Baldrick's Welfare Benefit Beef

[baldrick]

The following are Welfare Benefit cases opened under the legal help scheme. It is proposed these will be removed from scope and no help could be offered on such cases if the reforms go ahead.

The argument is that other agencies will offer the advice or that clients can represent themselves to tribunal. Some could but many could not. It is very unclear what advice agencies are proposed to fill the gap after the demise of SWL under the proposals. Nothing is specified in the reform.

The cases are real but are examples of types of cases rather than lots of similar experiences.

This will hopefully show the truth of such help and that many disadvantaged people will be affected by these reforms and that the cost will be greater both to those concerned and to the public purse.

These are everyday cases from an ordinary part of Manchester. They are not unique and will be very widely experienced cases across the UK.

Mr X Attended a Employment Support Allowance (ESA) medical

He suffer from schizophrenia and chronic anxiety
He cannot manage his own affairs and someone has power of attorney (POA) for him.
He is engaged with mental health services.
He is on the highest levels of Disability Living Allowance (DLA), Care Component.

He was assessed as having 0 points at the ESA medical and fit for work.

There were concerns with this and very serious concerns about the way the medical was conducted.

He also had two substantial overpayment of other benefit

The POA was not coping at all, and the client could not do anything on these matters himself. It was seriously affecting his health.

They approached us for help

With our help:

1. Appeals and complaints were lodged on the Work Capability Assessment (WCA)
2. Appeals were lodged on the over payments

The ESA appeal was overturned on a medical review of the medical that had been undertaken.

The overpayment appeal was successful and the client found not to be at fault in the recover-ability of the overpayment.

The second overpayment was reconsidered successfully on the basis of the other overpayment appeal.

Would this have occurred post reform?

[baldrick]

Mr Y

Has a none dependent son that suffers from chronic mental health problems and cannot manage himself nor his own affairs.

The son had the offer of a new address, but the move involved a technical decision on a small amount of housing benefit that had been claimed.

The local authority (LA) decided against the Mr Y. He appealed this decision and won with no help from professional representation. The LA then sought and won leave to appeal to upper tribunal on grounds of clarification of the particular regulation rather than anything else.

The Upper Tribunal Judge advised the appellant (Mr Y) to seek professional representation from bodies that operate under SWL legal aidThe Judge wanted detailed responses in a short period on several key legal points.

This case could potentially change the interpretation of this regulation, which could adversely effect or actually help similar clients on any ruling.

Could Mr Y have done this himself?

In the future Mr Y won't have the option, if the reforms go through, even if Upper Tribunals Judges see the value in such representation and ask for it to be provided. There just will not be anyone there to do so.

Similarly, this case would be very unlikely to be able to be opened as a housing case under the new proposals.

[baldrick]

]Mr C had been found by the police trying to jump from a motorway bridge after a series of bad events including homelessness and others details that cannot be given.

Consequently he failed to attend a ESA medical being in no fit state to deal with this and all benefits had been suspended.

He l approached us for help desperate.

We helped by

Appealed the decision to stop ESA
Made a fresh claim.

The DWP treated the new claim as a CoC and reinstated the ESA claim pending a new medical but also put the appeal for not attending the medical to a tribunal

In the time it took to go to appeal the client then failed the ESA medical. Which we also appealed. The appeals about not attending the medical and the failed medical were both successful with our help.

Several weeks later after the appeal hearing He was sent for another ESA medical which they also 'failed.' This was also appealed with our help. We then wrote to the tribunal for the written statement of reasons of the previous successful hearing and sent this to the DWP as evidence in the appeal. This was reconsidered by the DWP successfully.

Client health has stabilised.

Could this case have been managed successfully without professional representation? Would it have even started?
They may not have the option of this help if the reforms go through.

[baldrick]

Mrs C was 64 when her DLA of high rate mobility and middle rate care was up for renewal. The DWP awarded at renewal only High Rate Mobility.

She appealed herself and attended the tribunal with no medical evidence. The Tribunal removed her high rate mobility and left her with nothing. She was 65 by the time of the hearing so could not reapply.

She came to us for help.

We helped by

Appealing to the upper tribunal on a point of law.

The upper tribunal agreed and sent the case for rehearing to a new tribunal after setting aside the previous appeal decision.

The client attended the new hearing with a properly presented appeal and was successful in a reinstated award of high rate mobility that continued after she was 65.

This client followed the advice of the reform and presented her own case to the tribunal but found herself in a finacially worse position in what was later found to be a defective decision.

However with legal advice this client was able to challenge a defective decision and via a professionally presented case and a new tribunal that they were were entitled to high rate mobility beyond the age of 65.

If the reform goes ahead this disabled client would in a much worse position by following the advice of the reform not just now but for the rest of their life.

[nickd]

Thanks for feeding these stories in to Mylegal, Baldrick. These are excellent examples of the positive values of how Legal Help assists people with real life situations. The most important people to gain out of the good work which has been detailed above are the clients, these are the kind of outcomes which do a great deal to change peoples lives and make dramatic differences. Please don't just read these accounts, think about whether you know of how Legal Aid has helped someone?

You may be a provider, you may be a client, if you are able to highlight good accounts such as those provided by Baldrick, this is the place we need to hear them. The material you provide will be used to good effect in challenging current reforms to removal Legal Aid for people who need it most. Make Mylegal an opportunity to provide the material we need.