‘Game the system’ disability benefits

[Tomatochocolate]

WTF
just read a bbc article about welfare reforms

Apparently ministers think that it’s an incentive to claim disability benefits as the incentive is no work commitments on UC. That claimants ‘game the system’

It’s a long process and really hard to get awarded dla or pip. It’s not just ticking a box that says ‘I’m too sick to work’.

AIBU to think this is just horrific

Bull shit ,it goes off how it impacts the child not the diagnosis, DLA won't just be accepting mums word for it they will want reports from professionals, and are likely to contact the children's school to see how they are there

Nobody is saying PIP is an out of work benefit. Full credit to those claiming PIP who are still managing to work. It's not a disability/sick bashing forum, it's a fraud bashing forum. Big difference.

Agree i get pip and i work i do the grave yard shifts all night i dont tell people i get it because i know id get well why this why that you work you dont need pip.
You look fine whats wrong with you bla bla bla.
I even get quoted on MN about how i type got told the other day to get english lessons.
No point in typing out why im nuts or why my comments are black and white because know on will understand it.

@GlitteringBall

Nobody is saying PIP is an out of work benefit.

OP did just this.

I can't understand why anyone that isn't themselves 'gaming the system' would disagree with this. We see it every day on here - people providing advice on how to optimise their hours so they can claim, people with no qualms about admitting they stay in social housing despite being able to rent privately, wealthy people hiding money in pensions so they can claim free childcare hours and reduce tax, people claiming sick pay despite not being ill,the list is endless. We need to stop all of this playing the system so that every penny we save from the gamers goes to those in genuine need.

The problem is that there are people who game the system, I've met them through work and absolutely they could work. It's less about pip though (you can work and claim pip), more long term uc claimants who don't see why they should work.

It's the nature of my job that I have contact with people who have not had easy lives let's say yet that doesn't give you a pass to never work.

I'd like to see those genuinely unable to work and with extra costs get more not less, just to weed out those who are work shy

You are looking at this the wrong way.
There are people who's job it is to get the highest award possible. It's a long drawn out process, but they will get it in the end. They onky care about the outcome and just go along with the process. If they'd put that much effort into a career, they would be on the top of their game.

I just feel sorry for people who really need this benefit for genuine reasons. They are the ones who will find the process taxing and intrusive. They are also the ones who often give up half way through or don't appeal decisions.

I don't know what the answer is, if you want to help people - as in having a welfare state- you always attract a few that will abuse the system.

And they've been corrected on this thread. LCWRA is what they are meaning I believe. As I understand it you are more likely to get LCWRA if you have PIP already.

@GlitteringBall
Full credit to those claiming PIP who are still managing to work. It's not a disability/sick bashing forum, it's a fraud bashing forum. Big difference.

It is disability bashing when people claim that it is a fact that a large number of claims are fraudulent/that people are gaming the system.

When in reality the DWP's own research has shown that fraud when it comes to PIP is close to 0%.

There is no evidence that the benefit is widely abused yet that claim is made over and over in threads.

The two are unrelated. I've had no issues with LCWRA and being reassessed. I had to fight for pip.

The criteria for both benefits is different

I have adhd, autism, I’m completely deaf in one ear and take medication for anxiety. I didn’t even bother trying to claim PIP as outwardly I look ok. I mean I work part time, I drive, I have kids, been with my dh over 20 years and I’m seen to be managing. On the inside though it’s a completely different story. My dc is autyand I get carers allowance for him but I pushed myself to get a little job (even though we were managing financially) to make me feel “better” in myself but going back to work actually made me feel worse. My anxiety increased threefold, I realised pretty quickly that I didn’t fit in with my work colleagues and bad memories of previous employment came flooding back,

I was often misunderstood and made to feel stupid if I didn’t get something straight away. I was bullied years ago in a different workplace and so when my ds started struggling at school I left my job and thrown myself into raising him and getting him all the support he needs. I wasn’t diagnosed until I was 37 and I hoped it would make me feel better about myself and I convinced myself that going back to work would do me confidence the world of good but far from it. I’m currently working in a different job doing a few hours week so yes I still receive carers allowance but I earn just under the earnings limit for carers which is actually an increase in hourly rate but the work is much harder (understandably) and I feel like I’m drowning. I plan to stick at it though as I do enjoy the work but I will never fit in around NT people and I will always have work anxiety. It will be so much worse in a few years when i have no choice but to find a full time job and I’m already worrying about it years in advance eg worrying I won’t cope and will burnout all the time. I won’t be eligible for PIP so I won’t have a choice but being autistic i’m already catastrophising and I’m sh*t scared for my future. So whilst I don’t agree with fraudulent claiming benefits in the whole I don’t bake people for telling the truth and elaborating ever so slightly especially women as you’ll find for every day one woman who over exaggerates their struggles you’ll find two who okay down their issues and don’t get awarded anything. It isn’t fair but it is what it is.

And a lot of people (in fact most according to ONS IIRC) have their mental health diagnosis as a secondary diagnosis to a physical one. Because unsurprisingly having a terminal condition or living with constant pain or a condition that limits your everyday life isn’t always great for your MH.

