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The government’s most senior welfare official has been accused of presiding over a “culture of complacency” that led to thousands of unpaid carers inadvertently running up huge benefit debts.
Debbie Abrahams, the chair of the work and pensions select committee, said the Department for Work and Pensions had repeatedly failed to prioritise vulnerable people, was unwilling to learn from its mistakes, and slow to fix errors.
Abrahams said she found it “difficult to have confidence” in the DWP’s permanent secretary, Sir Peter Schofield, who had promised MPs more than six years ago that he would fix critical flaws in the carer’s allowance benefit but had failed to do so.
An award-winning Guardian investigation revealed hundreds of thousands of unpaid carers, most already in poverty, were landed with large bills for overpayments running into thousands of pounds as a result of DWP shortcomings. Several hundred carers are estimated to have also received fraud convictions.
Schofield promised the committee last month he would put right carer’s allowance failures, which have been likened to the Post Office scandal. After outlining how the department would do this he was accused by one MP of giving out “a lot of blancmange”.
In a letter to Schofield published on Wednesday, Abrahams said: “Given the previous assertions by DWP that it would fix carer’s allowance overpayments, I’m sure you can understand my scepticism about your most recent commitments.”
Abrahams cited Guardian revelations about an internal DWP blog post published in December in which a senior civil servant in the department, Neil Couling, blamed carers themselves for incurring the overpayments.
Couling’s view was at odds with a government-commissioned independent review by disability expert Liz Sayce published just days earlier, which found the overpayments were caused by systemic DWP leadership failures, poor benefit design and unlawful internal staff guidance.
“I’m afraid this indicates that a member of your senior team doesn’t accept the findings of the Sayce review (although the government has), which raises questions about the senior team as a whole under your leadership,” Abrahams said.
“Moreover, I am concerned that these attitudes may be more widespread, and indicative of a culture within the department that blames claimants for errors and fails to recognise the needs of vulnerable people.”
Abrahams said that while there had been some “constructive” changes to DWP culture “fundamentally, we believe that the department is failing to put the needs of vulnerable people first, that it is unwilling to learn from its mistakes and that it shows a lack of urgency to bring about change”.
She added: “Until the department changes its culture, it will always struggle to build trust with the people it is meant to serve.”
Abrahams said a “culture of complacency” existed in the DWP: “[It] has shown repeated inadequacy in its response to mistakes and a lack of urgency when it comes to righting wrongs. You told the committee that DWP has ‘a great track record of putting right when we get things wrong’ – I disagree.”
She asks Schofield to write to the committee with evidence of the “action you will be taking in your senior team to address the evident attitudinal issues”, and to set out how he will ensure “the problems are actually addressed this time”.
Interviewed by the Guardian in December, Sayce said the DWP needed a management and cultural overhaul if it was to restore public trust, adding she had been surprised by the department’s “lack of organisational curiosity” when confronted by evidence of carer’s allowance failings.
The DWP has been approached for comment.
