Our first PIP case law webinar for claimant and carer members has proved a big hit, with attendees branding it ‘Fantastic’, ‘incredibly helpful’ and ‘immensely educational’. A worker at a small charity also thanked us for providing the webinar for free, explaining ‘we do not have an awful lot of money in our training budget so really appreciate this kind of thing’.
A further webinar, for professionals members only, is happening on 30 June.
The webinar was run by Mark Perlic, author of the definitive guides to benefits case law used by judges and welfare rights workers alike, supported by our own Liam Casey.
It covered topics including:
- What is case law - reported and unreported decisions (what’s the difference?)
- How to find case law - obligations to provide copies of case law decisions
- How to use / make reference to case law in mandatory reconsiderations / appeal submissions
- First-tier tribunal duty to follow case law and departure from statutory language
Over 200 people attended the event with almost three quarters lasting the full three hours, whilst other had to bow out early but said they would be watching the video recording later.
The event had an impressive four star rating from over 80 attendees on Webinarjam.
Separately, over 50 attendees completed a survey on SurveyMonkey.
55% had never attended a webinar before, making the high engagement rate even more impressive.
91% said the information was ‘extremely’ or ‘very’ useful.
96% said they would recommend the webinar to others.
In additional comments, people said:
“Thank you to Liam and Mark for putting together such a fantastic webinar packed full of invaluable guidance that was presented in easy to follow plain English rather than bamboozling us completely with legal jargon! This was my first webinar that I have attended since becoming a B&W member and I found it incredibly useful and I would definitely encourage others to join future opportunities.”
“This webinar was very useful indeed and helpfully guided us to places and websites to find the case law to help us appeal decisions more knowledgably. I was not aware these tools existed, and will help to arm future claimants going on. Thank You, one and all.”
“Thank you so much to the presenter and organiser for providing valuable information about the legal background to the benefit system, which I had absolutely no idea about, when I became disabled in 2012. You live and learn!”
“I could follow the speed/detail but I know that I won't have absorbed or understood it all, so having the handout and recording to watch will be invaluable. Thank you, I thought this webinar was incredibly helpful, thank you Mark and Liam”
“Great - please keep going with more of the same. NB I bought Marks book/usb a few weeks ago - webinar helped put it all into context.”
“Thank you for presenting this topic, much appreciated. Immensely educational and useful Feel confident and reassured that I have been equipped with tools and guidelines for how to search, research and apply case law findings. Thank you so much for this invaluable opportunity.”
“Thank you so much for making this webinar free, I work for a small charity and we do not have an awful lot of money in our training budget so really appreciate this kind of thing.”
The webinar for professional members of Benefits and Work runs from 9:30AM - 12:30PM (with a break in the middle) Wednesday 30th June 2021. N.B. Please register with a work email address.
