David Cameron welfare reforms-no family will receive more than £25,000 a year.

[Hammy02]

Good idea? I think so. I can't believe a single family receives this much already in benefits. It is about the same as the average income so it would be ridiculous for any one family to have more in benefits than someone that works?

Drug users can get DLA for the impact their drug use has on their ability to cope day to day. Same with alcoholics. I have worked with people in this situation and they genuinely have not been able to look after themselves so it isn't fraud. But providing DLA for these reasons doesn't IMO help the individual.

Remember DLA is given as a result of what you can and can't do, not on the basis of a diagnosis.

Bollocks Rob, sorry but WTF

We had the boys with a lifestyle that either one of us working would be able to support us. Modest house in a famously cheap part of the UK.

not our fault that we were both taken out of the workforce; what's the chances of someone becoming a carer and then a redundancy? DH still works, I am trying to, we worked every single day that we could.

DLA for addicts is a very wide field. the GP writes one cause for claim on the form; so someone with say intransient pain from an accident years ago who uses as a result of that would likely get their addiction named. There is a massive body of evidence to show that people with invisible connditions- MH, AS, etc- use in order to control either the symptomology or the damage done when these things were not recognised early on. theya re also the same people ore vulnerable to addiciton in the first palce.

You'd have to look at a full case history of each person and what led to them taking drugs before I would even consider passing judgement.

Rob ..."Ruthlessly weed out the chancers and let it be known that anyone claiming DLA is absolutely 100% entitled to it. Then there will not be massive amounts of distrust and resentment towards people claiming DLA and IB."
Sorry but this is crap, it is the scaremongerying and witchhunting that fosters a nasty undercurrent of suspicion and doubt. I'm not saying don't clamp down on abusers but this is an overblown problem for DLA (which the government has quietly admitted itself). Because of the nature of the reporting people with serious, depressing and horrible disabilities are the targets of abuse and resentment. A lot of disabilities are not clear cut or even obvious to the majority of people. I'm disabled but on a good day most people wouldn't even guess it, I am lucky enough to be in position to not need to claim at the moment however who knows what the future may bring. I suspect tho Rob you would take one look at me and pass judgement that I am a chancer..... this suspicion comes from the fact that I get abuse for the simple things , like needing to use the disabled loo / seat on the bus and altho I may not claim, funnily enough i have quite a few friends in similar circumstances who need to and they do get the judgemental resentment of ill informed and ignorant people whipped up into a righteous frenzy by explosive over-reporting, who cannot 'see' their disability or need.

However I suspect that it is pointless trying to convince you that your black and white view of the world may be simplistic and you are the kind of person who thinks that they know best and will never be convinced otherwise.

Sorry will have to run after but Porto, personal insurance, really?

We ahd mortgage insurance, when DH's boss at the time went under he pissed off and so we couldn;t get him to sign the forms. I am big on insurance- I take out every penny we can afford- but I quite understand why DH thinks it is wasted money.

One of the reasons people claim long term benefits is if they become too ill to work. Many of the people at risk of this would not be able to get insurance. I work and have long term chronic health problems. No insurance company would touch me. I already find it extremely hard to get insurance for a 2 week holiday.

Peachy - Many people who become alcoholics or drug users choose that route to help them mentally cope with everyday life.

For example, 1 alcoholic I know who gets DLA. He does not have a recognised mental health diagnosis. But he is very fragile emotionally. Small everyday problems make him very depressed and anxious and to cope he reaches for the bottle. Of course this doesn't help in the long run, but in the very short term it does.

His fragile state emotionally and general inability to cope means that without support he won't do everyday things e.g. visit the Dr, shop in a supermarket, open and deal with mail, etc.

It is very difficult to know how much of his difficulties are caused by general anxiety and how much are caused by long term alcohol abuse. But he genuinely does need help to maintain a tenancy, deal with his finances, eat properly, go to the Dr, etc. I think there do need to be services for people like him - and there have been but they have been largely cut.

What people like him don't need is more money. Because fairly obviously he doesn't use the money to buy in support in whatever form, instead he uses it to buy more drink. And so he doesn't eat much, gets evicted periodically, gets into debt, etc.

i confess i haven't read all this thread, but isn't the main element of the 25k+ we read about housing benefit? Surely having this limited, even if you are a large family, in the short-term is not going to cause long-term damage to a family. I can see it would be inconvenient - having to be in an area with cheaper accommodation and sharing rooms - but if you are receiving benefits this doesn't seem unreasonable. many working families have to do this.

I'd just like to add to lesley's excellent posts about the underlying psychological dproblems of substance misusers that many people with these difficulties have physical disabilities, too. Even after they have been clean and dry for years. For example HIV, hepatitis C, heart problems, liver disease, alcoholic brain damage etc.

They also frequently have criminal records which make them less employable.

