Motability cars - should they be UK made?

My daughter has epilepsy. She is under the care of a consultant, who she sees every year, and she sees the epilepsy nurse every quarter, plus she has an annual review with the GP.

And they write reports.

But this isn't enough for you? You want her to be under surveillance to see what she can and can't do?

How do you see that working? And who is going to pay for it?

The fact you aren't sure is the answer you need.

As I said, just because that is your experience doesn’t mean it is the case for all. Not all are online. Some are paper-based assessments, some are via telephone and a minority F2F.

November 2024 parliamentary statistics showed 18% were paper-based, 4% F2F, 77% remote (either telephone or video - more the former than the latter according to benefits and work but I haven’t looked at the breakdown of those statistics) and 1% unspecified.

4,000 were F2F in August 2025 according to the government.

People can request a change to the type of assessment if they want/need to.

It appears to be standard now for our team since covid

but you are right I am not aware of how many are now in person

point is many should not be online how can someone be assessed correctly over a screen so often then can’t, the questions can be confusing and this more often than not goes against the applicant than for them

also having to do a higher number of reconsiderations now (I believe more are being put forward)

And I have sobbed many times filling out her DLA forms, which are very long and time intrusive.

Nissan has a plant in Sunderlqnd. I think Minis are made in Oxford.

If you qualify for high mobility, you must demonstrate very severe mobility needs. a mobility car isn't a perk for these people.

In five years, we have paid (out of our own pocket) £20k in advance payments.

Just because the assessments you have experienced recently have been online doesn’t mean all assessments are now online. They aren’t.

I have sat in a number recently

all online which is absolutely ridiculous for some I have sat in

and not impressed by some of the assessors others have been understanding and empathic and professional.
I can’t give an opinion as there for support so will only interject when necessary which I have to be careful so it does not appear I am trying to influence who I am supporting

one I made a complaint about but that’s another thread

I wonder how many people on this thread genuinely believe that motability cars are free?

There was an astonishingly spiteful thread on here the other day about how people should spend their child’s DLA/their own PIP. One poster declared that disabled people should only travel by ‘basic saloon’. Unfortunately it autocorrected to basic balloon. I wondered how many hot air balloons have suitable wheelchair access.

We are on our third Motability vehicle for our daughter, who is 10. Previous two vehicles - the first a 7-seater Peugeot to accommodate our family needs, the second a Ford 5-seater once son had gone to Uni - both required upfront deposits of £3k each. Our new vehicle is a WAV (if you don’t know and/or are naive - Google will help). Our advance payment was £13k, with monthly payments taken out of her mobility element if her DLA.

We need this vehicle because she is too heavy for me now to lift in and out of a standard car and I drive 100 miles a day to take her to our local SEN school.

I also work full time, I am 51 and have worked full time since I was 16, with three six-month maternity leaves.

I do not feel guilty for claiming this “benefit” - I have paid enough tax to supplement this 🤬

It would seem the OP has shuffled off

To look for more things to “google” and start and Op about

I am aware how ridiculous the questions are on an assessment (which now is online)

Not all assessments are online.

Yet another ableist thread. So here’s a reality check.

Yes, there is PIP fraud, but it’s the lowest of all benefits at just 0.2%.

Secondly, there isn’t a one size fits all disability that means you can give us all the same car and consider the job done. My needs are different from the needs of other Motability customers.

I’m currently in lease extension because I’m too disabled to work and the only cars on the scheme I could switch to are the Skoda Kodiaq and the Hyundai Santa Fe, both of which carry heavy up front payments because that’s how the car manufacturers make up the difference between the lease payment - my HRM - and the price of the car. I can’t afford an up front payment so I’m hoping to be well enough to work and save up for the up front payment before March 2027 when I’ll have to surrender my current car. And bear in mind my needs have changed since I got the current car so it’s not got everything I need, but it’s better than no car at all when you live rurally and public transport isn’t available.

