Recommendation 78

The UK Government’s Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work, however, told us that he had reservations about the Scottish Government’s ‘potential changes to adult PIP [Personal Independence Payment]’192 and how he felt the potential changes ‘would replicate the limitations and failings of DLA [Disability Living Allowance]’.193 In particular, the Minister raised questions about how the process would work for obtaining the correct supportive evidence to help Social Security Scotland make decisions on the levels of support for disabled claimants. The Minister noted how the Scottish Government wants to ‘have a greater reliance on medical evidence’194 and highlighted that this evidence could be provided by GPs. However, he then raised the issues that ‘not every single claimant regularly visits their GP’195 and that GPs themselves would not want to be ‘part of the benefit process’.196 This would mean that without the supportive evidence from a medical practitioner, greater emphasis would be put on the application form which would in effect be ‘recreating the old Disability Living Allowance benefit, where claimants had a 16% chance of getting a higher rate of support, yet under PIP [Personal Independence Payment] it is 33%.’197 This point was further highlighted in the letter the Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work and the Minister for Welfare Delivery sent us after their evidence session where they explained that the highest level of support was only achieved by 6% of DLA claimants whilst 37% of PIP claimants did receive that support.198 Overall the Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work worried that the ‘Scottish Government are at serious risk of cutting support to disabled people in Scotland.’199