[2025] UKUT 296 (AAC)

The relevant parts of Upper Tribunal Judge Jacobs’ decision in RC read as follows (I have highlighted in bold the key passages on which this appeal has focused):

“8.

On appeal, the First-tier Tribunal found that the claimant scored two points for activity 9b and two points for needing prompting or assistance to make complex budgeting decisions, but that was not enough to allow an award. The presiding judge spent almost two pages explaining the tribunal’s decision on activity 9. She recorded detailed findings about how the claimant managed or avoided contact with men in his daily life. The essence of the tribunal’s reasoning was this:

The Tribunal considered the extent to which [the claimant] could engage socially with people he did not know. There was nothing to indicate that he could not engage with women, indeed he chose to do so. At the least therefore some of the people that he met were not going to provide a difficulty for him. In respect of the remainder while he was by himself he might find engaging difficult but with someone there to encourage and support there was nothing to indicate that social engagement as a reciprocal exchange (rather than friendship or a longer relationship) would not be possible.

11.

I have decided that the tribunal did make an error of law by not dealing with head (c) of the definition of ‘engage socially’ and by not appearing to have taken sufficient account of regulation 4(2A), despite setting it out. I will concentrate in my analysis on how a tribunal should approach that aspect of engaging with other people face to face.

12.

The Secretary of State’s representative has cited from the three-judge panel in JC v Secretary of State for Work and Pensions [2014] UKUT 352 (AAC). That case concerned activity 16 (coping with social engagement due to cognitive impairment or mental disorder) in Schedule 2 to the Employment and Support Allowance Regulations 2008 (SI No 794). There may be much of value in that decision for activity 9, but I do not find anything particularly relevant to head (c) of the definition that applies in the personal independence payment legislation.

13.

I do not accept that establishing a relationship means no more than ‘the ability to reciprocate exchanges’. There is more to it than that. A brief conversation with a stranger about the weather while waiting for a bus does not involve establishing a relationship in the normal sense of the word. Nor does buying a burger or an ice cream, although both involve reciprocating exchanges.

14.

Heads (a) and (b) are important parts of establishing relationships, but more is required. Relationships vary in duration (from fleeting to life-long), nature (acquaintance, business, friendship, partnership, sexual) and intensity. Head (c) refers to relationships without qualification. I take that to mean that it is concerned with skills relevant to relationships in general rather than with a particular type of relationship. And the focus is on establishing a relationship rather than nurturing or developing one.

15.

The claimant is able to establish relationships with women, but that still leaves roughly half the population that cause him a problem. I have not had argument on this, but I consider that difficulties of that magnitude would be sufficient to satisfy the definition.

16.

I am not going to attempt to list the essential characteristics of a relationship. ‘Relationship’ is a word that we all use and the law reports are replete with example of judges explaining why it is a mistake to try to define such words. Not only is that task difficult if not impossible, it is also dangerous. I doubt that I would have envisaged the facts of this case if I had tried to compile as. I doubt that I would have envisaged the facts of this case if I had tried to compile a list. That is why I have not attempted itemise the various skills that are brought to bear in establishing a relationship.

17.

The way I have approached this case – and the approach I would recommend to the First-tier Tribunal – is to begin by asking what it is that the claimant says is preventing or inhibiting establishing relationships. Assuming that the tribunal accepts the evidence, the next question is whether that forms part of the claimant’s physical or mental condition for the purposes of section 78 of the Welfare Reform Act [2012].”