'Early warning' report about sanctions

CPAG in Scotland has set up an ‘Early Warning System’ to identify problems reported by front-line workers nin the operation of benefits.  Their first policy briefing is online, giving examples of problems with sanctions.  They give examples of a series of  mistaken decisions:  for example, a sanction for not reporting for the Work Programme while in police custody and benefits were already stopped, and a sanction for turning up for the time on the letter instead of the time the office thought it had sent out.  Part of this, too, is that people who are suffering sanctions then have to go to food banks – a link recently denied by Neil Couling, of the DWP, at a meeting of the Holyrood Welfare Reform Committee.

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