Fancy cars for disabled people

[LemaxObsessive]

Motability.

I am sick to absolute death of seeing people saying on various threads, that Motability vehicles are “given” to us disabled people “for free”.

PIP is awarded in 2 separate elements.

1. Daily Living (day to day care needs etc)
2. Mobility

Each element is paid at different rates depending on how affected by your disability you are (and yes, medical evidence is required). However, to be eligible for Motability, you need to be getting the highest rate of the Mobility element. This is currently £77.05 per week (which works out at £308.20 per 4 weeks or £333.88 per month).

When you join Motability you agree for the DWP to give Motability that £77.05 per week instead of it being paid to your bank. If you also receive the Daily Living element of PIP then you will still receive that directly.

You ALSO, in most cases, have to pay an advance payment (AP) for the vehicle. The better the vehicle, the higher the AP. You do not get the AP back.
The £77.05 per week pays for the lease of the car, insurance, roadside assistance, tyres & windshield cover. Disabled people in receipt of the highest rate of the PIP mobility element are already exempt from road tax.

With regards to the ‘fancy’ cars such as BMW, Audi & Mercedes, as you can imagine all of these have a whopping great AP in the multiple thousands of pounds; Which as I said, you don’t get back.
The taxpayer is not paying a penny towards these vehicles besides the fact that Motability don’t currently pay VAT which I believe is up for discussion.

I think a really important point to make here is that PIP is categorically not means tested (even millionaires can claim it, provided their health meets the criteria) and is not paid to replace a disabled person’s income! In other words, people do not live off PIP instead of working, it is paid to cover the added costs associated with being disabled. Costs non-disabled people likely have never even considered, such as cleaners when we can’t do it, basic gardening when we can’t do it, extra electricity for when medical equipment is used at home, ready meals when we’re bed-bound, delivery charges for every single thing we buy because click & collect isn't possible, taxis to work because the bus always already has a wheelchair user on it, along with lots of other small but mounting costs we have zero choice but to pay because the alternative isn’t an option for us. The lowest rate of PIP is just £29.20 per week so we’re not talking big money!

Millions of PIP claimants work full time but crucially, couldn’t do so without PIP and in many cases, without Motability!

As I said above, even wealthy people are eligible to claim PIP to cover the added costs associated with their disability and they can, if they receive the highest rate of the Mobility Component of PIP choose to use Motability. If they want to spend £7,999 plus £77.05 per week to lease an Audi Q4 for 3 years then they can but not many do because it’s a lot of money to have nothing to show for it after 3 years.

So no, nobody is being ‘given free BMWs, Audis or Mercedes’ regardless of what’s being said by anyone!

The problem you’d have is that loads of people would phone in.

you’d then need to staff the call centre that they ring. I suppose it could be an automated email address that you report it to.

either way, you’d then need to employ people to find out whether the reports are true.

it’s s bit like social services - you do get pissed off ex husbands etc who maliciously report to SS people who are not abusing their kids. SS go round and check it out (because they have to) but by the time they’ve had five calls in as many weeks they’re like, yes, we looked already now enough.

so suppose a neighbour reports someone for disability fraud. Chances are the neighbour doesn’t know the full details. For example, people can get disability payments under accelerated rules if they have terminal cancer and are expected to die. They might still look healthy and be walking around …. But they are not.

SS check all reports of child abuse because it’s too important to miss. But most reports are either of families already known to SS or not at a level to trigger SS involvement.

generally, my suspicion would be that where pip is defrauded it’s by people who genuinely are ill and disabled exaggerating. So sending out investigators to check each and every complaint is going to be expensive, and not actually save a lot of money.

now I wouldn’t care if they put trackers in motabiloty cars and said it should mostly be at a nominated home address.

I get hrm and don’t have a motability car and that seems reasonable.

I think the situation in your family is not the only instance of it happening.

i think that’s at least partially why pip doesn’t have lifetime awards. The shortest award time I believe is a year, and the max is ten years. They do apparently have an “indefinite” award (presumably because people who have lost legs/arms etc aren’t going to grow them back anytime soon) but even those have ten year reviews.

it’s so you do have to keep demonstrating that you meet the requirements.

