APLE Collective’s Themes from Welfare Experiences Workshop – Expert Citizens, ATD Fourth World. Thrive Teesside.
Croft, T; Goldstraw, K; Herrington, T and Parkes, P
APLE Collective have been working with Kings College London on a Welfare Experiences Research Project as a lived experience partner organisation. APLE Collective address poverty with lived experience. The project is one of the first international comparisons of the experiences of individuals receiving public benefits, looking across Norway, Estonia, the United Kingdom, Spain, and Hungary. By ‘experiences’, we mean issues related to concepts such as justice, security, and dignity. The project aims to both change the way people theorise public benefits systems in academic work, and to improve experiences in each of the five countries. Crucially the project is coproduced (we are currently working with claimants across Europe to develop a conceptual framework for ‘experiences’, and will work throughout with people with lived experiences of claiming benefits).
APLE Collective, experienced in lived experience led participatory research hosted three workshops across the UK; at ATD Fourth World in London, Expert Citizens in Stoke on Trent and Thrive in Teesside. Each workshop hosted a diverse range of participants from a variety of backgrounds. [x] people attended the workshops in all, [x] in London, 8 in Stoke on Trent, 6 in Teesside. Participatory methodologies focus on sharing the power within the research process. Co-production is a term used to describe work that is developed collaboratively with communities. The workshops were all participatory and utilised a variety of creative approaches to build conversations around welfare experiences. Creative approaches such as collaging, doodle sheets, flip charts pictures as prompts and word association conversations were utilised. Co-production in its purest form co-designs the research, co-delivers the research project, collaboratively analyses the data and collaboratively produces the research findings. The themes and findings from the creative workshops were collectively analysed with workshop participants and in a separate workshop themes across the three workshops were collectively analysed with representatives from each of the three workshops.
The three workshops identified themes around knowledge gaps (those who work within the system and those trying to access support simply not knowing where and how to get help), the, stigma and labelling experienced from being in receipt of social security payments and the fear and anxiety that the uncertainty of if the payments would come through caused, which has a direct impact on people’s mental health. The social security system no longer being fit for purpose was a key theme from all three workshops. The system errors, navigating the jargon (often this involves learning a whole new language) the waiting for payments and sanctions as well as the ‘digital by default’ approach further exacerbating digital exclusion. The benefits system quite simply isn’t working, most (job centre workers and those applying for benefits) don’t know how to navigate the systems, jargon and process. Alongside this the impact of the uncertainty on claimants mental health is significant, which is exacerbated by the stigma and labelling of people on benefits by the media and more generally within communities.
The workshops also collectively identified solutions, things that could be enacted within policy that could make things better. Lived Experience Led Policy Design as key to reforming the Benefits System was at the core of all the suggestions for policy change. Important practicalities were set out around the need for payment certainty, that the 5 week wait should be removed and sanctions stopped. The support for applications should be improved, Job Centre staff should be offered training in person centred support. Jobcentres should be re-launched as safe welcoming spaces and they should offer offline benefit application options for those who are digitally excluded. It was also noted by workshop participants that work available needs to be possible, for example work needs to be accessible on transport routes. A solution to this was to offer free bus passes to Benefit recipients so that people can travel to access work.
APLE Collective have fed these themes into the Kings College London research team, contributing to the international comparative research. APLE Collective will continue to work with Kings College London, feeding in our knowledge and guidance in addressing poverty with lived experience using participatory methodologies. A benefits system that doesn’t work impacts the whole of society, those in receipt of social security support and those not. The social safety net, created at the birth of the welfare state is no a longer safe space, lived experience led reform needs to make positive changes swiftly.
