Changes to PIP

[Orangesandlemons77]

It looks like to qualify for PIP people will need 4 points in one area, see here from the Times
"In future, ministers will require applicants to score at least four points on at least one activity to qualify"
Not sure if this means in each section (care, mobility)

This would exclude quite a few people I think

PIP does not and is not designed to replace a work income. It's not an alternative to work. When people say PIP is not an out of work benefit, that's what they mean.

It enables people to afford to take the afternoon off to go to a medical appointment, it enables people to afford the help they need to access work, like therapy, or mobility aids, taxis for their bad pain days, or a cleaner so they can manage their home a little easier. PIP gives disabled people options, and the freedom to explore their own solutions to their problems. Sometimes those solutions can enable people to work, sometimes not.

37% of PIP claimants get full mobility and full daily living combined. They're absolutely not able to work, you have to be very very ill to qualify for that. 20% already work. So there's 43% of claimants somewhere in between. Being able to walk 50m or feed themselves, but who nonetheless have conditions that prevent them from working, (sometimes because accessible workplaces are not really a thing if you have almost any mental health condition). Those people deserve freedom and options too, to find their fulfillment wherever they can.

To reduce the cost of disability benefits they need to fix the NHS and ensure that timely diagnosis and treatment is available to everyone. Wealth tax to achieve that if necessary. Not just ask the people they themselves have defined as disabled to struggle more.

It boils my piss, honestly.

This worries me. My ds1 gets pip, standard for both parts. He also works. He has autism and his work are very understanding. His job is also only 15 minutes walk from our house which is good for him as he struggles with public transport and can only use it if he doesn't have to be somewhere at a specific time and dh is around to rescue him if needed. His award is up for renewal this year and I'm scared he will lose it. I've had a lecture from his grandparents today saying he shouldn't be getting PIP.

What extra costs does he have in relation to his disability?

We can't leave him on his own for long so he has to come with us on days out that he isn't interested in which costs money.

We still need a bigger car when most people his age would be staying at home or driving themselves instead of being involved in family outings.

He is restricted with the work he can do.

He needs a parent to be around so dh and I are restricted in the work we can do.

He needs prompting/reminding to do stuff which takes time.

I can't think of anything else off the top of my head, a lot of it we just do and we forget that most people don't do things for their adult children.

So really instead of freezing / restricting pip and doing whatever they plan to cut LCWRA perhaps they should instead have added an extra amount for those on PIP and in work ? So an incentive if you’re able to work rather than a punishment for everyone ?

I think you are wrong. The people you talk about with less severe mental health issues, don’t get PIP. It’s very hard to get.

It is all very well putting the onus on getting into work on the disabled person, when there are often significant barriers to them getting work. What would be better would be a financial incentive for employers to take on disabled people to begin with.

Oh I absolutely agree with you . I just feel that taking anything away from a whole group of people is wrong and was thinking what could be another option. Employers are going to have to have pressure on them to support candidates even at selection and interview stage they will have to modify a lot and yet ive heard nothing about this at all only about 1000 extra work coaches who I assume demand you apply for certain roles but will wash their hands of you when you pass over to being employed ?

It does need overhauling, same as other benefits. Of course there is fraud, as in every area of welfare, particularly in recent years with today's entitled attitudes. There are often threads on here about it.

If that is the case, the media drip feed still suggests they're about to use a sledgehammer to crack a walnut. I will go under if they decimate working age sickness and disability benefits in the ways the reports suggest so far. It will kill me, I'm not exaggerating. I'm too unwell to fend for myself these days and given what I've read in the last 24 hours I look likely to fall through the ever-narrowing cracks in both benefits. The idea of it is already exacerbating one of the diseases I suffer from.

Today they're reporting a likely u-turn on the proposal to freeze rates of PIP from next year, so that there is no fractional annual increase as there usually is. This will apparently placate many of the back bench MPs objecting to the cuts and opposition will be extremely diluted. Frighteningly, that particular aspect of the forthcoming green paper was the least of my worries. They won't apparently be u-turning on drastically reducing UC for people who are too unwell to work, and they seem intent on drastically rewriting the eligibility criteria for PIP in ways that mean I'll no longer be judged disabled.

