Social contact - work focused interviews etc

Hi All,

Just wondering if anyone has come across a tribunal stating that although they accept that a client has limited ability to socially engage that they believe that attending work focused interviews and work related activities at the JCP does not count as social contact?

I am just trying to figure our a definition of social contact.

Thanks

There are cases on this., To quote from WCAinfo (https://wcainfo.net/activities/coping-with-social-engagement-lcw):

Commentary: Merely attending a medical examination or tribunal is not of itself evidence of an ability to engage in ‘social’ contact. See [2013] UKUT 446 (AAC) and [2014] UKUT 22 (AAC). However, the ability can still be assessed in any context (including during a medical examination) and tribunals must assess the claimant’s capacity to engage, the distress caused, and the impact of distress, on the ability to engage [2013] UKUT 552 (AAC).

In [2014] UKUT 352 (AAC) a three judge panel considers that ‘coping’ and ‘engagement’ require assessments of ‘reciprocity, give and take, initiation and response’ in communication. The panel further holds that a tribunal can use examples of social contact in any context to form its view of what limitations exist which are likely to be effective barriers to the claimant working.

Is this from a Schedule 3 perspective or a Reg 35 perspective?

As a basic answer to your question - I wouldn’t agree with a statement from a Tribunal that work related activities/appointments at the Jobcentre do not involve ‘social contact’.

From a Schedule 3 perspective a finding that activities at the Jobcentre do not constitute social engagement could only ever be helpful to your client’s case (although it could be a finding that you would want to be challenging with the Schedule 2 descriptors)

From a Reg 35 perspective I don’t think it matters whether a claimant’s interaction with others in the course of WRA counts as ‘social contact’ or not. Whatever definition you use for them the question for the Tribunal is whether those interactions might pose a significant risk to the claimants health. It may be that the Tribunal is trying to reconcile their finding that there would be no risk with their finding that the claimant met one of the coping with social engagement descriptors under Schedule 2. As above I don’t think I agree with their statement as worded. But it may be that it is a clumsily worded and what the Tribunal was trying to get at is that under the regulations people who are accepted to have very significant problems with social engagement (for example somebody who is completely unable to deal with anybody unfamiliar to them) are by default still treated as being able to manage work related activity.

Thanks both, that was our thoughts here too.  Apprecviated