Is there no depths PIP will go to...

[Home77]

Saw this today, shocking. Pip called a lady a 'lying bitch' in her appeal submission. Kind of confirms the DWP attitude really. Horrible.

Sexist as well...

www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/mar/22/dwp-document-refers-to-benefit-claimant-as-lying-bitch?CMP=share_btn_tw&fbclid=IwAR2OcNV34F2dyDS7S15k_aw9nEIMLVii6gfKNN-sskR40sPJJxC9hGuldmo

Claire, who pays for help? my friends doesn't get help apart from DLA/pip/CA.

fwiw, I have a severely disabled child myself and know the ins and outs of the system. you really are left to yourself most of the time!

I know it does not cover the full cost of help that most people need. But yes I do know people who pay for help. So a cleaner, ready made meals as they can not prepare food, taxis, someone to come in and give them a bath.

What do you think people without anyone to help them does? They pay for the most urgent help they need.

Also if you really can not do the most basic things, and have under a certain level of savings, and income, local authorities also give help.

I know there is not enough help. We are not well off but pay for extra hours for FIL to get extra carer hours. Because otherwise he would get the absolutely basic through various benefits, which would keep him alive i.e. food, dressing and washing, but nothing more.

I don't understand why you would say "But someone would be being pretty neglected if they did not get the help that PIP says everyone needs." when clearly you know that PIP doesn't get people the help that they need. They need their families to step in, be that to actually help, or pay for it, or both.

Also if you really can not do the most basic things, and have under a certain level of savings, and income, local authorities also give help.

That entirely depends on where you live.

Here the couple I mentioned earlier had to fight for help as the terminally ill man was classed as 'living with someone who can assist' even though his wife was disabled and he was her carer.

The 'help' they received from the LA was a wheelchair ramp that took 13 months to fit and finish.

He also had to use a bath bench for 12 weeks, then a motorised bath seat for 12 weeks before he could be assessed for a wet room (they rent from a housing association so HAD to have the assessment before a wet room could be fitted even if they paid themselves) - despite the fact even the LA's assessment said he couldn't use the bath bench, and that that bath seat would make the bath too small for his 6' length.

The same LA took 14 weeks for a blue badge, and 29 weeks for parking space.

The same LA then took 16 weeks to put a 'care package' into place to help the couple and that consisted of 2 visits of 9 minutes per day. This was removed after they had visitors for 2 visits then missed 2 visits (they were at hospital appointments).

It really, really depends where you live

Yes you are right, I was unclear. PIP includes help for things like socialising and getting out and about.
What I meant, although not what I said, was that the various benefits will mean people get the minimum of being fed, etc. I know first-hand the long wait there can be for adaptations. Although under PIP if you can wash yourself using wet wipes, that is deemed good enough - which I think is a disgrace. But PIP actually does not say that you have to be able to have a shower or a bath.
My FIL was entitled to 3 15 minutes visits a day from the LA and topped this up with other benefits he had. We topped it up still further. I know it varies from area to area.
But I was trying to answer those saying that people had no choice but to rely on family. That is true if you want a decent life. But plenty of elderly people have no one except the care provided by the LA and the care they pay for through benefits.

”But plenty of elderly people have no one except the care provided by the LA and the care they pay for through benefits.”

Not just older people but young adults also. It’s the minimum and will mot always meet your needs, despite what you may think. Imagine a 30 year old who has a neurological condition, is a full time wheelchair user and needs help to get to the toilet. Carers come in the morning to hoist him out of bed, wash him and give him breakfast. They come at lunchtime for a meal and incontinence pad change, again around tea time for a meal and pad change. Then bed time for pad change and hoist into bed. He has full bowel and bladder control but he lives in an area where the maximum offered is 4 care visits per day, so he wears pads because he has no family or friends and he cannot physically get himself onto a toilet or commode. Its not very dignified to have no option but to soil and pee yourself. His other option is a care home. Oh and his financial assessment from social services means some of his PIP is counted as income so he pays towards his social care. It doesn’t leave much left over...

Yes I know that. That is why we pay for FIL to get more carer hours.

clairemcnam I fail to see what any of your posts have to do at all with the DWP calling a claimant a lying bitch on official paperwork, which is what this thread is about!

Yes I know that. That is why we pay for FIL to get more carer hours.

you can afford it. many cannot and have to do without it. LAs don't step just in.

besides, having a disabled FiL where carers come is a world away from having e.g. a disabled child living under your roof for whom you have to provide care. I never have a carer coming to help with my severely disabled daughter and never had even an hour respite care. and I cannot pay a carer out of DLA/CA as this is our income - it's not enough to pay for carers but we have the use it to put food on the table and to put heating on.