So are often very 'damaged' in more than one way.

Right Leslie which is why I said you'd (i'd) need to know someone's background

Having worked in MH and wider family support (several addicts) I know a little of this but it's an essential personal philosophy that I would never discriminate or cause judgement against teh genuinely needy in order to place blame or even just identify those who might be less deserving or in need of certain support routes.

That's my choice of how I live my life, but one I am proud of.

And yes there is an element of sense in benefits in kid. i;d far rather see decent access to proper recovery for a start. But there's a limit how much you can do that as long as social services (to which we were allied) were not allowed to even invovle ourselves with famillies where thre was a non addicetd aprent. The spouse / aprtner and children should not be peanalised and absolutely chidlren grow up with massive issues when vbouchers and simialr systems are used- you see that with areas where there is low uptake of FSM. It's a delicate balance but an important one to get rihjt, esential not to alienate the kids and create yet another generation of people who feel outside of society.

Do I support the one aprent policy of SSD/ nope, not all,. but it was what we dealt with.

Right, once again Rob goes chuntering on without a shred of statistic to back up his Daily Mail wank material.

I would post the DWP link that I have provided previously, but for some reason the DWP no longer has it up which demonstrated that there is far more error and payment mistakes than fraud on DLA. I'm not talking about other benefits, I'm talking about DLA.

Sod it, i'll post the link again, hopefully it'll come back here

See... Rob can't post firm stats, just his bitter, twisted opinion that would have human beings starve for no fault of their own. Nice individual there.

Still, at least one disablist troll has had a thread deleted, one small step forward....

Want some stats? Can't point to error payments page Glitta had but how about here

And some otehrs-

DLA- Government estimated fraud rate (which itself could well be an over estimate) %. Under claim rate- estimated at 40%. Is easily that IMO. A fairly informed opinion what with work over the years and all. intended cut to DLA budget-%.

Now if people wish to agree with that ideologically that's their choice but it is impossible to argue realistically that genuine claims will not be affected. MAria Miller is well aware that it won;t be Mr X faking a bad back that is picked up, the ATOS tests will in fact make it easier for hima s they refuse to read medical reports and assess on half an hour of someone going 'OOOh me back'. Nope it will be Mr Y who ahs too much pride to complain even though he's in agony; or people with serious hidden disability- mental healt, autism, etc.

Want a massive rise in mentally ill people living on the streets? You got it.

Housing benefit (related to disability as the two systems are inter linked). % of claimants are not unemployed.
%. Wow. Shelter figures not some leftie think tank.

Apologies for dodgy stereotyping with the ooooh me back thing: am well aware that back pain can be serious and disabling. trying to make a clear point to those who do want to see.

Oh and Leslie there may be a chance I read your posts wrong, if so I apologise- after a few days of crappola SN on MN again I find myself on the defensive. have just ahd to pop to GP to request the assessment appoitnment for my only apparently NT child after a school request so let's say am feeling- pissed off.

Remove people's crutches to make them desperate enough for crime. Put them in prison. Set up a programme sending prisoners to work in Fat Cat businesses for nothing to pay for their prison place.

Make proper wage employees redundant. Cut their benefits and make them desperate too, whilst Fat Cat industry markets heavily to their children telling them they are worthless if they don't have x. Remove opportunities for said children to have access to x without crime. There be your cheap workforce next generation!

A government with 22 millionaires is not likely to treat poor people well Cam showed that with the dis march in london

to be fair Gabby the person that should have attended that was Maria Miller, not really Cam's job

Does anyone know if today's DM story is true or a misrepresentation? It's saying that after a diagnosis of ADHD, presecription of drugs is required for a DLA claim. Surely this can't be right and if you decide to treat it differently you can still get DLA. Surely that can't be true.

I don't want to link, it's a horrific story, but I just wanted to ask if that assertion was true. I'm sorry if I am upsetting people with this question.

I don't know if it is true Goosberry, but Social Services told me to go and get some drugs from the doctor to make ds sleep at night, and my refusing to do so should not be their problem and trigger any respite.

It's not true.
DS got DLA for the way in which his ADHD manifested itself long before medication commenced.

As has been stated before it's not the diagnosis, it's the way in which the condition affects your life.

So.... putting self at risk of harm, no concept of action/consequence that kind of thing which requires 24/7 supervision.

They were trying to reduce DLA for people who have 'solutions'. i.e. if you have a wheelchair then you are 'mobile' so can't claim mobility allowance etc.

I remember thinking at the time that they will remove it from people who use drugs to control their condition (As if the condition is completely removed by the drugs) etc.

yup starlight i would be one of those as i have awheelchair yet still lotf of places i can not go train needs 24 hr travel and means sititng in the doorway buses some i may get on some not .

The current mood of posters needs much more exposure

Thanks for the answer.

What do you mean Gabby?