Fairness in Welfare Benefits

Booking are now closed for this event.

All seminars will be recorded for post event delegate access.

Six online training seminars to help you get fair treatment for your clients, by effectively challenging unfair or discriminatory practices, especially those that reduce people’s benefits below subsistence levels. The course also looks at improvements to make the benefits system fairer, and adoption of the s.1 Equalities Act socio-economic duty , both statutory (in Scotland and Wales) and voluntary (by English local authorities).

Who this training is for:
• Advisers and lawyers working with those on benefits
• Civil society campaigners, community groups and policy people working to change Government benefit practices which are unfair or, ultimately, unlawful
• Researchers looking at benefits practices and the way these impact on claimant’s lives

Outcomes for delegates (you will learn to…)
• Challenge benefits sanctions
• Negotiate typical problems in benefits appeals processes
• Understand how the socio-economic duty is being implemented, and its effects.
• Apply for waivers on benefits overpayments
• Share and discuss ways the welfare benefits system can be improved

Tickets

£75 full price  – public bodies, those in private practice, fully qualified solicitors or barristers (NB this is slightly different to our usual pricing structure)
£50 discount price – advisers, trainees, charity workers that are not fully qualified solicitors or barristers, researchers at university.
If you have very limited or no training budget, we are happy offer free places. Please contact [email protected] to enquire.

Monday 27 February 2023

9.30-11.00: Challenging benefits sanctions: A practical guide
Our speakers will take you through the process of challenging sanctions, from mandatory reconsiderations to tribunals, and on to legal challenge through judicial review, offering practical tips and insight. 

• Jagna Olejniczak, Public Law Project
• Martin Williams, Child Poverty Action Group

14.00-15.30: Personal Independence Payment (PIP), Employment Support Allowance (ESA) and Universal Credit Appeals.
Our speakers will discuss health assessments, mandatory reconsiderations and appeals and look at typical problems such as dealing with a non-responding DWP, and at discriminatory practices, and how these can and should be challenged.

• Chair: Saba Shakil, Public Law Project
• Sue Davis, Harrow Law Centre
• Shirley Hayes, National Deaf Children’s Society
• Jamie Thunder, Z2K (Zacchaeus 2000 Trust)

Tuesday 28 February 2023

9.30-11.00: Implementation of the s.1 Equalities Act socio-economic duty (Scotland & Wales) & the English local authorities that have adopted voluntarily.
Speakers will look at the implementation of the s.1 Equalities Act socio-economic duty in Scotland, Wales and at implementation by voluntary adopting local authorities in England.  How has this been achieved in cooperation with civil society, and what are the practical implications for people, i.e. what are the benefits for those living with  the Socio-Economic Duty and those who don’t?

• Chair: Stephanie Harrison KC, Garden Court Chambers
• Rick Burgess, Greater Manchester Coalition of Disabled People
• Helen Flynn, Just Fair
• Sonia Khan, London Borough of Hackney
  Another speaker TBC

We are waiting on invite responses. If you have experience in the area we’d love to hear from you! [email protected]

14.00-15.30: Challenging recovery of benefits overpayments
The DWP has discretion to waive benefit overpayments, but their waiver rate has historically been ‘vanishingly low’, though recent statistics show waivers granted are slightly on the increase. This session will explain the DWP’s current policy on waiving recovery of benefit overpayments and the steps that individuals can take to challenge this recovery. This will include a discussion on preparing effective waiver requests and the availability of judicial review as a remedy if a waiver request is refused. Speakers will pay special attention to overpayments caused by official error and the recent High Court case on this topic of R(K) v Secretary of State for Work and Pensions.

• Kevin Higgins, Advice Northern Ireland
• Emma Vincent Miller, Public Law Project
• Tracey Herrington, Thrive Teeside

Thursday 2 March 2023

9.00-10.00: Lapsed appeals
The speakers will talk to recent caselaw relevant on getting the DWP to settle, and look at the expected implementation of new guidance in this area. And, what to do if the DWP are not doing anything!

• Hannah Moxsom, Public Law Project
• Diane Sechi, Simmons & Simmons
• Elizabeth Whittaker, Simmons & Simmons

14.00-15.00: What do we want a government to do to make the Welfare benefits system fairer?
What does a well evidenced benefits systems actually (or could actually) look like?
How could the system be improved with increased transparency, especially in the areas of Automated Decision-making (ADM) and how could the DWP, and Government more widely, use data already in existence to improve the system and reduce discrimination?

• Chair: Jessica Jones, Matrix Chambers
• Rosalind Burgin, Garden Court Chambers
• Ciara Fitzpatrick, anti-poverty campaigner from Northern Ireland
• Jagna Olejniczak & Saba Shakil, Public Law Project

If you have very limited or no training budget, we can consider offering free places. Please contact [email protected] to enquire.

Please note that all bookings are manually processed by a member of our Events team. Please allow 2-3 business days to receive confirmation.

All joining instructions are sent the working day before the start of the course.

For any ticket queries, please email PLP Events.