Taxes to rise to fund PIP

[Viviennemary]

I just read this, Don't agree with this at all. PIP needs to be reformed. But not by introducing this two tier system. Sick of Labour already. Might have know they would revert to type. With all the infighting and disagreement so nothing ever gets done except back peddling, increased taxes and prices rises.

Pip is mostly an out of work benefit.

You are part of the problem when you call people liars.

So how do those people cope?

Where did I say it was an out of work benefit? You have connected two separate points.

DLA and PIP are currently paid to households irrespective of income. There are very few benefits that aren't means tested now and I see no reason why these DLA and PIP can't be means tested. People rabbit on about means testing costing more money than you would save but it's simply not true when we manage to means test most other benefits.

We need to do something about people who are avoiding paying tax, people who own companies like amazon and starbucks. We all know they are doing it, why can't we stop them.

PIP is extremely difficult to get. I know some people think that you just tell the gp your back hurts and you get loads of money but that's really not how it works.

Again chopping veg isnt a criteria we already went over this if you can put a ready meal in a microwave you can cook. Secondly you still need scans and consultant letters, surgery dates, medication lists, physio appointments to back up what your saying you can't just say you can't walk.

Everyone gets anxious sometimes but some people have disordered anxiety. It is uncontrollable, disproportionate, and prevents them from completing daily living activities or being able to move around and plan journeys.

PIP isn't given for diagnosis, it is given based on the level of need and evidence provided to back up those claims.

Similarly depression. Everyone has low moods, every one has hard times every so often, every one finds themselves in a hard situation from time to time but depression is a disordered low mood which doesn't just stop people from completing daily living activities or being able to move round and plan journeys, it stops some people living.

Not to mention anxiety covers a large spectrum of disorders: generalised anxiety disorder, panic disorder, agoraphobia, social anxiety disorder etc. There are some associated disorders related to anxiety: ocd, selective mutism, separation anxiety, ptsd, cptsd, acute stress disorder etc.

It's not a little bit of the worries. These conditions can be absolutely debilitating.

Let's go through depression. We've got: major depressive disorder, persistent depressive disorder, bipolar disorder, cyclothymic disorder, pmdd, psychotic depression, situational depression, melancholic depression, catatonic depression, treatment resistant depression, and then some other depressions like: postnatal depression and atypical depression.

You can't just lump anxiety, or depression all in one basket and say bin them all off they're all the same, work will absolutely help them, force their hand, give them a time limit to recover, get them into therapy give them a few rounds of ineffective CBT, blame them for not complying because of the constraints of their disability and blame them further.

Feeling a little bit anxious every so often isn't going to get you PIP. Don't fall for the bullshit.

How do you prove you can’t chop veg. How do you prove you can’t wash your upper body. How do you prove a persons anxiety isn’t that bad and they can actually attend interviews even if they say they can’t. There’s no brain scans handed out to everyone. There’s no way to disprove any of this. This isn’t about those severely affected which would retain their benefits anyway. This is about those who aren’t

That's because the threshold for pip is so high so you have to be significantly disabled to get it

I am not soaking as much as I can. I receive £749 in PiP every four weeks. £308 of that goes toward my Motability cat (no it isn’t free)! The rest covers what is needed for me. I’m a wheelchair user so looking after my space can be difficult. I have a cleaner once a fortnight to wash floors, clean bathrooms
change my bedding. Arrange shopping into cupboards so that I can reach things.
It goes toward a supermarket delivery pass so that I can guarantee a delivery when needed. It goes toward pre prepared vegetables because I can no longer chop them myself. I have a stoma, on occasion it leaks, so it goes toward the extra soap I need to wash It helps with the electric bill because I do more wash loads than a person normally would. It goes toward new underwear, as I need it replaced after accidents. It pays for someone to cut the lawn once a month.
Are you bored yet?
Pip. fraud according to the DWP is negligible, but unclaimed pip is around 23 million.

I was an active member of society with a decent job, until I wasn’t. I’m now disenfranchised because people see us as leeches. How do you think people feel when you accuse us of soaking up benefits?
We are a target for a society that doesn’t understand equity and it’s a fucking hard place to be!

It's a sorry state of affairs.

The usual suspect starting a thread to put the boot down on disabled people and PIP...

You really need a new hobby.

This may be unpopular.

As a country we don't pay enough tax. Particularly the middle classes / earners. If we want better facilities and services we should be paying more.

I do believe we need to reform (particularly healthcare, social care and education) and spend better.

This graph just shows how we lag behind other countries. We want to be like scandi countries yet don't want to pay for it.

Omg for the 3rd time chopping veg isnt criteria for pip. They won't give you money for not being able to chop veg

I know blind people who've had to go to tribunal. So yes it is difficult to get with a "genuine disability"

Re. claiming for long term anxiety and/or depression.-
I do not understand this - are people just not taking their pills?
Do they need more/different pills?
Have the people who dish out the cash even check if they've seen a doctor?
Perhaps the pharmaceutical companies need to pay more tax till they get their pills right and everyone is dying (!) to work and get a job!

No I didn't - you connected it. One sentence "I think things like non means tested PIP and DLA will need to be completely reformed and we need to make it more attractive to work which inevitably means making it less attractive to rely on state benefits" - no separating punctuation and a single clause indicates a single thought. Since neither benefit you quoted depends on employment status it is irrelevant whether work is more attractive. You can work and claim PIP. You can have DLA claimed for you but you aren't of working age anyway.

Agree. No one’s saying there isn’t a health issue. The issue is whether it warrants additional benefits if it is being managed by medication or / and therapy.

People don't see all those claiming benefit as leeches but there are big problems with the system and the number of new claimants, It is not sustainable. Benefits and disability payments should be subject to scrutiny to ensure only those who need them get them.

Agree. Aside from some legacy claimants falling outside the time line for migration to PIP, DLA for adults doesn’t exist - it’s only paid for children, who are migrated to PIP at age 16. And i’m so utterly sick of having having to repeat to people ad nauseam that PIP is not an out of work benefit. . The government have insisted on conflating PIP with out of work sickness benefits and now I believe that was deliberate because this thread is anything to go by, they’ve achieved their objective. And you can bet your bippy that if these cuts were focused on child benefit or childcare fees this would be a very different discussion. I’ve never understood how MN seeks to justify benefits paid out for the voluntary decision to become a parent, while denying the necessity to pay benefits for disability. The former is a choice, the latter is not. The difference is, parents have a voice. The disabled, by and large, do not.

Anxiety disorder is not the same thing as being anxious. It's not fixable its a life long condition that may or may not be manageable to get pip for an anxiety disorder alone it would be a very severe and debilitating anxiety disorder. People are confusing this with people who are a bit anxious and stressed and pop along to their gp for some anti depressants and a referral to talking therapies.

The ability to peel and chop veg is clearly set out in the assessors guide:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/66d80e00701781e1b341dbd1/pip-assessment-guide-part-two-the-assessment-criteria.pdf

See page 86. Activity 1.

The large tech companies are highly mobile and would simply offshore. They'll go where the tax rates are lowest, hence why Ireland did so well over the past decade or two with all the international firms who moved there, due to their low tax regime.

Lies damn, lies and statistics... One metric out of context is not proof.

Well not being able to walk is very expensive.