By Colin Campbell

Copyright inverness-courier

THE last major government “crackdown” on benefits propelled Inverness into the headlines for a particularly shocking reason. A sister paper of the Courier revealed that an amputee living in the city with only one leg had been assessed in an entitlement review as “fully fit for work”.

That was during the reign of the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government of a decade ago. And this particular case was highlighted as a prime example of some of the injustices being perpetrated against people in the drive to get them off benefits at all or any cost.

The sorry and dreadful story of the “fully fit” one-legged man was supplemented by many others. I wrote about my own knowledge of a tough-as-teak Inverness forestry worker who within the space of a couple of months had smashed his shoulder in a timber accident and then been diagnosed with cancer. When his work assessment came up he had a humiliating time trying to convince an assessor that he should qualify for any benefits at all. In an awkward moment, this ironman was reduced to tears as he recalled the experience.

There was an added source of local controversy to this harsh approach to benefits distribution. The Chief Secretary to the Treasury was Highland MP of the time Danny Alexander. He had been elected on a wave of cordial goodwill towards a likeable young man and within a fairly short space of time had been branded “the ginger rodent” because of his role as the TV frontman in defending severe benefits cuts and attitudes which looked draconian to very many people. When the 2015 election came around critics of all persuasions were glad to see the back of him.

Pressure groups and charities have been forthright in condemning all and any proposed benefits cuts. But, regrettably, that stance is now almost as difficult to defend as claiming a man with only one leg could be a scaffolder, or a postman.

The number of people on benefits is soaring, as is the bill for funding them. Half of the disability benefits rise since Covid is due to mental health issues. One in 10 adults of working age is now on sickness benefits as the post-Covid rise in mental health conditions fuels record disability claims.

And how many people have the straightforward reaction: “It can’t go on”?

It’s not as if mental health problems are a new invention. They most certainly existed before. But you were generally expected to go back to work after being in recovery. That was in an era when there was a lot more stigma attached to “mental health issues” – often referred to in much less respectful ways – and a lot less sympathy for those who had these afflictions. Shunning work for ever and a day was not a state benefits supported option.

For decades we had Craig Dunain hospital serving Inverness and the Highlands. Often it wasn’t even full. How many Craig Dunains could we apparently do with now to cope with the exploding “mental health” crisis?

In the 1970s and 1980s and even beyond people were reluctant to admit they were afflicted by such problems and tried to keep them to themselves. Now analysis, discussion and expansion of “mental health issues” is so widespread as to be inescapable. We have gone from one extreme to the other.

There’s a need for lessons to be learned from the excessively harsh “crackdown” of a decade and more ago. But despite the self-serving protestations of the “free money tree” SNP government in Holyrood, it can’t go on.

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