Welfare reform: will technology be up to the job?

But the reforms, beginning on Monday, also herald a massive shift in the way citizens interact with government. The buzz phrase is “digital by default” – the idea is to deliver every government service online, all seemlessly joined up.

So as it was explained to me, if you lose your job on Friday, by Monday your tax record will have been updated, your pension and national insurance contribution adjusted, and you’ll be ready to claim benefit online if you need to.

It’s an ambitious project, to say the least, and requires an overhaul of the monolithic IT systems currenty running government services.

Ground to make up

The benefits shake-up, and more specifically the new Universal Credit, is the test ground for this tech revolution. But if Channel 4 News’s experience in Birmingham is anything to go by, the government has a lot of ground to make up before its launch in October.

Birmingham is one of several pilot areas in England and Wales where new Job Seeker’s Allowance claimants are told to apply online – they’re at the sharp end of the “digital by default” agenda.

Staff at Castle Vale Residents Association told us that, of the dozens of JSA applicants they see each week, half are unable to make the online system work – figures borne out by the Birmingham’s Citizens Advice Bureau.

Job centre wait

One claimant, Chris, said: “I got three quarters of the way into processing it on the computer and then couldn’t get any further no matter what I did.
“I phoned them up to say ‘How can I get round it?’ and they said ‘you can’t’, basically. I had to wait 6 days before I could do anything else, then go to the job centre.”

Several weeks of delay before Chris’s claim was paid meant digging into the small amount of money he’d saved before being made redundant.

Ray Goodwin, the association’s chief executive, said: “There’ve been a lot of issues. People trying to make a new application or even log into the Government Gateway (the access point for government services online) are having real problems.

“The PIN number doesn’t work, it doesn’t recognise the email address, or it’s an invalid account. And when they get in it’s so complex to navigate they really struggle. Some of them have never used a computer before, it’s all new to them.”

The Department for Work and Pensions believes moving claimants online will help them find work, and says support is available.

A spokesman said: “Seventy-eight percent of working age benefit claimants say they use the internet already. Anyone without computer skills or access to the internet will still be able to go into their local Jobcentre or call us to get the personal support they need to help them through the process.”

Online shift

There are savings to be made by shifting government services online. And with many of us increasingly shopping, banking and socialising on the internet, there’s a strong argument for engaging with government in the same way. But for people like Chris, snags in the system have a real and instant effect on him and his family.

A government IT overhaul on this scale needs to result in a system that’s simple to use, yet robust and secure. Against that backdrop, the evidence on the ground looks troubling.