Don't be poor, disabled, sick or elderly . .

[MistressoftheDarkSide]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2024/apr/19/rishi-sunak-sicknote-culture-welfare-reform-post-office-horizon-conservatives-labour-uk-politics-lastest-updates

So this is a big part of the next Tory strategy to get elected.

I hope the buggers don't get in

@Decoart I am so sorry for what you and your family are going through. I sincerely hope your DD pulls through and you manage to find some peace and stability in your life. Your tragic story is the perfect example of why we need a functioning health service and an effective safety net. Having destroyed the health service, the Tories now want to remove the safety net. It is shameful and I am disgusted that anyone thinks that this is a good thing.

Lol @ "get a job and work like everyone else".

You realise that men are currently able to walk away from former spouses and partners and their children, reduce working hours to reduce reportable income, falsify income if self employed, and not pay a penny toward the care and keeping of their children, and refuse to do any parenting so the mother has to?

You clearly have an interest in current affairs or you wouldn't be commenting on this thread, so you're aware of the cost of childcare, waiting lists for available spots in nurseries, the housing crisis, and the state of the rental market, right?

What exactly is factually incorrect about either of the things I said?

“We’re also going to test shifting the responsibility for assessment from GPs and giving it to specialist work and health professionals”

Ah. So they're going to get Capita to pay some ex-nurse peanuts and incentivise them to reject applications. So we'll have people with zero experience of mental health claiming they know better than experienced consultants who have known the patient for years. We know that will happen as it is what happens with benefits assessments currently.

So then they will have to put in place another expensive tribunal appeal system at which, as with benefits, the appeal success rate will be 65-70%, and there will be precisely zero saving financially against a lot of suffering amongst the disabled.

And that is why they haven't tried this nonsense over the last 14 years. The fact that the current batch seriously put this nonsense forward shows us just how stupid they are.

So then they will have to put in place another expensive tribunal appeal system at which, as with benefits, the appeal success rate will be 65-70%, and there will be precisely zero saving financially against a lot of suffering amongst the disabled.

Yep. None of which the "but they get something I don't!" brigade who base their votes on spite and indignance over stuff like this will even think to consider.

Apologies if this point has already been made, but with a roasting in local elections less than a fortnight away, and heavily forecast to lose the soon-to-be General Election, the Tories are in full panto mode this last week or two. Ignore the laughable cunts.

I think he means some GP's write out sick notes for 6 months at a time. So in a way they do determine who is classified as sick. DWP accepts GP sick notes as too sick to work.

Only the cunt proportion.

You’re entirely welcome to any of the perceived “perks” of my disability as long as you take the rest of it. Hope you don’t mind chronic respiratory failure and dying young. The parking “perk” in Tesco really makes up for it. 👌🏼

I don't understand it. David Cameron's son had very severe epilepsy and sadly passed away. How can you on one hand know the impact of ill health and on the other not care.

They won't have felt the financial impact the way ordinary people do.

Nice to see the usual crowd on here.
It’s still bloody cold in the north east. I have £123. 00 to last me two weeks. Two bills is £10.00 each to pay and one of £39.00. Part of this problem was my utilities going up from £79.00 per month to £123.00. Strangely, my PiP didn’t go up to cover this increase, or the increase in food, travel etc.
Anyone who knows someone conning the system, I think you either don’t know the full story or are exaggerating. Anyone voting Tory or Reform, you’re a cunt who is slowly starving people like me into the gutter.
Funny thing is, I predicted this in 2010, on Mumsnet and got told I was being unreasonable…

Who are all these bogeymen who won't work or game the system? Where do they all live?

They get mentioned so much, they must be easily identifiable and well known to the powers that be (who nevertheless are powerless to stop the piss taking on a massive scale...)

This is not quite true. DWP asks for fit notes at the start of an ESA claim until the claimant has the face to face assessment and receives a decision from DWP. If DWP decides the claimant is awarded ESA in the long term, then no more fit notes needed.

I don’t understand why you are so defensive in response to my post. If you are (and I have 0 way of knowing this as you are someone on an anonymous online forum) actually disabled, then you have no need to be defensive. My post is aimed at people who don’t honestly need the support they are receiving.

Notsurewhatsgoingonhere you should be ashamed of yourself, peddling such ableism.

Not sure the financial impact matters - his son died. That’s the same no matter what tax bracket you sit in.

You’ve completely ignored the part of the poster’s post where she has falsely put down her daughter as her carer. You’re also using a blanket definition of fibromyalgia to excuse what sounds like someone claiming a severity that simply isn’t there. On a scale, it doesn’t sound like she has it badly. Other people might, and then they may need support.

The fit note culture is a dog whistle. It has nothing to do with PIP. But most people don't know what PIP is. So he talks about fit note culture and how PIP payments will increase by x% in the next x years (is this fact checked). So most people who are ignorant of the system conflate the two.

Then he tries to say that PIP eligibility aside, payments should be linked to the extra costs of disability and that people who qualify on the basis of disability may not need cash payments because their needs can be met by the NHS and anyway it's it one off payment. So disabled people would have to submit monthly statements of what they actually had to pay for. And mentally ill claimants of PIP don't actually need a cash payment because they have oodles of mental health support from the NHS and even if they don't mental ill health doesn't cost so they don't need a cash payment - especially not every month.

So everything that is not available on the NHS right now would not be available.

But the NHS can only function (barely) on the basis that there is an army of unpaid carers who struggle to survive with PIP and CA. Take it away and the NHS will collapse.

I’m not. I know that’s the way society is now - scream made up things like “ableist” and “TERF” in order to shut down any debate or ideas which disagree with your own.

I don’t agree with that. I agree with supporting disabled people. Some people are not entitled to the support because they are grossly exaggerating or making up disabilities. That’s not “ableist”. It’s more ableist to support skivers and fakers to the detriment of actually disabled people.

this society is fucked because people think you can stop all debate by name calling.

Tories are a few months away from being kicked out. Labour are always more lenient on benefits.

It’s actually all a bit like how you aren’t allowed to say people are fat, despite the fact that overweight people are causing a huge strain on the NHS. But it’s “mean”
to discuss that, so we are having to just pretend this isn’t an issue so people aren’t offended by an issue they are creating.

@Rinoachicken

Completely agree with
You

Ableism is not a "made up thing". There is a lot of prejudice against disabled people, always has been.

Yeh, it’s going to be great. Labour will get in and do exactly as much good as they’ve done in Wales…oh, wait….

but it’s ok because they will tax the private schools, sending students flocking to the already oversubscribed state schools in droves. And the nhs will be fixed by the surplus of people entering the country illegally.

benefits for everyone! Let’s focus on taxing the people who already pay the most tax so that they fuck off! Yay!

It’s gong to be great!