To dob in family member - benefits

[Dragonsfoot]

I have a relative that does have health problems. They went to tribunal and were awarded higher rate PIP and have a motorbility car apparently supported by a Rottweiler of an advocate. I have no gripe that they deserve something - occasional falls, mild mental health problems, physical health problems that require monitoring and support and mild difficulties dressing themselves due to joint problems but don’t actually need to be helped. They do have a disability.

However, they are able to walk miles most of the time, decorate their home, complete domestic tasks and attend social activities on a very regular basis on foot. Morally torn. They probably will struggle without the money. Would DWP even do anything kind of thing. Either way I feel a bad person.

DLA was completely separate from other benefits, and as with PIP didn’t assess work capability. You’re correct in that it merged two separate benefits of the time - the attendance and mobility allowances - to basically do same thing as PIP does now, which is to assess the extra costs attached to disability. But the assessment criteria were very different from that of PIP, and assessors had some degree of autonomy, whereas PIP criteria are more tightly controlled.

DLA only assessed physical disabilities and l remember the controversy you mentioned about those conditions and a few others too. There were many cases denied on that basis and at the time weren’t allowed to be challenged at appeal because they were deemed outside the remit of DLA.

When PIP replaced DLA it was opened up to mental health conditions, cognitive difficulties and learning disabilities - mainly because there was no choice. By then the Equality Act 2010 had provided a legal definition of disability and that had to be built in to the eligibility criteria - which is also why there doesn’t have to be a formal diagnosis to be eligible for PIP - the EA determines you don’t need one to be considered disabled. It’s not the condition that matters, it’s the effect on the claimant.

I think you make a really good point in that all of these changes have inevitably impacted the numbers of claimants - the number of appeal tribunals has also increased because of the poor quality of decision making based on a fundamentally flawed system, and that has massively increased the cost to the tax payer.

Instead of addressing these problems and properly overhauling the system, successive governments have tinkered around the edges and made things progressively worse for claimants by blaming them for the increase in claims. It’s been progressively fed into the public consciousness that fraud is the reason, and that the tax payer is being fleeced by dishonest claimants. It’s a false notion but you only have to look at some of the comments here to realise that many people are more than happy to accept this with no critical thinking applied.

So here we are seemingly quite happy to have Joe Public randomly reporting as suspected benefit cheats, any claimant who doesn’t fit their perception of ‘disabled enough’. I can’t imagine how that’s going to improve the lot of such people, whose lives are already significantly more difficult than those doing the reporting. There are undoubtedly cheats in the system, but on past experience successive changes to the system designed to catch them out only end up making things much harder for the genuinely disabled and vulnerable.

Yes I agree.

I do, honestly, understand why fit and healthy working taxpayers get so angry about the massive increase in disability payments. It is creeping towards unsustainable.

But, it’s pointless blaming the claimant and accusing them of being cheats.

One government after another (including this one) just try to shift the blame onto claimants.

We’ve had the Benefit Integrity “reform” under Major - it ended up with more people getting more money.

We had the Right Payment Programme “reform” under Blair, and as above. More people claiming.

And, so on, through every government.

If the money and will was there to really improve mental health services, for children and adults, enough de-tox programmes, support workers, children’s services etc then it may be that a lot of people wouldn’t need to prop their lives up on benefits, and could have better lives.. They could be helped in a long term way and lead a full life. .

Obviously, some disabilities couldn’t be helped very much - an amputee will never grow their limbs back. Certain diseases can never be improved that much. But, some could.

But, no government can ever seem to do that.

The NHS is just a failing system that needs complete reform. But, it won’t happen. Social care (children and adults) is collapsing. Special needs provision for children seems a huge mess.

Schools are under strain with teachers trying to prop up the needs of some children and having to do tasks they were never employed to do.

I don’t know what the answer is - but it’s definitely not getting stroppy with claimants.

