Adult disability benefits are non-means tested payments available to people with ill health or a disability to compensate for some of the additional costs of living. These payments are not dependent on work status and are different to the out of work benefits available through Universal Credit for those who cannot work due to their health or disability (usually referred to as incapacity benefits).
Analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS)[i] and the Resolution Foundation[ii] have documented the increase in new awards for Personal Independence Payment (PIP) in England and Wales in the post-pandemic period. In Scotland, a new benefit has been rolled out to replace PIP: Adult Disability Payment (ADP). The rollout started in 2022, and now all new adult claims for adult disability benefits are channelled through ADP. Alongside this, the existing PIP caseload for Scottish claimants is gradually being transferred.
The IFS have more recently looked at the trend for new awards for ADP in Scotland, since 2022[iii] and echoing previous work by the Scottish Fiscal Commission (SFC)[iv], have showed a higher rate of growth in awards in Scotland compared to England and Wales in the 2022/23 and 2023/24 financial years. As eligibility criteria are broadly the same, the increase was nonetheless expected due to the level of publicity surrounding the launch of ADP and changes intended to make ADP applications more straightforward.
Whilst the IFS and the SFC are primarily interested from the perspective of fiscal sustainability (i.e. how much it will cost the Scottish Government) there is also interest from a health inequalities perspective. Payments to cover additional costs of ill health and disabilities can be a protective factor against economic disadvantage in which case higher numbers of awards could signal that more people are claiming their entitlements. Conversely, a rise in new claims could be due to rises in the prevalence of heath conditions, or a worsening of economic circumstances meaning that more people are seeking out additional sources of income.
In this briefing we replicate IFS analysis with data from the two years prior to the pandemic (2018-19 and 2019-20) and two years post pandemic (2022-23 and 2023-24). We also look briefly at the latest data for April – July 2024 where there are indications of ADP claimants falling in Scotland relative to England and Wales.
Authors
Emma Congreve is Principal Knowledge Exchange Fellow and Deputy Director at the Fraser of Allander Institute. Emma's work at the Institute is focussed on policy analysis, covering a wide range of areas of social and economic policy. Emma is an experienced economist and has previously held roles as a senior economist at the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and as an economic adviser within the Scottish Government.