PIP and Motability, when I’m well enough, are vital in helping me be able to get to work, earn money and pay the higher rate taxes I’ve paid because of the salary I earn for the work I do. I know: shocker, disabled people work, too.

But if you really want to get more of us working, start challenge the return to office directives that are making it harder for us to work. The pandemic sucked for a lot of reasons, but it proved that people can work remotely and that it works well for companies to allow this. Now, there will always be micro-managing bosses who can’t handle trusting their staff to work when they can’t see them, and there will be others who have taken on a big office and want to see it used, regardless of whether that’s actually better for the staff, and lack the imagination to use the extra space for something else. Like supporting new businesses or charities with space, giving room to community initiatives, etc.

Start challenging councils and businesses when you see that spaces aren’t accessible. And don’t use disabled parking bays because you’re “only going to be 5 minutes”, because they’re not for you and you can damn well park further away and walk and make a disabled person’s life easier in one simple act.

Disabled people make easy targets for those who need one in order to make themselves feel better. But remember, the majority of us end up disabled at some point in our lives. You are not immune from the possibility of something happening that changes your life forever, and how people treat you when that happens says more about them than you.

I challenge you to live a day in my life and think I have it easy. What support I get I am so grateful for, but I’m hardly living high on the hog.

🙄 fine take it that way

there is no resentment I have supported people (work) with PIP applications and mandatory reconsiderations where they have received higher payment because they were entitled to it (and it should never have got to that) I am aware how ridiculous the questions are on an assessment (which now is online) and the whole assessment process

people do abuse the system this has to be addressed but while we can’t have conversations without it being all one side or the other it doesn’t get addressed (as with anything that is in public discussions now)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m002ks2s?partner=uk.co.bbc&origin=share-mobile

If anyone wants to listen 😁 👂🏻

No I'm aware of that. Just wondered.

Sorry your first post

@FallingIntoAutumn
i was replying to your first message not your second

Nope. You’ve still lost me.
can you try again. I don’t understand what you’re trying to say.

are you trying to say Motability should lose money on the cars at the end?

And @HRTQueen - the higher rate mobility component ALWAYS- not sometimes - is spent on the leased car. Always. Thats the Motability scheme - that’s exactly what it means. Nothing more complicated than that.
If someone buys their car and doesn’t use the Motability scheme at all, ever, they can spend that money on crack cocaine.
Just like people on state pension and universal credit and Attendance Allowance or Tax credits or ESA or Child Benefit.

Our dealer are arranged to buy our last one for his wife (only know because she lives locally and we've seen her drive it) Nissan that only had 3.5k miles on it. It was completely spotless.

I developed a dural ectsasia which quite frankly has ruined my life and I'd gladly swap my PIP and go back to work again and finance myself again.

@HRTQueen
Still want to see the abuse of the system.

I can see evidence of your resentment

“what is the need for the higher range car
most of us would like a higher range value car than we have (I would love a golf but not in my price range) but we can’t have one
so we have a car that does the job that we need it to”

For the umpteenth time - people can spend their benefit money however they want!

There is - contrary to the OP’s misleading statements - NO SUCH THING as a “Motability car”.

There aren’t cars especially made and doled out according to need.

I’ll put it another way - it’s like saying “There’s Marge in her Barclays saloon, parked right next to Gary’s paid-outright Ford and just look at Sally’s inheritance tax-avoidance purchased Honda.” It’s a scheme to exchange benefits for a car - any car that you want if it’s available via the car dealership on the Motability scheme.

Why does it matter if Susan uses all her mobility component to lease a wheelchair or a WAV or a Ford Torneo or a fucking tricycle.

WHAT the fuck does it have to do with what you chose to do with your money?

The person is going to get higher rate PIP/DLA no matter what car they get.

Very few cars are fully covered by higher rate PIP or DLA alone so you need to pay an advanced payment which is NOT covered by PIP/DLA.

The higher range cars will mean a higher advanced payment. Some people won't be able to afford those payments so they don't get a higher range car.