The Scotland Act 2016 devolves new social security powers to the Scottish Parliament. Although its new powers are limited, accounting for only 15% of expenditure on non-pension benefits, the Scottish Government has given an ambitious set of commitments for a devolved system. “Respect for the dignity of individuals” is at the heart of this vision. Social security is recognised in international human rights law as being crucial to the protection of human dignity. While human dignity is a core concept in human rights law, it is a poorly defined one and respect has no legal definition. The Equality and Human Rights Commission contracted Ulster University to look at how social security systems in other countries encompass dignity and respect. This report of their research proposes a legally-grounded definition of dignity and respect and discusses possible means of embedding dignity and respect as core principles underpinning social security in Scotland.

The protection of human dignity and poverty reduction are core functions of social security. Changes to working age benefits since 2010 have reduced claimants’ incomes, putting more people at risk of poverty and arguably reducing the ability of the system to support a dignified standard of living. Human rights law has been used to challenge key policies and pressure has grown for a different approach in Scotland and Northern Ireland, resulting in Northern Ireland’s mitigations programme and the devolution of new powers to Scotland. The Scottish Government has given a commitment to develop a devolved system on the basis of a distinctive set of principles, notably respect for the dignity of claimants, and plans to reinstate statutory targets for the reduction of child poverty. The Northern Ireland Executive has a legal duty to publish a strategy for tackling poverty and social exclusion. There are also proposals for enhanced protection of social and economic rights in both regions. These objectives could be undermined by benefit cuts. Limiting the child element of universal credit to two children per household is projected to increase child poverty and merits particularly close attention. Recent judicial reviews show senior judges are increasingly prepared to hold governments accountable for the impact of social security regulations on children’s rights. It is therefore likely that this change will be challenged in the courts. However, the devolved regions need not wait for legal action. The two-child limit works against Scottish policy on child poverty, while Northern Ireland’s larger average family size and higher rates of socio-economic disadvantage mean it will be among the most affected UK regions: parity in social security provision does not mean parity of living standards. Drawing on research for the Equality and Human Rights Commission, the seminar will examine how social security system can protect dignity. It will then assess the impact of recent reforms in the UK, with a focus on child-related benefits. Finally, it will suggest that dignity and child poverty can help devolved administrations identify priority areas where limited resources can be targeted to improve social security at the regional level.

This paper discusses the implications for the right to a life in dignity (article 1 CFR) of the “activation turn” in the welfare state. The concept of “dignity,” lacking consistent definition, has been described as a better basis for “judicial manipulation” than “principled decision making.” Nonetheless, it is possible to discern a standard of living deemed compatible from the various references in international human rights agreements to a “decent” or “adequate” standard of living, freedom from inhuman or degrading treatment and the right to a private and family life, as well as to dignity itself. The “activation turn” (while the focus here is on the UK, the phenomenon is international ) is characterised by the requirement that social security claimants be available for paid employment and undertake compulsory activities intended to result in finding employment. Failure to comply may result in sanctions, the maximum applicable being loss of benefit for three years. To date, the most significant challenge to conditionality in the UK resulted in the rejection of a claim that the right to freedom from forced labour was violated. This paper argues that while activation of claimants is compatible with the human rights instruments, the UK’s sanctions regime may be vulnerable to challenge. The main focus is on whether a regime claimed to be designed to result in “complete destitution” can be compatible with human dignity. While the socio-economic rights instruments will be discussed, given their non-integration into UK law the key focus is on article 3, article 8 and P1-1 ECHR and their relationship to three elements of the protection of human dignity as identified by McCrudden: prohibition of inhuman and degrading treatment, individual autonomy and satisfaction of essential needs. In each case it is concluded that there is potential for violation of the right to dignity, either in individual cases or in the general operation of the policy.

In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, the British welfare state came under systematic attack within a broader agenda of deregulation and austerity. As part of ETHOS Work Package 5 on justice as lived experience, this report explores what people understand to be the relation between means-tested working-age benefits and social justice. Its focus is on the impact of welfare retrenchment on three subordinated social categories: disabled persons, foreign nationals and young mothers. The research is based on documentary legal and policy analysis, secondary quantitative data, a literature review on political and media discourses of deservingness, as well as one interview and three focus groups with benefit claimants, activists and caseworkers. Each encounter lasted between 30 minutes and two hours. Most interviewees were recontacted after participating in previous ETHOS studies. All interviews were recorded, transcribed and, where necessary, translated into English. Findings reveal an influential media and political discourse holding that insufficient motivation to work and other individual factors are to blame for poverty. Under the rule of Conservative-led Governments, this rhetoric provided a cover of legitimacy to coercive measures purporting to make employment more attractive than claiming benefits and instill work-related behaviour. While the principle of ‘less eligibility’ continues to enjoy broad support, upholding it in a context of increasing in-work poverty has meant plunging families into destitution, riddling them with debt, subjecting their daily lives to close scrutiny and making the conditions and process for claiming benefits increasingly onerous. By effect or by design, these impacts have exacerbated the subordination of disabled persons, foreign nationals and young mothers. Most disabled claimants have faced reduced allowances on the highly contested assumption that they would be able to participate in paid employment. Non-UK jobseekers have been imposed stringent conditions for retaining ‘worker’ and ‘resident’ status, including minimum earnings thresholds, compelling evidence of job prospects, language skills and social connections. Due to the scarcity of affordable childcare, single parents of young children, the vast majority of whom are women, have born the brunt of work-related conditionality. Interviews suggest that some of these impacts are more likely than others to be perceived as flagrant injustices. While migrants have proven willing to accept a degree of less favourable treatment, sometimes by comparing the inadequate support received in their countries of origin, gendered ideals of work and childcare have contributed to stronger opposition toward austerity measures targeting young mothers. Perhaps the most uniformly negative reactions were aroused by the procedural failures of an increasingly complex and automatised system modelled after a vanishing ‘standard’ employment relationship, whose foremost intention is to ensure that claimants do not receive any more than the amount to which they are entitled. While sowing division and arousing interpersonal frustrations, benefit cutbacks have also sparked transformative forms of mobilisation. Non-discrimination provisions have provided a legal basis on which to challenge austerity, and specialist charities have been joined by statutory bodies in their support for claimants. International human rights bodies have played an active role in legitimating these cases by condemning in unusually strong terms the negative effects of benefit restrictions. Unions and job centre staff have allied with claimants to contest the Government’s insistence on making greater use of sanctions. Driven by an ideal of needs-based social assistance that furthers the interests of precariously employed workers, these alliances may become fertile ground for a renewed politics of social security.

This paper was produced in support of advice offered to the Secretary of State in accordance with the Committee's remit (s 170(i) (a) of the SSA 1992 refers). The paper was prepared by independent researchers at the Department of Social Policy and Social Work, University of Oxford (Dr Julia Griggs and Ms Fran Bennett), working to a commission by SSAC. The paper draws on a discussion of relevant issues with SSAC stakeholders at the Committee’s annual Stakeholder Seminar in November 2008.