To be concerned about what Liz Kendall is up to with disability benefits?

[Locutus2000]

The Times reporting just how enthusiastic Labour are about targeting the disabled.

I can only hope they are getting the worst ideas out there first, if not I dread to think what is coming in the upcoming review.

I was confident Labour would at worst be no worse than the Tories.

I was wrong.

Free archive link here.

"anyone receiving MA does not pay a penny towards the car they receive. The tax payer pays for it."

Ds's car was £3000 up front.

You are going to end up in a circle here now, because someone will pop up and say PIP money is free.... and round and round we go.

But yep, the cars are not free, and many people have to pay up front for a deposit and adaptions for them.

I have a friend who had a car via PIP, but now she can no longer work so has given her car back so she can use the money for bills etc instead.

if I get higher rate mobility (it’s going to tribunal) I will be getting a second hand car. Through the mobility scheme you still need to pay for any scratches or damages that happen to it and pay for the number plate to be changed when the car is returned. It’s not worth it what if someone comes and dents your car

Why is this article depressing?

The article you link to says she wants to recruit 8,500 more mental health support workers to help tackle mental health issues and help remove barriers to work and stop young people entering "a lifetime on benefits". Don't we all want that?

@Purpleturtle46 yes! I know that's the basic reason many are so pissed off. It doesn't seem or feel fair. What could be done to make your hard work feel sufficiently rewarded so that you feel you are fully appreciated for all your hard work and your time. If you felt you were sufficiently rewarded financially and not being screwed over somehow you wouldn't care so much I imagine about your family member.

I see a system that goes for the easy target and feeds on the very understandable frustration people like you are feeling. It's exploiting people like you in many ways. If we went after the RFamily as one example, who are sucking more from you than your relative, might that prop up a system that enables you to be less exhausted and worked to the bone whilst also raising children. What other losses beyond the vulnerable group are you incurring that you don't realise? There will be plenty.

It's too easy to push people to the brink, get them understandably pissed off and then say ' look at these guys' the lazy, smelly, poor people robbing your cash. They are easy targets.

I was a high earner high tax contributor and then I got very sick with various illnesses and I saw inside a system that terrifies you. Because if you dare step out that system you know that you'll find it difficult to ever get back in again if you become severely unwell, in hospital, need time off. You'll be at risk of losing your home, debts piling up, even legal action whilst you're terrifyingly unwell in many cases.

Your relative might be a lazy bugger to be fair. But it's usually alot more complicated behind the veneer. The RFamily are robbing you more than he is.

You have to pay these costs if you own a car as well

You are going to end up in a circle here now, because someone will pop up and say PIP money is free.... and round and round we go

Indeed. But that argument then must apply to all benefits.

People using their child benefit to buy their children clothes are getting "free" clothes. If they use it buy food, then they are getting "free" food.

Pensioners using their pension credit to pay their gas bill are getting "free" gas.

Etc.

Honestly if I buy a cheap second hand car (can’t have savings over 6k) I’m not fussed if it has scratches or dents. Or if I spill or mark something. But if you do that on a leased car you need to find the money for it

Pensioners have paid in for 40 years.

People that own their own cheap car don't tend to care much for the odd ding or scratch. With lease cars, you have to, as the car is not yours.

I think you have heard some untrue things! You certainly don't have to pay for a new numberplate or for fair wear and tear to the car when it is returned. If someone dents your car, you have insurance just like any car owner.

There are people who are disabled and can not work. There are people who can not work full time because of a disability bit can work part time. Both need more support.

The problem, as I see it, is there are a number of folk who could work but don't, or could work full time and dont and claim benefits or shouldn't be getting benefits.

1. Drug addict, works (as ad hoc tradie), gets PIP. Paid to his Dad who distributes it to other family members also.

1. Man, stands in middle of a sports field, moving around, refereeing sports, 3 or 4 nights a week, then all weekend in summer, most Sundays, reffing cricket. Disability car and on benefits, wife doesn't work either, they have six kids. Three are adults but don't work ... all referee sports matches 3 nights a week as does wife.

