The Mental Health Champion for Northern Ireland welcomes the opportunity to respond to this consultation, which you can read in the attached.
The Mental Health Champion, Professor Siobhan O'Neill, would endorse the goal of reforming the welfare system to better support those who need it, increasing the opportunities for work and enhancing social mobility, however, cannot support the chosen method of cutting support payments to those already deemed in need of assistance, and is opposed to raising the severity threshold to reduce and prevent access.
The Mental Health Champion's main recommendation is that the Department for Work and Pensions do not proceed with the proposals which will have a particularly serious impact on people with a mental illness. They will cause distress and further suffering and will result in increased costs to the economy. The impact will affect the poorest areas of Northern Ireland, more than any of the other UK regions, and will create additional pressure for our health and mental health services, as well as in the justice system.
The mitigation measures proposed are wholly inadequate and rely on a robust system of alternative support which simply does not yet exist. The concessions announced on the 27th June will create a two-tier system and a myriad of unintended negative consequences. It is essential that adequate welfare protections are in place for people who are unable to work due to mental illness. The severity threshold and criteria should not be changed and should be the same rate for both current and future claimants.