ESA

Hi all

I’m looking for opinions or comments on Employment Support Allowance rising from sitting activity.

The activity states “rising for sitting from an upright chair”.  I makes no mention of what type of chair it should be other than it should be upright (as opposed to lying down i suppose)

We have discussed here and we have come to the conclusion that the purpose of the test appears to be “if you are able to get out of a chair without assistance” rather than the type of chair involved.  Therefore if you can use chair arms or other “aid” you would not score points.

This however appears a little unfair as, as one of my colleagues put it, the client is unlikely to go though life avoiding chairs with no arms.

Does anyone else have any comments regarding the type of chair or know any case law on this issue.

Thanks

Matthew

It is probably safe to assume that the removal of the IB “no arms” was a deliberate decision when ESA was introduced, no doubt because most office chairs do have arms.