I fully support the idea of a (very observant/nosy Parker) person reporting alleged benefit fraud and gaining £1,000 for their astute observations and “it definitely is the case” IF and ONLY IF there is a counter penalty for false, speculative and malicious claims to the tune of £4,000 to cover staff costs and to compensate the person they’ve reported to the tune of the £1,000 they thought they’d gain.
All those very certain people can put their money where their mouth is.
The Stasi doesn’t exist yet but I see potential for income generation from this scheme.
Imagine how much money could be pumped into education for the non-disabled and .. perhaps stop any further VAT increases on public schools.
The purse might fill up again!

I think we should also have a separate reporting system where we could report people just SAYING they have autism or AD(H)D or mental impairment or any non-visible disability with the reporter gaining £1,000. Again, if it emerges that the reportee has mistakenly ascribed lying to the claimant then they have to compensate the claimant with £1,000 and further costs to staff investigation (£4,000) - straight into that black hole to prevent taxation rises.

Further to that, I propose that anyone who insists that Motability should offer basic cars should lodge a complaint with their MP (that’s free!) and additionally report to the new and soon to be introduced (hypothetical) governing body of ableist complaints stating who they know who uses Motability to obtain a more than basic car at taxpayer expense.

£10,000 if they can prove the disabled person didn’t need a car at all because that’s just a life-cost.

£1,000 if they spot a disabled user driving a BMW.
£2,000 if they can get an investigation into a family with a disabled member using the car for going to work, although while permitted by Motability currently CLEARLY should not be so let’s get extra income for making up rules.

And of course £10,000 fine for misinformed or false reports to compensate a charity for brining it into disrepute and £5,000 to the car user for lost earnings and taxi expenses while their vehicle was ceased.

I mean one cannot buy a pony or a massive Christmas pile on thin air but these disableds can DRIVE or BE DRIVEN instead of standing or sitting in a wheelchair to use the bus (doesn’t matter if the bus won’t let you on).

The righteous deserve a payout for spotting someone who wasn’t aborted when they should have anticipated that the Uk would run out of empathy and for heavens-sake think of the (non-disabled) children THE PURSE IS EMPTY. Compensation if you spot a should have been aborted person £25,000.

Sportage is a Kia?

Well ours is. Is there another?

Googled it. Can only find Kia Sportage.

Thank you ❤
Fingers crossed for your son's remission x

Exactly. Some people are just nasty and would ring in to be malicious, although I don't doubt that it happens now anyway. It would probably cost more in investigations etc than it would ever save.

You only had to look at the threads on here about Covid to see that some people enjoy the power trip and would report anyone for anything.

So yes, give people £1000 if fraud is proven, but fine the living daylights out of them if they got it wrong, and compensate the person they reported.

My bf doesn't drive but is entitled to a blue badge (and I imagine if he applied for pip would be awarded mobility)

But that's based on the fact he's legally severely sight impaired (IE. Blind) so whilst he very obviously can't drive, a blue badge would be of benefit when he is given a lift to appointments etc allowing him easier safer access.

I have a friend who has a BB but is not on PIP. Her husband drives her about in a flashy sporty type car.

I bet a lot of people would see her car and assume she has a flash sports car via Motability, also see she can walk fine, and post about it on here.

BB are linked to a person, and not a car.

You do realise that not all disabled people are only able to do min wage work?

I have a degree, a teaching qualification at master's level along side a load of other qualifications.

Er yeah... sorry, but plenty of us are capable (in some aspect) of earning far more than min. wage.

My hourly rate for my subcontractor role is £19, as its regular weekly work. For freelance stuff it varies but one of my regular clients pays me £30 an hour.

IF I were capable of working full time hours, I'd be on a LOT more money than I am now!

However because of my disability, I am not able to work full time hours nor am I able to predict when I can/cannot work or even guarantee that I can complete a full shift. Fortunately the role I am in is a small team that can take on my hours if I can't do them/have to leave my desk mid shift and I am extremely lucky to have that job, and hyper-aware it could all end tomorrow, there's no security whatsoever as a self employed subcontractor.

