BBC Breakfast host Naga Munchetty confronted Work And Pensions Secretary Mel Stride over the government’s by pressing the MP on whether the Tories were suggesting the current system is overdiagnosing unfitness to work.
The heated interview came ahead of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announcing his plan for welfare reform and a clamp down on “sick note culture” in a speech warning against “over-medicalising the everyday challenges and worries of life.”
The reform would involve further curbs to disability benefits but also moving responsibility for work fitness assessments away from GPs to other “work and health professionals.”
Opening the interview, Stride said: “We have 2.8 million people on long term sickness benefits. Part of the journey on to those benefits almost certainly involve visiting a GP and being signed off. We have 11 million fit notes that are signed off every year. And in the case of 94% of those fit notes that are signed off, a box is ticked that says that the person is not capable of any work whatsoever.”
This led Munchetty to question whether the government was implying family doctors were producing sick notes too easily: “Do you think fewer than 94% should have been signed off by GPs?”
Stride, failing to answer the question, began evasively talking about getting people back to work with “the right support.” After the host interrupted and reiterated her question only for the MP to continue his non-answer.
Munchetty interrupted again: “I’m sorry, you’re not answering my question. You’re telling me about how you would like to encourage or help people who have been signed off to avoid being signed off? What I’m asking is of the 94%, who were signed off by GPs, do you think, of those, some of those should not have been signed off?”
Stride said: “I’ve already said yes, so there’s a one word answer, yes. I’ve already said that three times.”
Munchetty asked: “So then you don’t believe that the GPs should have signed those people off, therefore the GPs aren’t doing their jobs?”
“No, not at all. I think GPs are doing a fantastic job,” Stride replied, explaining that the question of acquiring a sick note should require “a more holistic approach” than simply “going to their GP” and “being signed off.”
He continued: “I think that will take the numbers down, but that will be to the good and the benefit of those people that will then benefit from staying in work and all the good things that work brings, rather than what is currently too often happening, which is people drifting along a health journey where they end up on long-term sickness benefits.
And that’s not good for them, it’s not good for the communities they live in, it’s not good for the economy, and that’s something I’m absolutely determined to change.”
Watch above on BBC Breakfast.