Terrible language but I would not have thought you could claim pip for yourself and declare to be a career for someone else. Yes pip is an in work benefit but carers is stating you provide care 35 hours + a week, unless one has a mental condition the other physical I suppose ???

but I would not have thought you could claim pip for yourself and declare to be a career for someone else.

it is legal and many people do. who do you think would do the work looking after a disabled child/partner if they had a disability themselves?

Caring for someone can take different forms. The bulk of the caring I do is watching closely for signs of anxiety, monitoring the environment for things that may cause anxiety and using different techniques to keep my child calm and so avoid distressed behaviour. The typical caring stuff although he is totally dependent on me for it, makes up only a small part of it.

Why are people focusing on being a carer and claiming PIP as if that's the story?
This is why DWP get away with this as more people are concerned about whether you can be a carer and claim PIP.

I’m a carer for my son & I receive pip for my mental health. My son has various complex needs & will never live independently. I am undergoing intensive trauma therapy & my nhs therapist supported my pip application.

Not everything is black & white. I had a professional job before the bottom fell out of my world.

Pip pays for the additional costs of being disabled. If a recipient can’t cook for themselves and also for their children, the pip is available to procure suitable food or help pay for someone to prepare food. If a disabled person requires personal care from local authorities they are expected to contribute from their pip or dla.

None of this precludes them from being a career too. Where a disabled person is assessed as not being eligible for ESA but who cannot work because of caring responsibilities what are they to do? Martyr themselves to death?

Whether she was lying or not is irrelevant here (I haven’t read the story and am obviously not privy to the in’s and outs of the claim so couldn’t possibly know) but it’s the language used here, but again people are focusing on the actual application rather than the fact that an individual in professional capacity referred to a claimant as a “lying bitch” in writing.

If you went into the job centre and started calling the adviser there a bitch and so forth you would be told in no uncertain terms that they operated a zero tolerance policy and would possibly even be escorted from the premises and your claim could be impacted accordingly. Yet it’s ok the other way around and people, instead of focusing on that are nit-picking who should and shouldn’t be entitled to PIP?

This is why pip assessments are so complicated and gruelling, because the disabled are easy targets because many don’t have the ability to keep fighting, and the public and seemingly the DWP just view them as scrounges. And yet disability benefits have the lowest instance of cheating than any benefits.

The DWP is not fit for purpose, I recently supported a family member with their ESA reassessment where they were moved from the support group (highest rate) to being awarded zero points and everything removed. Mandatory reconsideration was turned down and, as with pp on this thread, on the day of tribunal she was phoned and told it should would all be reinstated and back dated to the day of her assessment. They had ignored lots of the info we put and contradicted themselves, it was a mess.

But I have to say that document the font size looks slightly different on the lying bitch part. There's more photocopy fuzz on that line, it's slightly pit of alignment and then with the highlighter.... just doesn't look quite right to me. This isn't a scrawled note or an aside it's in the middle of the formal document. I don't believe it. I can believe they say and think that though, based on my experience.

Out* of alignment not pit

Interesting I didn't notice that. I guess the telling thing would be whether the copy the tribunals received had it as well. No mention of that.

I wonder how many of them have comments from the claimants that the assessor was also a 'lying bitch'.

I just checked it and I have to say it doesn't look a different font size to me. The whole thing is out of line etc so the sentence is no different to the rest of it, really.

Just to update on this the Benefits and Work newsletter reports on this today-

DERISORY PAYMENT TO DWP FOUL ABUSE VICTIM
Also in a newsletter last month, we told readers about the foully abusive term used by a DWP decision maker to describe a PIP claimant in a set of appeal papers.

The story subsequently made the national media and was referred to in the House of Commons.

As a result, the DWP have suddenly changed their mind and awarded the claimant PIP without a hearing or any additional evidence being provided.

They have also written to apologise and are considering a ‘consolatory payment’ of up to £250 for the distress caused to the claimant.

Happily, it appears that her representative is unlikely to settle for such a derisory sum and legal action may now follow.

I so hope legal action is taken against DWP and the claimant doesn't accept the consolatory payment

Very disappointing there isn't more traffic on this thread this is exactly how the DWP and the government get away with this shit

The civil service used to be a thing of pride in this country. Evidently not anymore.