Page 17 - Reforming Benefits Decision-Making

1.3 At a time when significant changes to the benefits system were implemented
and arguably advice and support was most crucial, access to legal assistance
was severely attenuated by the Legal Aid Sentencing and Punishment of
Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO). LASPO removed all welfare benefits advice
and assistance from the scope of legal aid (with some very limited
exceptions), resulting in a significant reduction in the number of people
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granted public funding in welfare benefits cases.
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1.4 The issues with the benefits system are not new and have been examined in a
variety of reports and inquiries which have made recommendations for
improvement. These include the inquiries of the Work and Pensions Select
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Committee, the Occasional Papers of the Social Security Advisory
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Committee (SSAC), the Independent Reviews of the Work Capability

9 (i) Legal help for appeals to the Upper Tribunal and Higher Courts, when the case involves a point of
law and (ii) civil representation for appeals relating to council tax reduction schemes (which replaced
council tax benefit under the Welfare Reform Act 2012). Legal aid remains available for judicial
review and Equality Act 2010 claims – this includes those relating to a benefits decision. There was a
£20.4 million reduction in spending for legal help and civil representation for welfare benefits between
2010-11 and 2016–17. H. Brooke, ‘An Analysis of the Evidence’ in Bach Commission on Access to
Justice: Appendix 5 (2017).
10 Figures show that there were 135,751 legal help matter starts and 51 civil representation granted
certificates in welfare benefits cases in 2008-09. These figures have plummeted to 443 legal help
matter starts and nine civil representation granted certificates in 2017-18. The decline is at its steepest
around the time LASPO was introduced in April 2013. There were 82,554 legal help matter starts in
2012-13, falling to 163 in 2013-14. This figure meanders up and down over the subsequent four years,
but not by very much. Ministry of Justice, 'Social Security Benefits Appeals: Question for Ministry of
Justice UIN 207160' (10 January 2019)
11 Of particular relevance to this report: Work and Pensions Committee, PIP and ESA assessments,
Seventh Report of Session 2017-2019 (HC 829, 2018); Work and Pensions Committee, PIP and ESA
assessments: claimant experiences, Fourth Report of Session 2017-19 (2018); Work and Pensions
Committee, Benefits Sanctions, Nineteenth Report of Session 2017-2019 (2018); Work and Pensions
Committee, Welfare safety net, Twenty-eighth Report of Session 2017-2019 (2019); Work and
Pensions Committee, Universal Credit: the wait for a first payment, Third Report of Session 2019-21,
(HC 204, October 2020); and Work and Pensions Committee, DWP's response to the coronavirus
outbreak, First Report of Session 2019-21 (June 2020).
12 Of particular relevance to this report: SSAC, Decision making and mandatory reconsideration:
Occasional Paper 18 (2016); SSAC, The effectiveness of the claimant commitment in Universal Credit:
Occasional Paper 21 (2019); SSAC, A review of the Covid-19 temporary measures: Occasional Paper
24 (November 2020).

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