Main points from the Social Security Advisory Committee's response to the welfare reform proposals

The SSAC have expressed major reservations about both the content and method of the government's welfare reform proposals, to a quite surprising extent. Their overall conclusion recommended a drastic slowing down in the pace of reform, the establishment of a commission to consider proposed benefit reforms, and the creation and use of a base of evidence that the proposals would work before imposing them wholesale.

Specific concerns included:

• Increased conditionality

  The SSAC point to DWP research that sanctions don't work, and a lack of evidence for the Green Paper's assertion that sanctions will contribute to people entering employment. They raise particular concerns about new FTA sanctions, coercive treatment of drug abusers, and sanctioning potentially violent customers.

• Working for benefit

  The SSAC excoriate 'work for benefits', again partly on the basis of the DWP's own research which (leaving aside the remarkably misleading DWP summary) shows that workfare schemes across the world may actually reduce job entry for participants and cut off people with multiple barriers from benefits altogether. They also highlight the negative impact of the proposed ability of advisers to send repeat JSA claimants straight into full time workfare.

• Child poverty

  The SSAC point out that the proposals may lead to lone parents being pushed into 'in-work poverty', and that increased conditionality on partners could lead to relationship breakdowns and more child poverty in turn.

• Carers

  The proposal to move full-time carers onto a modified JSA regime is 'ill-conceived and short-sighted', damaging to social cohesion, and ignores the fact that the 'majority of carers are already working fulltime - caring.'

• Giving disabled people control of their care budgets

  The SSAC are less negative about this proposal, but still raise concerns including the possibility of a postcode lottery, the burden on customers of managing contractual relationships with care providers, and the dangers of exposing vulnerable people to a care marketplace.

• Skills

  The SSRC welcome improved skills guidance and support, and the proposals for 'skills health checks'. They also recommended a review of the 16 hour rule. However, they criticise mandated skills training on the basis that 'it is not possible to command people to learn', and would damage the learning experience for voluntary learners attending alongside mandated ones.

• Operational issues

  The SSAC shares the Social Market Foundation's concerns on Flexible New Deal, but still supports the basic concept of personalised support. Specific concerns include parking, and accountability of suppliers to the DWP rather than to customers. A wider concern is that Jobcentre staff won't be capable of handling the increased workload and change in practices while reducing staff numbers.

• Benefit simplification

  A host of individual criticisms of the green paper's proposals for JSA and IS reform were made, and the SSAC recommended the etablishment of a commission to consider benefit reform properly.

The report can be found here. (pdf)
Guardian story about the review, with reactions from campaigning charities

The Committee is the main UK advisory body on social security matters. It is a statutory body, established in 1980 and now covered by the Social Security Administration Act 1992 and its Northern Ireland equivalent. The Committee gives impartial advice: it is independent of both Government and sectional interests.