Neville Harris

Dispute resolution in additional and special educational needs: Local authority perspectives

The UK Government is keen to encourage the use of mediation, rather than court or tribunal, as the best means of resolving disputes between citizen and state on the grounds that legal proceedings are costly, lengthy and stressful. The policy of proportionate dispute resolution appears to be particularly applicable to the field of special educational needs (SEN), where both mediation and tribunal are available as dispute resolution mechanisms. However, evidence suggests that very little use has been made of mediation in either England or Scotland. In order to understand this phenomenon, this paper begins with investigating the dominant policy frameworks in SEN (England) and additional support needs (ASN; Scotland). Subsequently, the attitudes of English and Scottish local authority (LA) officers are explored. It is argued that both countries now have an eclectic mix of policy frameworks in play, including the traditional models of bureaucracy and professionalism, and the more recent models of managerialism, consumerism and legality. In Scotland, professionalism and bureaucracy continue to dominate, and this is associated with more restricted access to and less use of all forms of dispute resolution, in particular the tribunal.

Welfare Reform and the Shifting Threshold of Support for Disabled People

Among the highly significant changes to the benefits system made by the Welfare Reform Act 2012 is provision for a new disability benefit, personal independence payment (PIP). PIP is replacing disability living allowance (DLA), received by three million people, as the principal form of state financial support towards disability‐related care and mobility costs for those of working age. The legislation, including regulations prescribing a new disability assessment framework, plays its traditional role in this field of rationing access to benefit and directing front‐line policy implementation. This article examines how, in the context of the Coalition governments welfare reforms, PIP shifts the threshold of entitlement for people with disabilities and it assesses PIPs potential impact on equality and the right to independent living, to whose realisation disability benefits may be expected to contribute significantly. It also considers the impact on disabled people of other relevant reforms, including the controversial ‘bedroom tax’.

Demagnetization of social security and healthcare for migrants to the UK

Over the past two decades, starting with the social security ‘habitual residence’ test, UK governments have maintained a consistent policy of restricting the access of migrants to welfare benefits and public health care. It has represented a response to increased levels of inward migration flow, including anticipated increases arising from enlarged European Union (EU) membership, and the supposed ‘magnetic pull’ of UK welfare and health care systems to migrants. Adjustment of the benefit rules affecting EU migrants, which has at times come very close to crossing lines of legality under EU law, has lately featured prominently in the UKs proposals to the EU over the terms of its Union membership. The article focuses on the policy changes and legal developments, including case law, across the areas of social assistance benefits, state retirement pensions and health care, and assesses their impact, seeking to analyse the changing position of residence as an issue in entitlement and its implications.

Complexity in the law and administration of social security: is it really a problem?

This article analyses the problem of complexity in relation to the law and structure of the modern welfare (social security) system and its impact on administration, which has represented a significant driver for simplification reforms in the UK. The article outlines diverse conceptual and methodological approaches to the definition of complexity. It argues that despite the difficulties which complexity presents, attention should also be paid to the dangers of simplification and that a degree of complexity in relation to social security provision may be necessary if rights to welfare are to be adequately safeguarded.

Board and Lodging Payments for Young People

Abstract The Government proposes to make major changes to the rules governing payments to meet board and lodgings charges when the new income support scheme is introduced in 1988. The plan is for accommodation-costs of those in board and lodgings to be met through housing benefit rather than via income support (supplementary benefit at present). Living costs would be met through income support instead of through the allowance for personal expenses and meals included in board and lodgings payments at present.1 The Government acknowledges that some will lose benefit as a result of the changes but intends to offer some transitional protection.1a

Complexity, Law and Social Security in the United Kingdom

The UK has a very complex system of interrelated, rule-based social security benefits and tax credits which are highly conditional and targeted. The conditions of entitlement and provision for the assessment of need have been bound up in an intricate legal framework. Rules have enabled governments to adapt and develop schemes to meet social needs while controlling the delivery of welfare from the centre, but the system, its components and its legal framework have evolved into a state of such complexity that some of the core aims of welfare and its management in the modern state are being undermined. Focussing on Great Britain,1 this article explains the causes of this complexity and discusses its impact. It also assesses the practicability of significant simplification, for which there are increasingly urgent calls.

Liability under education law in the UK — How much further can it go?

Providers of education in the United Kingdom are becoming increasingly likely to be sued for the consequences of failures in relation to educational provision. The university system was the first to recognise the potential risks of litigation, but now local education authorities and further education colleges are busy discussing ways of minimising them. The trend of litigating, which has seen a substantial increase in education cases before the courts in England and Wales over the past five to six years, has begun to have a significant impact upon the education system.1 In this paper I will first examine the principal reasons behind this trend. I will then discuss three key areas of new development: negligent education; contractual disputes between students and universities; and the incorporation of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (the ECHR). Finally, I present some conclusions about how much further might legal liability extend and discuss the implications. I believe there may be lessons for many other countries from the UK experience.