Not according to the figures http://www.hi-mag.com/health-insurance/product-area/income-protection/article382799.ece
· 7% of people are deemed unfit for work
· 17% are in work related activity
· 39% fit work
As you would expect these figures not all they would appear to be
Do look at the DWP’s site for the break down (http://research.dwp.gov.uk/asd/workingage/esa_wca/esa_wca_26072011.pdf )
For instance if you go to table 4 you will find that when the appeals have been taken into consideration the figures are
Ø Unfit for work. Range 7-8% average 7%
Ø Work related activity Range 17-23% average 21%
Ø Fit for work Range 31-36% average 34%
Ø Closed before complete Range 34-41% average 36%
Ø Not settled Range 0-8% average 1%
And last but not least
Appeals: average 37% (range19-41%) of people appealing (please note that his is appeals heard not lodged) of which claimant upheld range 30-41% average 39%.
If you take out the data from the months where not all claims have been settled this evens out to a range 41-43% average 42% people appealing and in favour of claimant, range 39-41% average 40%.
However the tables are a little hazy on the specifics with1% of people with their cases not having been settle average 1% (range of 0-8%) which given that some of the initial assessments are in Oct 2009 (figures quoted 1%) is disgustingly poor and I hope that this is due to the nature of how they describe assessment/ case settled and not because people are still waiting to hear if they are going to get any money to live on.
The problem with this data is that it’s an ongoing collection and all the figures are logged as of when the claim was started and it’s impossible to tell what constitutes a claim being settled.
For instance if someone appeals then their claim isn’t settled. If they win their appeal and then go into work related activity they have their claim settled, but then if they go for review and it’s decided whether they are fit for work as part of the work related activities and are deemed fit for work and appeal are they then back into being unsettled again and is that logged as the same claim and therefore from the same start date?
If that is the case then people who have been in work related activity could change between being settled and unsettled several times before they are actually leave ESA for work.
Interestingly they state
Table 1 presents initial assessment results by breaking down cohorts of ESA benefit claims. This is presented for claim starts to November 2010. Beyond this date the results are not reliable as many claims are still within the process.
That’s a year! I’m horrified. What are people living on if they are not receiving sickness benefit?
Well people who were already receiving benefit continue to receive the lower rate of job seekers while this claim is sorted but I wonder if any new claimants who have been working have been left without any money coming in during this peroid or whether they were given preference for settling their cases to provide them with an income as quickly as possible. It is certainly worrying to think that as a new claimant you could be waiting up to a year to receive any money.
I would definitely be interested to know if the people implementing this system consider that this is a reasonable length of time for a claim to still be unsettled and precisely how much longer do they expect it to take for these poor people?
The figures for Nov 2010
8% not completed assessment some 4200 people
From the same table you can see that from Oct 2009 at least 1% of claims are not completed assessment and if you add all the claims for those months that’s
18100 people with claims not settled for at least a year
Something newspapers and the media seem to be missing every time they quote figures about ESA. That they persist in quoting figures that are not explained in order to make people believe far too many people are claiming without cause is creating fear and stigma for people who least deserve it.
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