My controversial view is that if basic out of work/top up benefits were increased there would be a drop in the numbers of people claiming disability related benefits. Single unemployed people under 25 get a little over £300 a calendar month in UC if they have no other eligibility. That's not enough to maintain a healthy lifestyle, especially if you have to top up your rent, and certainly not enough to enable people to look for work - they're just trying to survive at that level. For single people over 25 it's £400 and for couples £628. It seems so obvious that sustained poverty will cause health issues and also that if you're on that low an income it would be sensible to try to increase it by whatever means were available.
As you and Ross have said, blaming claimants for claiming what they're entitled to is commonplace. Evidently blame culture is satisfying for certain types of (rather unimaginative ) people but ultimately pointless. Government needs to look at how to help people achieve their potential, not set them up to fail and then beat them with a big stick for doing just that.

You see I remember patients claiming DLA for severe and enduring mental illness in the 90,s such as shizophrenis ,Bi polar etc .

You see I remember patients claiming DLA for severe and enduring mental illness in the 90,s such as shizophrenis ,Bi polar etc .

Yes, but it was fairly unusual. Established mental heath conditions were sometimes included, but it was basically more physical things.

Yes, you’re right. There were a very limited number of MH conditions for which you could claim DLA back then. If I remember rightly MH conditions were divided into Organic and Functional categories. Organic conditions were admissible because they were thought to have a physical cause involving brain stem abnormalities or disease, whereas functional was thought to be purely psychological and outside the remit of DLA.

Studies since then have informed the admission of most MH conditions into the scope of PIP, AA and child DLA because it’s accepted that all MH conditions have a biological basis involving brain function and structure. In addition, the Equality Act 2010 gives the accepted legal definition of disability and includes mental as well as physical health conditions, so disability benefits have evolved in line with that.

Well, you might be right, but there would be even more resentment, with working taxpayers feeling they are supporting those with NO health problems.

The arguments then would be to get a job/work more hours. 🤷‍♀️

It happened before, in the 80’s, with people getting furious about the so called Giro families knocking out babies. (As they saw it).

There will always be this aggro between those who work/those who don’t, and those that are claiming disability benefits. 🤷‍♀️

Yes, things like spectrums, anxiety, ND etc didn’t get into the equation.

It was just a different time. 🤷‍♀️

I think it’s going to be very difficult to reform PIP, or indeed any of the other disabilty benefits, to specifically exclude MH problems now. The Equality Act provides the legal definition of disability and that includes mental health conditions, so they can’t be disregarded as disabilities for the purposes of PIP. I think the only way forward is to tighten up the eligibility descriptors in such a way that claims for MH conditions can be made, but only severe and enduring conditions would actually qualify.

It’s also been suggested that a basic universal income would go some way to solving the problem, but for the life of me I can’t see how it would be sustainable.

Well, no, I don’t think that would work with so many financial constraints.

As I say, I don’t know what the answer is, but it’s pointless just moaning at claimants. Everyone is trying to work through a system that doesn’t work too well. For anyone. 🤷‍♀️

There's an awful lot more conditionality now when claiming out of work benefits. I think that would be used to mitigate anger at a rise in UC. And also, what's the alternative? We can't continue to justify people's health and prospects being wrecked because the link between a very basic level of subsistence and levels of benefits has been broken. This is a disaster happening in slow motion and with the effects of the renter's rights act yet to be seen, pretty soon it's set to get even worse as more and more people won't be able to afford even basic housing.

If you saw my DD you'd think she didn't deserve PIP. They've also said she can apply for a mobility car. But she struggles with journeys she doesn't know, needs someone to go on unfamiliar trips with her, she has awful mental health and autism.
You can't see these things but it doesn't mean they don't exist. If you are 100% certain they are lying you can report but they must have a good deal of evidence to have got PIP in the first place.

I am pointing out that the op's attitude is horrible, that you never know how much someone is masking and that op should mind their own business.