I don't look down on those who do 'menial' work (its all work and it needs doing, without someone doing it, I dread to think what would happen) or those who earn min. wage, but to assume the majority of disabled people aren't able to do better were they not disabled is pretty ignorant and an abhorrent attitude too!

I think that some of the posters are laying bare, just how much value they place on disabled people, and what they think they are capable of. Some of the ideas about disability, are quite frankly shocking.

Yes, but sadly that's always been the way. Just currently it's ok to say what they really think about those born with less advantages as them. It was also like that when I was young. These things are cyclical.

Yes, I know I still remember some of the unfortunate attitudes that I sometimes came across growing up. It just seems to be amplified, and aided by not only the Government, but their partners, the media. People are now not afraid to voice quite unpleasant thoughts, regarding disabled people. I am no stranger to bigotry anyway, but things are sadly getting worse,imo. You mention it being cyclical, so do you think that this will pass?

@LadyKenya It's hard to say as it's linked to different things driving it in different periods. This my own potted history perceptions (and moving from north to south) The dates are mainly averages, and others will have entirely different perceptions according to their own lived experiences

Intersectionality wasn't well understood when I was young. Quite a few instinctively saw it, but didn't really have words to discuss it, it was more just hierarchies, and lots of stuff from an earlier generation who where encouraged not to mention the suffering from the war, and disabled where often a huge reminder of the things they where supposed to have moved on from.
That generation taught me about their anger at all the stuff about 'homes fit for heroes' etc when actually many where being blamed for local financial issues and treated as scum when turning up to collect assistance.There where also those including children, who'd been disabled in the bombings.They where 'lucky to be alive' so should shut up and get on.

But when the Motability scheme came in, many war disabled who had rejected the cruelty of the benefits systems (" Both benefits and Unfit To Serve' carried a huge stigma) and whose wives had had to work while raising families, (also a stigma for many) finally signed up for social security assistance, because a decent car was hugely life changing, (especially for WC families) and no longer meant a blue death trap for his sole use only. I think in the beginning only those who needed adapted cars where accepted onto the scheme, but then the motor industry wised up to how it could shift stock, and general disability if HRM, was accepted by the charity.

There was an initial backlash as those disabled men had become very invisible other than the 2nd week of November, and suddenly the 'forgoten' tolerated disabled, had something there neighbors didn't.
The 'Windrush generation' had arrived to fill the spaces left by war loss. They where less quick to have their disabled children institutionalized when they started being born. So other than children with Downs or Polio, many visible disabled children weren't white. The care system had a lot of mixed race disabled children swelling it. Often hard to know which bit of the intersection was considered how by whom.

Disabled children where hidden away a fair amount and there was a lot of "The rich man in his castle, the poor man at his gate, God made them high and lowly, and ordered their estate" going on, which was very firmly applied to disabled children particularly those abandoned to the care system.. Open disgust at deformity generally rose, Thalidomide and the idea that 'entitled modern ' women who weren't prepared to suffer morning sickness had caused this, not God, was part of that. Portrayal of disabled children was white, clean, and with acceptable disabilities only.

We where moving on from that, but then we got Thatchers seizing the rise of the right and capitalizing on it, and the awful rhetoric about swamping, and for a while disability dislike was pretty much scraped off elsewhere, but soon enough the Right wing remembered. With the end of Thatcher new laws giving legal rights to adaptations where initially Ok, but resentment built over that, concepts like the social model of disability rather than the medical one came to the fore and the battle lines shifted according to which was being believed. Different parts of society behaved totally differently towards the disabled based on this, but overall it got better. around '95 when the discrimination act, came in, but again it was followed with a resentful backlash - By 2003 mums with buggies where starting demanding priority over wheelchair spaces on buses etc

Around 2005 the whole Asian 1st cousin marriages and associated disabled children flared up, along with a lot of 'They' and 'we' 'can't afford to pay benefits', and attitudes about 'Them' following the line taken that 'Allah decides.' vs the taxpayer should. The trickle down about 'why any was born disabled' was felt.
Around 2010 demands to open up disabled faculties to all was being felt and by 2016 provision and use had ceased to be disabled prioritized. 2017ish disabled loos where becoming Gender Neutral & disabled, but the latter now add ons. Then the everyone can use any space- loos, disabled bays, supermarket car parks spread. The direct hostile on the street he crap was really starting up again in mid 2019, and then Covid situation caused a total schism, followed by a backlash. And 'white woke' took off with it's backlash too.
Now we back to swamped by both kinds of 'other' rhetoric, and who we can and can't afford.

