Yahoo Finance Thousands refused help to self-isolate by cash-strapped English councils
More than half of people applying for financial support to self-isolate are being rejected in some coronavirus hotspots in England as councils report running out of cash and loopholes leave low-income families ineligible.
Thousands of people are being excluded from accessing the £500 one-off payments due to gaps in the policy announced by Boris Johnson two months ago, according to council leaders and charities.
People who are told to self-isolate by the NHS test and trace app are not eligible for the payments. Neither are the parents of children who have been told to self-isolate. Small business owners, sole traders and self-employed workers also appear to be excluded.
Councils also say the government “vastly underestimated” demand for the payments, which were introduced in September to support those who cannot afford to take time off work to self-isolate, and has provided insufficient funding.
The scheme is critical to the government’s coronavirus strategy because the disease will continue to spread unless infectious people and their close contacts go into quarantine for between 10 and 14 days.
Figures shared with the Guardian show that nearly 7,000 people who have applied for the money in Yorkshire and Humber have been turned down – 60% of the total – while in Oldham half of people are being rejected.
Leaders say the high number of rejections is mainly due to strict eligibility rules, rather than people applying for the fund fraudulently. Alistair Cromwell, the acting chief executive of Citizens Advice, said gaps in the safety net meant people were facing an “impossible choice” between obeying the law to self-isolate or paying the bills.
Several councils told the Guardian the government is refusing to increase their allowance of “discretionary” funds, which were made available for people on low incomes who did not receive universal credit or other benefits.
This means that in practice only people who receive benefits will be eligible for the scheme in some areas, creating what local leaders in Yorkshire and Humber believe is a “postcode lottery”.
Judith Blake, the leader of Leeds city council, said: “It’s clear that demand for this type of support is currently out stripping supply, and with many councils already in financial crisis, we need the government to urgently provide more funding to address this.”
Oldham council, which has had one of England’s highest infection rates for months, has paid out £210,000 to 421 people – almost double its allocation from the government.
Arooj Shah, the deputy leader of Oldham council, urged the government to expand the scheme to include parents whose children have to self-isolate. She said: “As a society we cannot make people choose between paying their bills and putting food on the table and following government guidance.”
Eamonn O’Brien, the Labour leader of Bury council, which also has one of England’s highest case rates, said it had used up the allocation provided by the government and was having to transfer money from a hardship fund to cover the cost. He described it as “short-sighted penny-pinching from government”.
Susan Hinchcliffe, the leader of Bradford council, said it had paid out £420,000 in support payments by 25 November, far more than its government allocation of £311,500. It had paid out a further £184,000 in discretionary payments, £500 short of its allocation, she said, adding that the government had refused to increase the “meagre” funding.
Alice Wiseman, the director of public health at Gateshead council, said the £500 payment “doesn’t meet the needs of real humans” and that its eligibility should be widened. “Behavioural science says if we want people to do what we ask them to do we need to ensure that they are not financially penalised as a result. I don’t think we’re there yet,” she said.
A Department of Health and Social Care spokesman said: “We have given local authorities an initial £50m to cover the costs of the scheme which includes money for discretionary payments to people told to self-isolate who fall outside the scope of the main scheme but who may still face hardship as a result of having to self-isolate. This is in addition to other support that people may be able to access when they are required to self-isolate, such as statutory sick pay. ”
