, either in old arrears or through being short on that first payment, and it's mandatory possession.  So yeah, cutting the wait and scrapping the waiting days would be a start, but UC would still be a pretty poor Social Security system to leave to your generation.'

It was strange how, suddenly, Toby felt as if he was one of the old guys at the Project.  Maybe it was meeting Shane the day before that had done it; the lad had been less than half his age.

'You're not kidding,' said Ashley.  'I can't believe what's happening with the severe disability premium!'

Toby agreed.  He had an advice-worker's affection for the good old SDP, which he described to those of his clients who qualified for it as the 'off-side rule' of benefits.  Not that easy to spot and harder still to explain and, when it did apply, it could be a game-changer.  Not a benefit in its own right but an add-on - a premium - to the calculation of other means-tested benefits, if three qualifying conditions applied.  The claimant needed to receive a particular disability benefit; Attendance Allowance, PIP for daily living or DLA at the middle or higher rate for care,  In addition they had to be treated as living alone, which wasn't quite the same as actually living alone, since children under eighteen and others on those same rates of disability benefit weren't counted, nor people registered blind.  Disabled couples could, therefore, qualify for a 'double SDP', almost the Holy Grail of advice work. 

The final condition was that nobody must receive Carer's Allowance for looking after you. Worth about sixty-two pounds a week to a single claimant, twice that to a couple and, occasionally, even more where a qualifying pensioner triggered entitlement to Housing Benefit, he still got a kick out of tracking down SDPs..  There was even a clever dodge you could do with underlying entitlement to Carer's Allowance where a disabled couple, looking after each other, could both get carer premiums too.  Setting up that scenario was the nearest equivalent in advice work to scoring at hat-trick, away at Anfield, in a cup tie, in front of the Kop, that Toby could think of. 

But his SDP-scoring days were over, because there was no severe disability premium or equivalent in Universal Credit.  He was still pleased enough when his clients got their PIP awards - whether lucky first time or after an appeal - but it galled him that, in most cases, he couldn't go on to boost their income still more.

'We ran a take-up campaign all through the spring, rounding up as many unpaid SDPs as we could,' Toby told his new colleague.  'Most of them were on contributory ESA and PIP, as you'd expect, but it was surprising how many people on means-tested benefits were missing out, and through official error too.'

'I know.  We had a bloke in who was owed over four thousand quid.  We got it for him, too!'

Toby had found one double that, but he didn't want to turn this into a competition.  Ashley was new, she was still getting used to them all.  He was being professional and respectful, even to Hilary.

'Well done,' he said.

Janet, one of the regular clinic customers, called him over for help.  She was a cleaner, claiming UC to top up her intermittent wages for irregular hours.  Ashley, he noticed approvingly, waited to be invited before joining them.

'I can't see if that job application is showing up in my actions,' Janet said.  'I had this problem once before with something, and they sanctioned me.'

'How long ago was that?' asked Toby.

'Two months.'

'That's recent enough to ask for a reconsideration, if we can find good cause for you not asking before,' said Ashley.

'It doesn’t matter,’ Janet replied.  ‘They're paying me again - for now.'

‘It does matter!' urged the newcomer.  'It's about making sure they don't give you a worse one next time.'

'Ash is right, Jan.  If you want an appointment, just to be on the safe side...?'

Toby checked with his new colleague that she would be up for that. 

'I'll see what Vaughan's got in the room diary,' said Ashley.  She looked almost too keen as she rushed to the door.

Before Toby had finished tidying up Janet's Universal Jobsmatch account, Ashley was back with a choice of appointment times for her first client.

'There's another thing with the severe disability premium,' she said to Toby, once Janet was settled back into her job-seeking and two additional customers were logged on.  'Have you seen that catch with the carer element?'

Toby wasn't sure what she meant.  He had seen the rules around the carer element in UC as one of the few changes for the better, extending the right to be treated as a carer - and therefore assessed more generously - to large numbers of working carers overlooked by the so-called legacy benefits it replaced.

'You don't meet the SDP conditions if you've got a carer who gets UC with a carer element,' Ashley said.

'Since when?'  Toby didn't remember that change.

'Since all the time I've been doing this - a year and a half, anyway.'

'Are you sure?'

'Deffo.  I'll show you.'  She called up the Disability Rights UK website.  'It's not a big deal yet but when they start moving people across from Income Support...'

She was right.  The regulation had changed in April 2016.

‘All those carers in work or with an underlying entitlement who claim UC will get carer elements included in the calculation,’ she said.  ‘A legacy benefit carer premium doesn’t mess up the other person’s SDP but a UC carer’s element does.’

‘So when the carer changes over to UC, the person they’re looking after is going to lose their SDP,’ said Toby.  ‘That’s evil!’ 

‘It’s sixty-two pounds a week’s worth of evil,’ Ashley agreed.

‘It’ll be more for some.  I’ve done claims for pensioners who only get Housing Benefit because the SDP gives them Guarantee Pension Credit.’

‘How come?’

‘If they’re over the capital limit for Housing Benefit.’

‘God, yeah!’  Ashley thought about that for a few seconds.  ‘They could lose hundreds a week!’

‘And because UC is the benefit to rule them all now, the carer can’t decide to claim something else.’  Toby tried to think of a fix. 

‘I suppose one way out is to care less,’ suggested Ashley.

‘Do fewer hours?’

‘Under thirty-five a week.  No carer premium then.’

‘But, potentially, full conditionality.  And what if the carer needs thirty-five hours of looking after?’

‘Share it with someone.  Or under-estimate what you do.’

‘We can’t advise people to do that,’ Toby said, quite firmly.

‘I know.  It doesn’t mean they won’t.’ 

‘We’ll talk about this with the others in the morning,’ Toby said.  He looked at the door as another potential customer came in.  ‘What bothers me isn’t just how this will affect disabled people, it’s that they and their carers don’t know and probably won’t find out until they’ve been overpaid.  Can I help you, mate?’

The new arrival, a man in later middle age, looked towards them warily.

‘I’ve been told to come here for help with something called Universal Credit,’ he said.  ‘The bloke on the desk told me to come on through.  I’m crap with computers.’

‘Don’t worry, buddy.  We’ll get you sorted out,’ he said.  Toby settled him at a PC and switched it on.  He hoped his new customer wasn’t a full-time carer.