Every politician and editor grew up with some of the hand downs and perpetuation's of these attitudes, and we now have Farage and TikTok and monetizing likes, views and 'popularity.'

At some point the internet educated us all that UK future finances where not looking great, and just how many of the young where suffering poor MH, and that genie is now well and truly out of the bottle.
So much depends on good leadership (and media manipulation) and we've lacked that for a very, very long time.

Just wanted to say thank you for taking the time to write this - fascinating and depressing all in one, but really important information that everyone should read when considering their biases.

@Elleherd Thank you for your really detailed reply. I am going to read it again when I have finished my lunch! There is a lot to take in. I hope that a lot of people see it.

How's that increased moderation going MNHQ?

Did you get to choose the schools, your children went to? From the age of 10, my DD was sent to schools a minimum of 1.5 hours drive up the M1 or M25; and 8 hours on a bad day - because she was too complex for any teacher in the county!

Have you had to give up work, because you couldn’t take all the time off work for the appointments, meetings and sheer amount of paperwork, trying to co-ordinate input from up to 40 professionals and public sector agencies?

How many times have you had to make a formal complaint about your child’s education, or rather the lack of it? Say for instance, the local authority said all your local schools are full, so they are sending your child to a special school for children with learning disabilities, where they wouldn’t get a education or have a peer group? Not once?

How many times have you had to take your local authority to court, just to get an education for your children? Not once?

You live in a completely different world from parents of disabled children, and you should be grateful for that. When you have tried driving 26,000 miles a year to and from your child’s school, as I have done, then you might have a bit more insight?

@Elleherd
That post should be a standalone post that people should be forced to read before commenting on how we can’t afford the disabled any more (especially the “but not MY parent because they worked all their lives” to put money in their pension “pot” aka the state benefit called the state pension, and those who happily drive their regular child to a state school and NHS appointments but begrudge a parent of a disabled child having access (which is all the Motability scheme is in fact, to a car to do the same thing but usually over greater distances).

@Marshmallow4545
You don’t need help to drive your children to school- but if one of them develops MND or cancer or becomes unable to walk from illness or accident or goes blind through a not yet recognised condition or accident.. then you might.
And the help you would need just might be an adapted vehicle that’s only available through Motability because car manufacturers don’t make adapted cars - they have to be adapted.
Equally, you might need help getting them to school if you yourself become disabled or chronically ill.
Im sure you don’t think it will happen to you.
I didn’t think I’d have a severely disabled child either but somehow disability happens to some people and not all.
It doesn’t happen just to morally or criminally reprehensible people.

@Octavia64
Why should there be trackers on Motability cars? They are not leased for specific journeys.
They are leased for the person who is disabled to use as they see fit. Motability has a limit on how many miles you can drive - so you don’t really need trackers.
Disabled people are allowed to go to more places than work and appointments or school you know

I get adapted vehicles etc but I don’t get some other stuff
my neighbours don’t work and have a disabled teen. She goes to a care place every day. I don’t get how they’re in a 4 bed lovely home with a motability car not adapted for her and affording to have other children as well plus the usual bills of food, electric etc

am I jealous? Sure. It fucks me off when I’m struggling to pay bills and having occupational health meetings at work about capability due to my disabilities but I’m not sick enough for PIP. Can’t use public transport. Lost my job and entitled to £400 UC

but they have never worked in the 20 years I’ve lived here and can afford all that?

Whatever is happening with your neighbours, has no bearing on your life, other than making you jealous, which is unfortunate for yourself. You would do better to concentrate on what you can do to make your life more comfortable. You mention not being able to use transport, could you expand on that? Have you applied for PIP, and been denied?