Response to the Adult Disability Payment (ADP) Call for Evidence

Our key findings are: -

• Delivering ADP based on the values of dignity, fairness and respect is having a transformative impact. However, stigma remains a powerful disincentive to claim.
• Navigating, understanding and applying criteria to specific circumstances can be especially challenging for people with invisible conditions and those who do not define themselves as a disabled person. This is a barrier in the way of ADP reaching everyone who needs it.
• The process of claiming ADP and challenging a decision can be protracted and overwhelming. For many, it involves repeating sensitive information multiple times, which can itself be traumatic.
• Having access to a network, whether family and friends or professional services including advice agencies, is positively correlated with seldom heard groups progressing applications.
• Our evidence on re-determinations and appeals is revealing the extent to which decision making can be inconsistent and requires improvement.

Our key recommendations:-

• Continued development and roll out of text message conveyed progress updates and an online progress tracker linked to a person’s online account.
• Clear and accessible communication to claimants at the outset that they may receive informal contact to clarify gaps in evidence will improve trust and efficiency. Advance notification of this contact via the appropriate communication channel (typically text message) will allow claimants to prepare, access support, and re-arrange the contact as required.
• Relationships between Social Security Scotland and the Third Sector could be further developed to establish consistent links between Local Area Delivery services and frontline advice and representation services. The creation of alternative routes to access Local Area Delivery services would optimise this potential.
• Recording assessment method (telephone, video, in person) combined with award type could help identify possible discrepancies in outcomes.
• Auditing of individual decisions and representative samples of decisions is necessary.
• The development of escalation routes to support advice provision while also building operational issue responsiveness and safeguarding capacity.
• To minimise the risk of claimants “falling through the cracks” a “safety net” provision for cases in which the functional test has not been satisfied should be developed, modelled on that used to determine work capability for means tested benefit.
• In the medium to longer term, anchoring ADP to its purpose to support people to break-down barriers to promote full participation in society and flourishing, requires a re-design of the criteria to better focus on how this can be achieved.