Page 107 - JUSTICE and AJC Report - Reforming Benefits Decision-Making

BSL if required; and (iii) should be available in the most prevalent
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languages of those applying.
Digital by default

4.19 UC is the first ‘digital by default’ Government service. This means that
claimants are expected to make their applications online, manage any
subsequent changes online and all relevant contact between the DWP and the
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claimant will be done through the internet.

4.20 In 2019, the Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights,
Philip Alston, wrote of “the grave risk of stumbling, zombie-like, into a
digital welfare dystopia”. The “relative deprivation and powerlessness” 307
306
of many welfare recipients meant that they were likely to be “severely
disadvantaged” by issues such as digital illiteracy and lack of access to
308
reliable equipment. Alston was critical of “digital by default” policies –
such as Universal Credit – which he argued create “major disparities among
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different groups”.
4.21 The Universal Full Service Survey found that only half of UC claimants
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were able to complete their claim online without help. A third of people who
completed the process online found it difficult or very difficult. The greatest
difficulties people said they faced were gathering the necessary information

304 The Home Office rights and entitlement leaflet for the police station is available in easy read and
over fifty languages, so this is entirely feasible: Home Office, ‘Notice of rights and entitlements: a
person's rights in police detention’ (2019).
305 G. Hitchcock, ‘Universal credit to be first service 'digital by default'’ (The Guardian, 3 February
2012); DWP, Digital Strategy (2012).
306 P. Alston, ‘Report of the Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights’ (11 October
2019), para 77.
307 Ibid, para 6.
308 Ibid, para 45. In the UK, 11.9 million people (22% of the population) do not have essential digital
skills for day-to-day life, para 47.
309 Ibid, para 45.
310 Government Social Research and the DWP, Universal Credit Full Service Survey (see n. 8 above).

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