7.4 million people claim some form of disability or incapacity benefits

[MidnightPatrol]

Given the various back and forth of discussion on the reduction in disability and incapacity benefits, not much data on the debate has been shared - it’s a mainly emotional debate.

So for context, the figures:

• 7.4 million people claim sickness benefits of some kind
• The total number of claimants has increased by a third in five years (up 1.8 million)
• 1 in 10 working age adults claims, and 1 in 12 school aged children
• 1.2 million people aged under 25 claim sickness benefits, a rise of two thirds in 5 years - 1 in 15 claiming something
• 4 million adults claim sickness benefit of some kind, up from 2.8 million in 2019. Two thirds of that increase is people under 50.
• 2.5 million people claim UC health benefits, up 500k people this year alone - in 2019 less than 500k people claimed this
• 1.8 million have no requirement to look for work
• Sickness benefits for working age adults are expected to cost £70b by 2030 - a third of the cost of the NHS

Well that we can agree on. The rich and those in power will over ever care about themselves.

Dog eat dog. Much like most is society when You dig beneath the surface.

Yes, if anyone expresses any interest in politics they must be a government stooge…!

The reality is that the benefit bill cannot continue as it is. I do feel that there are people who are disabled who aren't getting the full help that they need but there are also people who are happy to live off benefits for a lifetime. I was just reading an article on the BBC, one of the women interviewed, 'Alison' stated that -

"She has been diagnosed with depression, anxiety and PTSD brought on by childhood traumas. She also suffers panic attacks and night terrors. Since Covid she is afraid of leaving the house due to "fear of germs".

Alison hasn't worked since she lost her job with Southampton City Council in 1997, and claims both PIP, the main disability benefit, and Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) totalling around £1,700 per month.

She says she would find it difficult to cope with the pressure of a job."

www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2gpl4528go

She hasn't worked for almost 30 years due to depression and anxiety. I'm sorry but that's ridiculous. I've suffered from depression myself (PND), I know how hard it is. But 28 years on benefits? Getting £1700 a month, the same as a lot of workers?

You would have been accused of being a Boris lover only a few leaders ago. 😅

That's not true though is it aa PIP is all about what you can't do ,so if you can essentially, cook clean ,self care and undertake a journey from A to B, then you wouldn't be eligible for PIP.

Except a lot of the people I know who use such products do so as a way to manage their independence.

Those that need more help have either paid care which would then need to be upped for each person to either assist in management of application (as reusable aren't as easy for those with dexterity issues) or at least more hours to wash, dry & put away.

Those with unpaid support from friends & family will feel like even more of burden & some of those unpaid care staff will leave or reduce work to manage the additional work load as above.

I think the budget situation is beyond “talent and creativity” in the short term at least so they are simply looking anywhere and everywhere they can quickly either raise receipts or cut expenditure. I don’t think there’s much more thought in it than that.

you didn’t answer the question about how much sleep you lost by the way. Was it none?

Sorry I must have missed the bit where you engaged in good faith with the evidence I shared about the cost of disability benefit fraud being tiny compared to other issues, and provided convincing evidence to the contrary along with robust arguments to support the continued focus on disabled people. Silly me.

And that PIP will continue until she dies and will make her eligible for significant amounts of Pension credit top ups for all her retirement years unless something changes. Way more money than someone who has worked their whole life in a low paid job. The system is absolute madness. I regularly have pensioners calling me for benefit checks and they have £600/ £700 a week to live off between them per week and no housing costs and they still ring up fucking looking for more benefits. Just greedy. It needs to stop. I'm absolutely sick of the sense of entitlement.

Silly me for thinking this was just a forum where people can express thoughts. Blow me
down 🙄

You can’t just compare someone you don’t know with your own situation. It’s not like for like. You obviously don’t understand agoraphobia.

genuine question could someone with agoraphobia not work from home? If they could be supported in getting the job could they not work on their computer at home.

But you’re fine with the taxpayers subsidising them?

If you’re going to spread misinformation and untruths at the expense of vulnerable people, you’ll be challenged. Particularly when you state unqualified bigotry as fact.

Yes, possibly - at least working from home is more acceptable these days.

@indigovapour

"you didn’t answer the question about how much sleep you lost by the way. Was it none?"

Apologies, didn't see that.

The problem with politics, in this country, is that, it's absolutely not about us, who live here, it's about the power.

I agree completely and I think people in your kind of situation are being unfairly lumped in with those who can apparently do everything bar work.

The number of people claiming PIP who can apparently date, have kids, go on holiday, look after their house, do the school run and go to the gym but ‘can’t work’ is a piss take.

As for ‘Alison’, nearly 30 years on benefits!!!!!!!! That’s an absolute disgrace.

👏👏👏👏👏

It’s far easier to point fingers at the billionaire boogeymen than accept that most of us demand far more of the state than we are prepared to fund via taxation. Billionaires aren’t the problem here, it’s the rest of us.

And yes I agree that supporting people into work is a good thing but the previous government did absolutely nothing to facilitate that whatsoever. They just punished people and cut health services. Mental health services were the first thing to be cut to the bone. And then Covid hit.

Sorry I didn't explain myself well.

Someone could score 2 points on a mixture of the 10 daily living questions & hit 14 points to get the enhanced rate of PIP, even if they only have those issues 60% of the time.

There are people pit there scoring 84/84 or daily living alone.

The need of these two groups are very different. I'm not saying both groups don't have needs, just that they are very different.

How much do billionaires cost us versus benefits claimants?

So let’s assume it was none, because it was, wasn’t it? And that’s my point. People don’t really care about problems they don’t have themselves. (I mean really care, not just care enough to post on MN). Often people are actually happy to see people who aren’t “like them” suffer in some way - just look at the threads bout private school VAT. We’ve been divided and now we’re being conquered.

I don’t think ‘supporting people into work’ is the silver bullet you think it is.

As part of work, I see members of the public ‘desperate for support’ who are then given that support. The results are mixed:

1. They don’t turn up
2. They turn up once or twice, then stop attending
3. They turn up but don’t really try

They usually claim they had no idea what day it was on (despite letters), they didn’t know where it was, or that there was a ‘family emergency’. Pinning them down is like trying to catch smoke with your bare hands.

There is a huge number of people who have made themselves unemployable through claiming. Benefits have actually embedded their problems and made them far, far worse. In the ‘anxiety’ cases, hiding away at home while the taxpayer funds them for years has made that anxiety much bigger. None of them have managed to get well and work again, despite presumably using their PIP for therapy. Unemployed men have spent their time dossing around, drinking and smoking weed until it’s addled their brains and they barely know anything apart from their dealer’s name and what to do to continue their claims. These people have spent years using benefits to fund their antisocial tendencies and actually grow them.

Job coaches would be a waste of money. They’re not interested. They have no qualifications and no work history. They’ll find a way of getting themselves exempt from the help. They won’t turn up.

As for mental health support, these people are so far gone nothing will help them. They’re a lost cause. No amount of counselling will undo 15 years of cannabis induced paranoia or agoraphobia.

Benefits have literally created the problem it was there to solve.