Disabled people, the reserve army of labour and welfare reform

Abstract

This paper is concerned with explaining why in contemporary society there has been a number of changes to income maintenance and labour market policy for disabled people. Taking a regulation approach theoretical framework it engages with the debate about whether disabled people can be considered to be part of the reserve army of labour. Rejecting previous broad‐brush approaches that seem to suggest that all disabled people are part of the reserve army, it argues that the policy changes have been aimed at reconstructing non‐employed disabled people as an important part of the reserve army in a period when labour markets are becoming tighter. In this sense disabled people are crucial to New Labour’s regulation of neo‐liberal accumulation that is structured through a contradiction between economic stability and increasing participation in paid employment.

Notes

1. We prefer to use the term ‘welfare to work‐welfare’ compared to ‘welfare to work’ because the subsidisation of paid employment through in‐work benefits is so central to getting out‐of‐work benefit claimants into work that many stay in receipt of benefits (‘welfare’) once they are in work (see Grover & Stewart, 2002).

2. While the agreement of the action plan is mandatory, as yet, following it is not. However, this is unlikely to remain the case for long because as the Financial Times (8 September 2004) notes the government is considering forcing people ‘on incapacity benefit to carry out “back to work” plans agreed with their personal advisers. If they do not carry out what was agreed – taking up training or medical treatment to help their job prospects, for example – benefit could be docked’.

3. The difference between disabled people and able‐bodied people with similar circumstances and income levels works out at about £40 per week in favour of disabled people and £57 per week for those deemed to be ‘severely disabled’ (extrapolated from CPAG, 2004).