At the
Conservative Party Conference this week, Iain Duncan Smith, the Secretary of
State for Work and Pensions,
pledged
to introduce pre-paid benefit ‘smart cards’ for social security claimants
affected by ‘drug or alcohol addiction, even problem debt, or more’. The
immediate activity will focus on extending and evaluating a relatively
small-scale scheme currently operating in North Tyneside. While the emphasis in
Duncan Smith’s speech was on parents and family, the scope of the current
activity is more broadly around people perceived to have difficulty budgeting.
Several
charities, usually in partnership with firms from the financial sector, are
developing specialised accounts products to accompany the introduction of
Universal Credit. These often involve ‘jam jar’ facilities that ring-fence pots
of money for specific bills like rent and many involve voluntarily giving up a
degree of financial autonomy, such as agreeing to a waiting period before being
able to withdraw large sums of money. These specialised accounts are, or will
be, entirely voluntary to take up and are fee-charging. A voluntary benefit
card scheme could be seen as analogous to this and, in this sense, as offering
what some individuals may want.
However, while
the idea of a wider roll-out of benefit smart cards may be at least
superficially attractive, the proposal raises a number of concerns.
Anyone with an
interest in drug and alcohol misuse, treatment and recovery knows that one of
the biggest barriers an individual can face is that of stigma. It can have a
detrimental impact socially, economically and is often not just restricted to
the individual themselves, but often extends to their family. There is
persuasive evidence from places where similar cards have been introduced that
presenting a recognised card, particularly at a local shop, possibly in front
of friends and neighbours, increases stigma. The Government’s 2010
Drug
Strategy places recovery capital and reintegration top and centre:
introducing a measure that would instantly make someone stand out as being
affected by addiction, problem debt ‘or even more’ seems unlikely to yield
dividends in that regard.
Again looking
at areas where similar schemes operate, the evidence for their efficacy is
unclear. Studies looking at
income
management schemes in Australia, for example, have highlighted both the
unclear evidence and the problem of attribution – that is, that in some cases
it’s unclear whether a significant positive change has occurred, and that where
a change has, it is difficult to attribute it to one cause among a suite of
other interventions aimed at the same cohort. Work around similar schemes in
the United States (e.g. the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, often
referred to as food stamps) have highlighted concerns around stigma and the
frequent inability to purchase necessary but unapproved items.
In addition to
concerns of increased stigmatisation and unclear evidence of efficacy, any
proposal to roll benefit cards out more widely would need to address a number
of questions. These include how to avoid unintended consequences. Any measure
that would serve as a disincentive to access treatment for drug and/or alcohol
use, or to disclose use or misuse as a barrier to employment at Jobcentre Plus
would be highly unwelcome – and we already know that for sensitive subjects
such as substance use and homelessness the disincentives (whether actual or
perceived) are already so substantial that comparatively few people do
disclose, or at least not immediately.
While this
measure has so far been talked about as
a means of protecting children and families from parents or carers who
routinely make suboptimal decisions, there is the question of who would decide
whether or not an individual would be eligible for (or potentially compelled to
take part in) the scheme, and whether Jobcentre Plus staff (or staff in, say, a
local authority) are equipped and trained to come to this decision, which could
approach or at least rely on a clinical diagnosis in the case of substance misuse.
Separate criteria would presumably be needed for problem debt, and the ‘more’
referred to in Duncan Smith’s speech.
While clearly some people (whether in
receipt of welfare benefits or not) do struggle to budget and measures such as
the
Local
Support Services Framework may turn out to be helpful in supporting people
to meet the challenges of Universal Credit in particular, there seems to be a risk
with benefit cards of moving from support to paternalism, against the direction
of travel of reforms by this and previous governments which have tended to
prioritise increasing autonomy and responsibility while focusing support on
those most in need. Moving away from groups with particular needs to the wider
claimant cohort, there is
little
evidence to suggest such measures are necessary.
Any government
implementing this sort of scheme also has practical issues to consider. Such a
scheme may come with a substantial cost, financially and in other resources, if rolled out nationwide. The implementation of the
Azure card for asylum seekers was beset by problems on introduction and, some
campaigners
and stakeholders claim, the failings of the scheme are actually inherent to
it rather than related solely to problems of implementation. Some of this may
carry across to a wider benefit card scheme. For example, if a scheme is
limited to a restricted pool of retailers, it may end up penalising those in
remote or dispersed communities or some people with mobility problems
. This is before one considers the potential for fraud and abuse.
Given that a genuinely voluntary smart card scheme could be seen as being broadly comparable to
the commercial or social enterprise products being developed, what could
government consider as an alternative? Positive steps to address the deep
disadvantages that lie at the heart of poverty and social exclusion – a
commitment given by the government in the
Social
Justice Strategy – might be a constructive way of doing this. For
example, investing in health education, family support, support for young
carers and so on might all bring rewards, as would improving the support people
receive to help them into employment, thereby providing an exit strategy for
people with histories of drug and alcohol use.
