How ‘healthy’ is the benefits system?

Several research projects have explored the experiences of those within the benefit system to try to understand how we can make it better from the inside out.

A study from Professor Ben Baumberg Geiger has demonstrated the worryingly high rates of mental distress among those claiming benefits. When polled as part of the research, 43 per cent of those who received benefits reported ‘thoughts that you would be better off dead or of hurting yourself in some way’ in the previous fortnight.

Professor Baumberg Geiger also authored a report last year on the future of the Work Capability Assessment (WCA), which found that while the current model of assessment is deeply flawed, there are risks associated with scrapping it entirely. Ending the WCA might actually make things worse by making the assessment for Personal Independent Payments (PIP) even higher-stakes and further extending conditionality.

This suggests firstly that any reform to the benefits system must be evidence-based and secondly that reform to individual parts of the system are unlikely to work and that a broader shift is needed in welfare as a whole.

Dr Gabriel Lawson and Dr Annie Irvine have also recently written about the flaws in the current Work Capability Assessment (WCA) and the need for a more holistic assessment of capacity for work, which moves beyond simplistic ideas of ‘sick’ vs ‘well’ and addresses the multiplicity of factors which can prevent people engaging with work.

This ESRC-funded analysis used data collected as part of the Welfare Conditionality project, which carried out qualitative interviews with a diverse sample of welfare recipients over a period of time. The reports from the secondary data analysis outline how current models of assessment fundamentally fail to reflect the actual lived experience of claimants, posing questions surrounding the outcomes that the system claims to prioritise, and what it actually produces.

Flexible working as pathway to inclusive workplaces

Centre researcher Catherine Hale has recently completed her report with Kim Hoque from King’s Business School and Professor Baumberg Geiger on the need to expand remote working, worktime flexibility and part-time working (Flex Plus working) to ensure disabled people can actually access employment which works for them.

The report focused on those with fluctuating and energy limiting conditions and the insights highlighted the need for a welfare system that provides genuine security to people who are unable to obtain employment, particularly for those who are excluded from work owing to inaccessible workplaces and employer policy. It proposes 39 recommendations (39 steps) to businesses and government on how to make Flex Plus work a reality that is embedded in workplaces and not just an add-on in a selection of businesses.

Data insights into how those with mental health problems interact with welfare

From the IoPPN at King’s, innovative research led by Dr Sharon Stevelink with co-authors from the CSMH has linked electronic health records from South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust with data from Department of Work and Pensions. The research includes records of nearly 400,000 people who have accessed mental health services and claimed welfare between 2005 and 2020.

It found that one in four people who accessed mental health services had received PIP, with higher levels seen among those most likely in need, as indicated by a severe mental illness diagnosis. Another analysis on the same data showed that one in four mental health service users had received UC at some point. Four in five of these had been allocated to the ‘searching for work’ conditionality regime in at least one time period.

Conditionality within welfare systems is about linking welfare rights to 'responsible' behaviour, so in order to access welfare benefits and services individuals must agree to meet particular obligations or patterns of behaviour, in this case they need to show that they are searching for work.

Another analysis which looked at a people who received UC for the first time in 2016 identified six different journeys over time through the UC system that varied in terms of the levels of UC conditionality applied and how long groups were searching for work. Surprisingly, people stuck searching for work longest weren’t necessarily those with the most severe mental health problems, suggesting other barriers like local job opportunities, caring responsibilities or skills gaps were the real barriers.

As policymakers consider changes to the benefits system, this research shows we need better support that recognises individual circumstances, rather than forcing people into long job searches that may harm both their recovery and job prospects.

Listening to Lived Experience and acting upon it

Finally, the Centre’s Lived Experience Advisory Board (LEAB) has issued a heartfelt plea for compassion and change within social security, calling for thorough reform, but reform which places the needs of claimants’ at the heart of assessment and support. In the LEAB’s view, the benefits system should provide a safety net offering dignity and support, but instead it has become a barrier, leaving too many people living in poverty, stress, and fear.

Taking all of this evidence together provides a picture of a system which is not fit for purpose and riddled with unevidenced incentives. A system which is too reliant on conditionality and sanctions – which in themselves can impact claimants’ mental health - and which largely deals with people experiencing high levels of mental distress.

Steps to reform

The evidence indicates that the system needs to dial down conditionality, encouraging engagement rather than mandating compliance, and reforming the system while listening to the voices of those with lived experience.

Any reform needs to focus on building trust and research shows that many claimants have little trust in the Department of Work and Pensions and fear engaging with the system as it stands. Recently announced restrictions to PIP will not help with this lack of confidence, and instead may well result in claimants retreating further away from work.

Reform is necessary, but that reform must be evidence-based and clear on what it wishes to achieve. With this in mind, researchers and lived experience experts from across King’s will be submitting evidence to the ongoing Green Paper consultation (closing June 2025), in order to shape government policy going forward.

At a deeper level, public services (including the welfare system but also services like the asylum system and education) need to ensure that they have service users’ interests at heart and ‘do no harm’. Last year the ESRC Centre for Society and Mental Health ran two ‘policy lab’ workshops in collaboration with the Centre for Mental Health, seeking to build mental health into public service reform through the application of user-focused principles.

The report from these labs will be issued later this year, with the hope they will inform the reform of public services to ensure they more effectively meet the needs of diverse individuals and communities and promote mental health.