The only thing that won't change is the level of my disability, but that won't be debated.

PIP will still exist, someone will need one 4 point descriptor instead of all 2 points. If you’re so unwell you can’t fend for yourself you’d surely get at least one 4 point one as they’re the one where you require support to do something, so you’d still get it.

Oh right ok. Thanks

I’d like to ask why several people thought my post describing my difficulties with eating and incontinence and how it was still difficult to qualify for PIP was funny enough to click the “laugh” reaction on it?

I’m very concerned by a lot of the posts on threads like this and I hope that the posters who don’t understand or don’t care about disabled people are unusually concentrated on MN, but adding a laugh reaction to a post like mine seems especially unpleasant.

So many people seem to forget that you can go from being fully able bodied to paraplegic like me in the blink of an eye, it’s not something that everyone has from birth as I have. A stroke, a car accident, an unlucky fall and you can easily find yourself facing the huge extra costs of living with a disability. I suspect that’s the point you stop finding it so funny.

And that's people like me screwed. I only scored 2 points on descriptors. But there's a huge misunderstanding of my disabilities and I had someone attempt to fill in my firm who missed out so much information.

Going through the criteria I should get 4s in a few areas

A relative of mine receives full PIP. She was already on both higher rates for MS and severe anxiety and MH issues (hallucinations etc, exacerbated by the stress of managing a condition like MS). She is now terminally ill and qualifies under the special rules for those with less than 12 months to live. She's in a right state about this, worried her PIP will be removed. We're reassuring her but this rhetoric doesn't help people with MH conditions.

Her MH is just as disabling as her MS IME.

I also have a friend who claims PIP (standard rate mobility) primarily for Epidermolysis Bullosa. An extremely painful and rare genetic skin disorder which causes fragile skin which tears and blisters easily, especially when walking. My friend's PIP helps fund treatments the NHS doesn't offer (like botox which reduces sweating, which reduces friction and reduces blistering). It also helps fund special socks (£14 a pair) which helps them to walk, fund the best shoes to maximise how far they can walk and pay to replace these frequently. Their dressings and creams for EB mean their shoes and socks wear out much quicker than normal.

My friend has to constantly plan their every step and they can quickly go from managing to walk to needing to stop with little warning. Then they need to pay for a taxi home.

PIP is the main means my friend can prove their disability. This means they quailify for a a disabled railcard and a bus pass. They have to use trains and buses a lot, especially for short journeys most people can walk, so this helps reduce the cost of this.

My friend works (with many reasonable adjustments) but is limited in what work they can do, and which employers will tolerate their needs. The push away from WFH is causing them issues now as WFH is a reasonable adjustment their employer is seeking to limit.

I share this as a PP asked about how PIP works for disabled people in work.

If anyone will be protected it will be people claiming under special rules.

I just don't understand why they're targeting us disabled people and not the larger group of people who aren't disabled, who choose not to work and claim UC and whatever else they get for sitting at home all day. Those people are able bodied. If it's people at work they want, why not them?

I'm on the highest rate of PIP for both elements, so yes, I'm very unwell. Confined to bed, constant agony, awful symptoms, I'm not entitled to anything else. I've been trying to find a WFH job I can do from bed, with enough flexibility for me to rest when I need to/be out of it on pain meds.

I've been looking for about six months now, with not so much as an interview. I've never known anything like it. I'm an educated professional and have lost everything because of my shit body, and they want to punish me even more for my measly £409 a month that doesn't even cover half my rent.

It's madness isn't it. I don't think people like you have anything to worry about with PIP being cut though. They will just make the criteria stricter and will be for new claims. The problem is that so many people are claiming sickness/ disability and . Over 3/4 of people having a work capability assessment are being awarded LCWRA.

If you are on the highest rates of PIP, then you are getting more than what you have written here. I am more concerned with the fact that the Government is not looking in the right direction, in their desperation to save money.

You really shouldn't have to justify it to a stranger on the Internet. It's none of their business.

No, that's what's you get after you pay for a mobility vehicle.

Because they're idiots. Best ignored x

It’s not an out of work benefit. 🤷‍♀️. Plenty of people work and claim it.

Ach, don't spoil the fun of the bigoted by pointing out facts to them.