Or Is There Some CF going on here.

[NotQuiteNorma]

Ok, first things first. I'm disabled and familiar with the support packages offered by local authority, but I can't help feel this man is trying it on a tad here? He is given funding for specific activities in this case cinema visits, where he can take his personal assistants. Instead he squirreled the money away to fund accomodation for his 'Pa's' (not carers) for a trip of a lifetime to Florida. The authorities found out he had not been using the funding for what it was specifically provided and want the money back. His contract specifically says that he can not use this money other than for the specific activities it was awarded and the terms and conditions state that the money must be returned if he doesn't use it on those very specific activities.

Cue the DM style outrage and intervention from human rights lawyers....

I can't help feeling he is trying it on a bit here and knowingly trying to circumvent the rules. Funding Is so space that it seems unfair to wilfully misappropriate funds like this knowing full well they should be returned if they were not used on the specific activities the funding was granted for.

Is he not being a little disingenuous spinning this as a sob story?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/disability-68178940

Yes he's been paid already for his social activities - via direct payments which allow him to pay the PAs.
To expect the council to pay a second time for the PAs work is ridiculous

Yeah his a cf’r.

The money is given on the understanding it’s to improve his live in general by being able to go and do things on a daily/weekly/monthly basis. Not to squirrel away 50k of tax payers money to pay for a 3.5k holiday while
then demanding more tax payers money to fund his assistants to come with.

He clearly doesn’t need such funding or want the activities the funded was actually
for so he should give it back.

He says:
"I have never wanted my holiday to be paid for," he said. "But I do object to having to pay for the people that will be working to support me."

If he had paid for his & PAs holiday from the £50k he's saved no-one would have known he'd been squirreling it away. The £50k he'd already been given to pay his PAs 🙄

People can disagree with you without being unable to read, you know.

If he is being given money for wellbeing then I thunk he would be the best judge of what contributes to his wellbeing.

However, most people cannot save 50k without benefits, so the amount he is in receipt of is very questionable.

I don't think the problem is him. I think the problem is with the benefit amounts.

£11k per month in direct payments for 24/7 care.
It's a huge amount....and I expect after this article will be re-evaluated!

I’d guess that’s two staff members wages / ni / tax / pension. Then money for the social outings and trips which Im all for.

But don’t call your life a prison because you didn’t spend that cash on what’s it’s for getting you out the house. The article even says they can and do pay for holidays if asked basically. They are also willing to pay for American careers in America. This man is a cake and eat it guy on someone else’s dime.

If he could save 50k from his benefits then I don't care how disabled he is he is getting too much money

50 grands worth of cinema tickets? That's a hell of a lot of money the tax payers is paying out!!

This.

£11k a month is an insane amount of benefit payment!! That is crazy. Even with two PA’s on call 24/7.

He is also cheeky for having £50k in the bank and then asking for more so he could go on holiday. I would love to go on holiday but no way could I save up for it

£11k is the direct payments monthly - the money to pay his PAs.
On top of that there will be PIP & ESA/LCWRA/housing benefit etc that he lives off! Another £1k at least

He did decide. He must have agreed to cinema trips to be funded for them.

He wants different now, that's another story and needs reassessment.

@WiddlinDiddlin You can save for a holiday like any other person can, using income that is designed for you to spend as you wish (so PIP/ESA/Universal Credit etc). There are generous capital allowances which would allow you to save without your benefits even being affected. Direct Payments on the other hand are for a sepcific purpose, and he knew that.

I think the report is somewhat confusing. There seem to be two issues, the first being the claw-back of his care payments, the second being whether he is entitled to carers he is used for the holiday. So far as I can see, it is only the latter issue that the lawyers are involved with.

Ooh but the rules, the rules! I'm not really bothered that he broke the rules. I don't actually think he's done anything morally wrong. He's got a life limiting condition, he wants carers he knows on holiday with him. It's not like there's nothing wrong with him and he's using the money for other purposes. He's taken control of the money himself, to be used on carers in a way that will benefit him most. Which is what the money is actually for.

This really stings when life is such a struggle at the moment.

To have saved that amount, I think he is receiving too much in general.

Wow... Most people I know feel like we are constantly behind and scraping money together.

He has managed to save what would be a HUGE house deposit???

I don't begrudge benefits and what people need, but it is upsetting when double-income households are working their fingers to the bone and are either barely making it or getting into debt to pay the bills.

This country is absolutely fucked up.

TBH it seems bizarre to say a person must spend their funding on a very specific activity. If it is that, then why not offer a digital voucher for that specific service/ cinema/ activity? He has autonomy but this seems to regiment people in a weird way.
It feels like if it's cash, he should be able to do what he likes with it. But I guess he broke the rules, so tough. I think the rules are shite but that's another story.

To be fair, some of it was saved during covid, when he wouldn’t have had the choice to use it for its intended purpose - so why did the council continue to pay it during that time, or fail to claw it back at that point? If he doesn’t have the choice to save it, it’s madness to have continued paying out when he can’t use it for a prolonged period.

I also don’t think it’s reasonable to expect a disabled person who - presumably - required personal care - to go to Florida without their own regular careers, and expect to use carers out there to save money. That seems really fraught with the potential to go wrong, and be really stressful and unpleasant for the person requiring care.

@takealettermsjones

it says that his care plan did not include holidays. He did not use the money for its intended purpose, so it goes back

and how the heck can he manage to save £50k from all those payments and still be in receipt of it? So to me the payments are too high in the first place

Surely he has still been paying his carers and just saving the cinema payments, which makes no sense as 50k is a lot of cinema tickets!

Unless he has been using the 'cooperative' of people mentioned to care for him and saving all the payments?

@Brotherlove They would have found out eventually when the Council got around to auditing him. Direct Payments money is paid into a separate bank account. Unfortunately, some LAs are very behind on the auditing.

When Direct Payments were introduced, they were billed as giving Disabled people more choice and control over how their care needs were met. They should still do that. But, in order to protect the taxpayers' money, there has to be restrictions to make sure that the money is spent for the correct purposes. A good care package funded through Direct Payments should allow for this type of scenario, but unfortunately in many cases, it's a case of a Social worker asking "what activity would you like to?" And in this case they were told "I'd like support to go to the cinema each week". That was then written into the care package. A good Social worker and a savvy disabled person or their advocate would have got a much more comprehensive and flexible package agreed. That may well have included support for an annual holiday.

Sadly, during Covid, many disabled people cancelled their care and/their activities and bolted their front doors. Some of them did this for a lot longer than the general public as they were so scared of catching Covid. During this time, the money that should have been spent on care often went unspent, and local authorities are now clawing this back as it amounts to hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Makes a bit of a mockery of the whole thing doesn't it. The payments were to get him outside routinely, he's decided not to do that... so is the funding worth having?

Council would be better off paying for a local cinema pass for 1 year, then the funds cannot be transferred. Bit like a free gym membership and slimming world club memberships that overweight people can be entitled to via a GP.

I agree but then you will be told your treating a group of people as sub human or in trustworthy.

Same as when people say money given for children should only be able to be spent on certain things like food or clothes rather than just cold hard cash.

But it actually makes sense in a making sure it goes where needed sense. But just like the food vouchers in Covid, they will and were sold on for upto half price so the addict kinds could use the cash for themselves, and yes I know this because at our old house the neighbour offered me £120 of food vouchers for £60. Crack head she was I refused but someone bought them as the children would eat just some super noodles shared between the five of them as a dinner.