Social Security Experience Panels - About Your Benefits and You: visual summary of research findings

Social Security Experience Panels: About Your Benefits and You - Visual Summary of Research Findings

Background

The Scottish Government will become responsible for some of the benefits currently delivered by the Department for Work and Pensions ( DWP). As part of work to prepare for this change, Scottish Government have set up the Social Security Experience Panels.

The Panels will work with people who have recent experience of benefits currently delivered by DWP to help design a new social security system with the people of Scotland. There are more than 2,400 of you.

Introduction

This report summarises the results of ‘About Your Benefits and You’ which was the first research activity undertaken with the Social Security Experience Panels after the recruitment stage called ‘Have Your Say’ finished.

1,144 respondents

About You and Your Benefits aimed to find out:

• About you
• About your experiences
• About your priorities

For more information about how we did the survey please see the full research findings available at http://www.gov.scot/socialsecurity-experiencepanels-aboutyou

About who responded

A wide range of people with benefits experience have participated including groups which are sometimes under represented.

Age and gender

Where people lived

84% live in urban areas

16% in rural areas

People responded to ‘About Your Benefits and You’ from all over Scotland, including from every Local Authority area.

Respondents who had a disability or long term health condition

Four in five said they are disabled or have a long-term health condition.

Of those…

Additional Support Needs

One in five need support getting to and from venues.

One in six require information provided in an alternative format, including large print, easy read, in a format suitable for use with screen reader software, type talk or text message, Braille, or in another language.

Caring responsibilities

Half of respondents have caring responsibilities and half don’t.

49% with
49% without

Time spent caring:

Experience of benefits

Respondents include those who are currently, or have previously, applied, received, challenged or appealed a decision for one of the relevant benefits, including those who have helped someone else.

Many respondents have experience of multiple benefits.

Overall experience of the current benefits system

51% of respondents aged 60 or over

63% of respondents aged under 60

Percentage of respondents rating their experience as 'poor' or 'very poor' by age

63% of respondents in the most deprived areas

51% of respondents in the least deprived areas

Percentage of respondents rating their experience as 'poor' or 'very poor' by how relatively deprived their local area is.

The most deprived areas are SIMD quintile 1, and least deprived are SIMD quintile 5 - please see the full research findings for further details

64% of respondents with disability or long term condition

23% of respondents with no disability or long term condition

Percentage of respondents rating their experience as 'poor' or 'very poor' by disability or long term health condition

Priorities for improvement in the new social security system

Respondents were asked about their top three priorities for the Scottish Government to improve in the new social security system. The majority of respondents (71 per cent) listed ‘advice and support about claiming’ as a priority. More than half listed ‘applying for a benefit’.

Percentage of respondents who rated each area as a priority for improvement

Summary Conclusion

The respondents to ‘About Your Benefits and You’ cover a wide range of people. This includes by gender, age,where they live, as well as having a disability or long term health condition, additional support needs, or caring responsiblities.

Three in five respondents would describe their experience of the exisiting benefits system as ‘poor’ or ‘very poor’.

The priority areas for Scottish Government to improve the in the new social security system were ‘advice and support about claiming’, ‘applying for a benefit’ and ‘having a claim reconsidered or going to appeal’ were consistenly the top three priorities.

How to access background or source data

The data collected for this <statistical bulletin / social research publication>:

☐ are available in more detail through Scottish Neighbourhood Statistics

☐ are available via an alternative route <specify or delete this text>

☒ may be made available on request, subject to consideration of legal and ethical factors. Please contact <email address> for further information.

☐ cannot be made available by Scottish Government for further analysis as Scottish Government is not the data controller.