1. Cleaner. Works part time, claims benefits. Does loads of hours cash in hand.

All these examples are people I know/know of. What are the strategies for stopping this? There must be a way.m, if there is a will.

Not all of them. Some might not have worked at all.

You're right.

That's how a proportion of people will be using it however. Can I quantify that number? No. But I'd estimate it's a large proportion of claimants based on my experience of supporting claimants historically.

But you can buy a cheap car instead. Getting a lease is your choice.

I know. That is the issue. If you do not need it for care or extra travel costs, maybe you should not be getting it.

I know the form to apply for this quite well. I've supported people in the past. The reality is that many apply because the cost of being unwell has impacted their earning ability. So they use this to enable a basic standard of living. Even though the intention of this is to enable back to work.

The problem often lies beyond needing financial support for material assistance to enable work ( equipment for examples which this benefit zones in on).

Even I forget it's actual intention because the questions and the approach to assessing need feels quite odd.

But it is not awarded based on that.
For some, PIP is not enough to cover the costs at all. They don't get more because they need it, any more than someone gets less because they don't.

I'm really sorry, your situation sounds similar to mine. I've had many hospitalisations for treatment-resistant depression over the past 20 years, I've even had ECT. A lot of people just don't get it. They don't see the full spectrum of depression, only the sort in the adverts and so-called MH awareness campaigns where people feel a bit blah but they open up to friends and go to the GP and take sertraline and everything's better. They don't see the catatonic patients on locked wards or the ones being wheeled into ECT suites. They don't see me googling everything unfamiliar I eat and drink to check it won't lethally interact with the MAOI I'm taking because none of the other drugs worked.

I won't offer up any platitudes but I will say that your post was meaningful to me, and I'm glad that you were here to post it.

I do agree in some cases. Yet, there will be cases where individuals will apply for what they can to enable a BASIC standard of living in the face of no employment due to ongoing sickness or disability which does make work unviable.

That is why I specified Pension Credit, which is non-contributory.

But pensions are paid for by the taxpayers of today.

I do think the increase in people getting LCRWA is due in part to there being no extra money for LCW group since 2017. LCW now get the same as someone with full work search commitments, except they could be in that group for years.
And people applying for PIP because even LCRWA amount is grim to live on.... and there has been talk of only people on PIP getting the extra money at some point.

But there are people long term sick on ESA not entitled to PIP. They have to manage

I have suffered from depression on and off for 30 years. Until very recently, people with mild/moderate depression/anxiety were encouraged to keep working precisely because having more time to think about things is likely to make their condition worse. Somewhere in the past decade or so, being signed off the moment you have any sort of mental ill health seems to have become the norm. This isn’t good for individuals or society, not least because once people have had a few months off, the chances of them ever rejoining the workforce plummets.

GPs should not be signing people off so readily. They also shouldn’t be encouraging people to diagnose themselves/ask for a sick note upfront, but my GP surgery’s app now includes the questions ‘is there any condition you think you might have?’ and ‘is there any outcome you would like, eg further tests, medical certificate?’. Those weren’t options until recently. It should be for the doctor to answer those questions, not the patient. I can only assume it’s yet another way of saving the NHS time.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/sep/23/cost-of-grant-that-funds-uk-monarchy-to-rise-by-more-than-53

This article is quite short for those who are willing to just look here.

Look at the picture of those two silver spooned bell ends and tell me why they are off the hook as part of this ongoing debate? Just look at them. These people make me physically sick more than any pie head scrounger who is actually defrauding the system ( and yes they need to be addressed).

Why aren't more people angry at these guys. Do you think they work akin to the guy slaving away every day on a building site? Therefore do they deserve this life of luxury and ridiculous decadence right now when people are working their arses off to manage a home and a basic standard of living.