Call for Evidence for the Independent Review of Adult Disability Payment

The first set of questions are about take-up of Adult Disability Payment which is described in Section 1 of the call for evidence paper.

Background

Take-up is a measure of how many people who are eligible for a benefit actually get the benefit.

There is a lack of evidence on disability benefits take-up in Scotland. Estimating take-up rates of Adult Disability Payment is challenging. Whilst some national statistics and surveys ask whether a person has a long-term health condition or disability, that does not necessarily mean that person would or would not be entitled to Adult Disability Payment.

Current strategies for improving take-up across all Scottish benefits focus on raising awareness of benefits and supporting people to access them.

There is currently no benefit-specific take-up strategy for Adult Disability Payment, but this is something that the Scottish Government may consider in the future. The Scottish Government plans to increase engagement with seldom-heard communities in future strategies. Existing strategies for improving take-up across all Scottish Government benefits include:

• a range of marketing and engagement activities to increase awareness and support people to apply
• the use of research to identify who the Scottish Government wants to reach and ensure that it uses the right methods to reach those people
• continued funding of the Independent Advocacy Service 
• use of Social Security Scotland’s Local Delivery service
• the opening of Social Security Scotland’s Dundee office to the public.