Transfer from IB to ESA – firm date finally given


The government have finally given a firm date for beginning the migration of incapacity benefit claimants onto employment and support allowance.

When ESA was initially introduced the government announced that they would begin transferring existing incapacity benefit claimants in 2009, with the last claimants being moved by 2013.

However, 2009 has passed without a single transfer. Instead, in a report entitled ‘Building Britain’s Recovery: Achieving Full Employment’ released last month, Yvette Cooper announced that:

“We want almost everyone to be on a journey back to work – either looking for work or taking steps to prepare to return to work in the future.

“We will continue to increase support to tackle worklessness, with extra help matched by extra obligations to take up the help that is on offer. This includes:

“Continuing the roll out of the WCA for those where health or disability is a challenge.

“From October 2010, beginning a reassessment of all customers receiving Incapacity Benefit or Income Support on the grounds of disability for ESA.”

So, it will not now be until almost the end of 2010 that the first incapacity benefit claimants will be assessed using the much harsher work capability assessment rather than the personal capability assessment.

No indication was given in the report of how long it will take to assess all incapacity benefit claimants using the new test. The original timetable ran from 2009 to 2013, suggesting that the DWP expected the process to take four years. However, ESA is clearly proving much more time consuming to administer than was originally anticipated. Without investing in more medical staff, it is hard to see how a four year timetable can now be considered realistic.

It may well be that some incapacity benefit claimants will still be with us until well after 2015.

More information

http://www.dwp.gov.uk/policy/welfare-reform/legislation-and-key-documents/building-britains-recovery/

I hope that this transfer runs to the same timetable as IS to CTC migration

Simon, could you tell us which section of those papers this info is in please?

Thanks very much.

Chapter 4, sub-heading "health and disability", para 71.

Migration will start gradually from October 2010, with full national implementation from February 2011, and a planned completion date by the end of March 2014.

see today's rightsnet news ..... Incapacity benefit claimants to be migrated to employment and support allowance from October 2010: Social Security Advisory Committee launches consultation on draft regulations

Does anyone know what the sentence in Chapter 4 paragraph 77 means:

"And we will look, with stakeholders, at the relationship between Access to Work and the Disability Living Allowance to see if there are other ways to improve support for work."

Also, before I read this thread I was about to post a message asking if anyone else has noticed an increase in clients who have been getting IB/SDA/IS for years and have suddenly received an IB50 out of the blue, sometimes the first for many years and in cases where they were previously exempt. Could the DWP be doing this it gather information about clients before the official migration begins?

Yes Murphs we've definitely noticed an increase of the type you describe.

Nicky

It appears the responsibility of sending out IB50's has been transferred from jobcentre plus staff to medical services (Atos) and no check's are being made under reg10 etc.
We are getting loads of client's who are on HRC getting IB50's