Will DWP digital welfare ‘lead to more inequality’?
A report commissioned by the Department for Work and Pensions warns that digitalisation could lead to exclusion and greater disparity in the UK.
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Conducted by the think tank RAND, the analysis looked at costs and savings, customer experience, wider societal effects, and ramifications of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Making a distinction between ‘digitalisation’ and ‘digitisation’, the report states that the primary societal impact of the former — defined as ongoing changes and updates to existing digital systems — has the potential to create greater inequality in Britain.
‘If the transition to a digital channel is not managed correctly, the change can lead to significant errors and can contribute to decreased equity among users through contributing to debt, mental and physical health issues and social exclusion,’ said the report, citing evidence from ‘one study focused on the digitalisation of primary health care’ which concluded that older people often became less engaged. The DWP has identified work to improve inclusivity as a priority to avoid people falling through the net.
When looking at savings, the report stated that it is ‘currently difficult to gather accurate estimates of the costs involved and savings generated’. It also suggests that ‘gains may be offset by increased demand spurred by digitalisation’, and wanted that technical difficulties and unforeseen expenses regularly plague public sector technology upgrades.
‘Despite interest in the use of advanced digital technologies in service delivery, digitalisation is occurring across a narrow set of public services and is often limited to simple transactional tasks rather than the delivery of more-complex services,’ the report, which can be accessed here, concluded.
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Image: Debangshu Das
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