I might have known the workers rights bill would come up. MN simultaneously doesn’t want make reasonable adjustments for employing people with disabilities, have legal protections against unscrupulous employers who don’t want to make adjustments or pay welfare to people who can’t work if those adjustments aren’t made.

Perhaps we should just line people up and shoot them.

This is at least in part due to UC being so inflexible and punitive. It's very all-or-nothing - you're either able to work full time and hit the earnings thresholds, or you are deemed to have LCW/LCWRA and have zero work commitments. There's no in between for those who could manage part time work, but not full time, but don't want/need to claim disability benefits.

There's been a big fuss made about people who were self employed on tax credits but making very little money, and the solution was posited as UC and the minimum income floor.

But fact is, a huge number of long term unemployed (and let's be honest, often unemployable) people back in the 2000s/2010s were strongly encouraged to go self employed and claim tax credits. It suited the government of the time to get them off the unemployment figures. Many of them were never going to be capable of supporting themselves fully via self employment, but the old tax credits system allowed for that and they ticked along ok. They were poor, because they didn't earn much and tax credits only topped them up so much, but they managed to survive.

Also, old style housing benefit was not conditional. It was solely income based - if you couldn't afford a home, it helped you out. Now, UC housing element is subject to the same conditions as the rest of a UC award. If you don't meet your work commitments, you stand to lose your home.

Now that UC is pretty much fully rolled out, those chickens are coming home to roost. That same group of people are not magically employable or capable of full time work all of a sudden - they're now having to claim disability benefits in order to get the work commitments lifted or to prevent homelessness, whereas before they could manage on the subsistence income they got from part time work plus tax credits and/or housing benefit.

We have reached a point where as a society we're not able to pay the luxuries of these benefits anymore. Someone in this thread mentioned they get a pip for ADHD. That is an incredible luxury not offered in the vast majority of countires worldwide.

We can't in-debt our children further to pay for these anymore, so it will stop or change. Either that or those working and not claiming will have to pay even more. That won't be millionaires/billionaires, that will be people on average wages.

I was very defensive of benefit fraud until I’ve seen it with my own eyes many many times. In the area I work there’s a culture of being reliant on UC and people ‘help’ each other ‘pass’ the assessments etc to qualify. It’s sad and it’s not a nice life but people DO do it.

It has to be possible as I know someone who claims it, I spend hours every day with them so I'm fairly clued up on what they can/can't do and they have also openly told me they told the PIP assessor that they live with a family member who helps them wash/dress/cook. But even though on paper she lives with her family member (names on bills, etc) she actually lives in a different town in a rented flat, on her own. Nobody is dressing, washing her or feeding her. She gets full PIP. They may have to provide evidence but what evidence can there be? She's back and forwards to the dr and repeatedly tells the dr how ill she is and how she can't do anything so guess there's letters there, etc "supporting" her.

My dd is unable to work due to health and we can't even face doing PIP as she's heard what a battle it is. On the surface she is young and should be healthy. But she spends 3-4 days a week laid up on the sofa in agonising pain screaming and projectile vomiting. No diagnosis. Every consultant has said they can't find anything wrong with her, discharged from gynae, discharged from gastro, rheumatology gave her a diagnosis of EDS but we have no proof that it affects her the way it does. She gets fired from every job for too much sick time. She'd love to work. She doesn't even claim UC as she doesn't feel well enough to do that. So I do get that some people are genuinely ill with unseen conditions and should be able to get benefit.

It’s the government planning to cut benefits, not posters on MN, and we’ll find out what they’re doing on 26 March. You can disagree but it looks like it’s happening and far deeper than anyone expected during the election or under a Labour government. It won’t be the conservatives giving the government a hard time but the Labour back benches who’ll be spitting tacks.

DWP have reported that there is 0% fraud in PIP claimants.

Fraser Myers has done some interesting investigations into this and given some eye-opening interviews about it. He claims we currently have the equivalent of the working population of Scotland on long term sickness benefit.

This is simply unsustainable.

From what I've seen and understand (please correct me if I'm wrong)

It doesn't look like they're looking at PIP but rather the LCW/LWRCA on UC but I guess we won't know until end of March.

@tfresh
We have reached a point where as a society we're not able to pay the luxuries of these benefits anymore.

WTF?

You think helping someone cope with a disability is a 'luxury'?

What do you think should be done with disabled kids and adults?

Do you think they should consider that their lives is now expendable and do the 'right thing' and curl up in a corner and die so that Reeves can balance the books?

Ableism at its worst.

I work in social care and have to support tenants with applications for a variety of benefits. There are absolutely a handful of people attempting to play the system. But by and large its unheard of. I spend more time helping to submit appeals for genuine claimants who cant get the help they need than anything else I do!

About every 18months or so, and with every incoming government (and let’s be honest the Tories have given us a few over the last 14years) we have a crackdown on people ‘gaming the system’ and fraudulently claiming. Making it harder to get and cutting them back.

How’s that been working out to reduce the welfare bill so far?

Surely it's Reeves and Labour you'd direct this at. It's their approach.

In my view PIP and DLA should be means tested. I understand the reasoning for these benefits - that it’s more expensive to be disabled - but this should only be addressed through the public finances if it leaves the disabled person with a below average standard of living.