“They must have something to live on” was one reaction to my story about benefit rules which state that the health of people who have their payment cuts will usually suffer. “They just need to reorganise their spending priorities.”
The relevant rule is buried in guidance to officials who decide on such benefit sanctions, telling them that vulnerable people are those whose health would suffer more than the average person’s.
While some readers were horrified, others were disbelieving. That people are left with nothing to live on is hard for some to accept. On a different article on a GP website I saw a doctor commenting to the effect that people were only poor if they couldn’t afford to buy cigarettes.
There is plenty of propaganda swirling around the issue, and many people would agree with the GP. But that is why the DWP rules are important. Here the government makes it clear itself. Sanctions leave people without the money for food, clothing, accommodation or housing, the DWP guidance confirms.
There were several other important welfare stories last week, not least the revelation that half of all sanctions decisions are overturned on appeal – if they are challenged.
If even a small proportion of the cases not challenged are also wrong decisions that is potentially hundreds of thousands more. All people who have their money taken away and have nothing left to live on.
The other story was about the DWP leaflets which featured made up people with made up stories of the way sanctions have benefited them, or their positive experiences at Job Centres.
This feeds into a perception that the Government doesn’t have evidence its policies help people back into work. The conviction that sanctions work to help job seekers find employment is not evidence-based, but ideological, critics say. Imaginary people, grateful for sanctions, fit into that narrative.
Some people want to see evidence that sanctions are harming people. It is certainly there – in reports from Westminster and Holyrood committees on the impact of welfare reform, for example. I hear regularly from agencies such as Citizen’s Advice Scotland, the Child Poverty Action Group and disability charities, with real stories of real people for whom sanctions have caused misery.
But the DWP's own actions help make the case. Their own guidelines. Appeal statistics. The fabricated stories. And the fact that this Thursday, yet again, the department is expected to block publication of the number of people who have died while on out-of-work benefits - despite being ordered to publish the information.
The irony. A job seeker with such a recalcitrant attitude, or a fictional job-seeking diary, would certainly be sanctioned.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel