Of his critics, he will say: “It is right that we protect these most vulnerable people in our society”.
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This is in stark opposition to a UK Government who have removed support from disabled people at every turn, scrapping the Independent Living Fund, cutting the disabled Access To Work Scheme, closing Remploy factories, and introducing the bedroom tax.
He also denied that he had a target of taking a million disabled people off benefits, arguing it was sensible to ask whether individuals could do some work rather than writing them off altogether.
“I want to place people at the heart of the system, and make the system work around them, rather than the other way round”.
The Work and Pensions Secretary will declare that work is “good for your health” – and can help people recover from illness.
“It is a system that decides that you are either capable of work or you are not: two absolutes equating to one perverse incentive – a person has to be incapable of all work or available for all work”. Those who receive the payment have their fitness to work tested under the Work Capability Assessment.
He said: “We need a system focused on what a claimant can do and the support they’ll need – and not just on what they can’t do.”
Mr Duncan Smith will say: “When ESA was introduced in 2008 under the last Labour government they said it was intended to be a shortterm benefit, with the vast majority being helped to return to work”.
A spokesperson for mental health charity Mind said a “one-size-fits-all” approach to sick benefits won’t help people suffering long-term depression.
Mr Duncan Smith’s previous welfare reforms have been criticised for penalising the most vulnerable.
She said: “One of the problems has been that the work programme has totally failed people on ESA”. If he truly wanted to see people supported into work, his first act should be to commission the independent review called for twice by the House of Commons Work and Pensions Committee.
Ministers want to halve the gap in the employment rate between disabled and non-disabled people.
“Let me be clear: a decent society should always recognise that some people are unable to work as a result of physical or mental ill health – or both”.
Yet there is one more area which we haven’t focused on enough – how work is also good for your health’.
“Surely, this needs to change”.
He added: “Whether it’s through Fit for Work, Universal Credit or an improved assessment, the more that people feel there’s someone with them, helping them get over the hurdles back to work and to stay in work, the more likely their lives will change for the better”.
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Around 2.5million people of working age are now on sickness benefits, many of them for years.
