As advanced in a previous article, the government introduced
a self-isolation payment scheme to
ensure that customers are able to self-isolate without having to worry about
money. Nonetheless, two-thirds of those living in England and Wales did not
receive this.
According to figures provided by local councils, which
administered the settlements, between
the 28th of September 2020 and the 15th of January, there
were 212,000 applications for the payment in England. 74,400 of these were
successful. In Wales, 15,000 people applied between the 12th of
November and the 15th of January. There, 5400 applicants received
the money. Between the 1st of October and 15th of
January, approximately 6.4 million of those residing in England were asked to
self-isolate by contact tracers. This means that only 1.5% of them receive the
settlement.
How come so many people did not benefit from this facility?
When councils were asked for a reason, they advanced that roughly a third of
the applicants were rejected because of problems with their applications. For
instance, they did not provide enough evidence, they applied too late or they
did not engage with the test-and-trace scheme. Others were not eligible
for the payment altogether. Moreover, Alex Collinson, a research officer at the
Trade Union Congress,
advanced that the scheme was underfunded in the first place.
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