The Welfare Reform Bill

[omaoma]

she's called Mrs Pat O'Nions see here

Only 6,000 people have signed her petition because... I don't know why anybody wouldn't sign it, so hoping it's just lack of awareness and am posting here.

The following blog post - Where's the Benefit - by Lisa, about how the government's proposed and imminent welfare reforms are going to affect real, breathing people, is what got my attention:

"The Welfare Reform Bill is only one Lords reading short of Royal Assent. Then that's it, all hope is lost and I have that deadline of 2013 when my life will actually become unliveable. I don't want to die; I may not have grand dreams any more but there are simple things I still want to do in life: I want to learn to sing, I want to go to Comic Con. Things I can't afford to do even now... I've got a feeling of this ominous deadline when I lose my DLA in 2013... It's almost impossible for me to even visualise 2014... I just see darkness.
"The current feeling of sadness is compounded by the fact that it doesn't need to be this way. People could have fought against the Welfare Reform Bill but they chose not to. I've always been acutely aware of how much society hates me because I'm disabled; the disablist-motivated abuse when I was in primary school made sure I had it drummed into me for life that I am a second-class citizen. I had thought things were getting better in recent years with things like the Disability Discrimination Act, but clearly I was a gullible fool.
"This year has seen a cornucopia of anti-cuts activity, but most of it has been geared towards saving libraries and trees. I don't see it as a zero sum game, I've campaigned about issues other than the WRB. But apparently the mainstream left does see it that way: The anti-cuts movement chose to fight to save libraries rather than lives. There's nothing quite like that knowledge to really make you feel despised."

"I beg of you, please don't just read, be horrified and pass on. Please do something."

Provocative? Yes. Worth 2 minutes of your time? Surely.

I'm afraid that my own policy is that if you can't afford it, don't buy it or don't do it. Most things that some people want are not necessary anyway. There are things that I would like to do or have but I don't do and I don't get because there's not enough money in the kitty. I was brought up at a time when a debtor was looked on as second class. There is so much debt around now (mortgages apart) because people have been fooled into borrowing and they make things worse for themselves. I have a credit card but I pay it off immediately on the very few occasions when I use it.

You say "Don't buy it or don't do it", Mabel - but how does that bear any relation to the Welfare Reform Bill? Don't buy what? Food? Don't do what? Go out once a week to a day-centre? These are the things that real people won't be able to do if the Welfare Reform Bill is given Royal Assent.

It's not debtors being looked at as second-class - it's Lone Parents, it's the disabled, it's carers, it's those suffering from terminal illnesses.

Try reading these: Blog, Twitter, and Facebook

HuntyCat, #frothers.

Thanks Hunty. I think i might go and end it all now, that was the most depressing response to that OP I can possibly think of.

Did you even read the blog, Mabel? Are you able to conceive of a level of personal wealth below your own? Can you consider the idea that this, and one's physical and/or mental health, might not be intrinsically linked to moral worth? I wish I could think of a witty and inspiring way to say that but I can't so I guess that's the end of this thread :(

Omaoma - please don't get disheartened by one uninformed response to your OP. Maybe Mabel hasn't come back because she is reading the Links? .

If we can educate even one person here and one person there - then we are getting somewhere,one person at a time.

Mabel - so someone that is classed as too ill for JSA, but too well for ESA, so gets no benefit, is wanting frivolities that they can put off buying? Or is it that they just want to EAT AND HEAT THEIR HOMES?

People on benefits don't have credit cards - they don't pass the income checks for one thing. It is NOT people living beyond their means, at all. It is people not getting enough to cover their basic outgoings. Is food unnecessary? Is paying your Gas bill unnecessary? Is paying your electricity bill unnecessary? Is paying your water bill unnecessary? Is buying clothes when your old ones have worn out unnecessary? (Not that most people on benefits can afford to do that - I certainly can't, for myself, what I have got for clothes goes on the dc's clothes).

I read that first response and just thought wtf??? I have already signed this petition because vulnerable groups already have to fight hard enough for their benefits as it is without any more change. My brother was caught inbetween JSA and ESA, and towards the end was declared fit to work, despite being sectioned due to mental health! Sometimes the system is a joke.

FFS! Sectioned yet classed as fit for work by ATOS?!

Some of these new rules are draconian and unneeded.
The disenfranchised in our society are going to be less able to cope the way this govt is going on.

dancingmustard they haven't gone far enough in my view

No maypole, they haven't yet managed to kill anyone yet...give them time.

Honestly, how can ANYONE not be angry about this??

I'm not angry about it. Not yet anyway.

But that's because I don't entirely understand it. People that are campaigning against these changes need to spell out exactly what it is they expect to happen, because lots of us that are skint and struggle to afford basic things get no benefits at all, so it's very hard to understand.

I want to know how much money people can get now, including everything. Prescriptions, FSM's, CTB, HB, and all the other benefits that are available, and how much in real terms they are likley to get after the changes if/when they actually happen.

If I could understand it, I could get angry about it. But as it is, all I know is that people who don't work (for whatever reason) are going to get less money. There is a perception that people who don't work get too much money, so I can see why others aren't bothered, or are pleased, that they might end up with less.

Of course, what disabled people will end up getting is a worry. But again it's very confusing, because 'disabled' covers a huge range of people, and many disabled people can and do work. So even that turns into a grey area.

stretch

people have already died because of these changes

Mark & Helen Mullins

still think they haven't gone far enough maypole?

This government has declared war on the disabled and the ill - fraud on DLA runs about 0.5% but the government is aiming to cut the bill by 20%. Which means that a LOT of genuinely ill and vulnerable people are going to lose the support they need. The government don't care - they have a right wing press happy to spout poison into the ears of people who are only too willing to believe it.

Everyone is feeling the pinch, but the government is very skilfully driving a wedge through society so that people like Maypole really believe that there are loads of people cheating the system. Everyone thinks serious illness and disability will never happen to them, and it doesn't help that the Chancellor talks about people viewing benefits as a 'lifestyle choice'.

Compassion seems to be the most expensive commodity around in the UK right now

I'm very angry about it and have been writing letters left, right and centre.

They're trying to shit on the most vulnerable people in society .

I agree with Slave - need to see some numbers, not just ranting about big banks and not be able to following dreams.
If I can see the numbers and agree it is too many cuts , will happily sign and campaign alongside you.

Pointy, without meaning to be provoctive as I am genuinely trying to understand, but there must be disabled people out there that don't actually need their DLA. Could that be what the government is trying to cut?

I'm thinking of the people I know, I have one friend who is paraplegic, but he has a well paid job and although he undoubtedly deserves money to account for the extra costs his disability means he has, I am fairly certain that he could cope fine without it. I know someone else who recieves DLA for her DD who has the huntingdons gene. She will get ill and probably suffer horribly at some point in her life, but at the moment she is a completely 'normal' little girl. She doesn't even know about it yet because she is too young to need to know and she has no symptoms. While I have a huge amount of compassion for them, I don't really think they need DLA.

Saying that, I do have a few disabled friends who wouldn't be able to come out if they didn't get their DLA, and the thought of them being stuck inside their homes like prisoners because they can't afford to meet up for dinner occasionally is heartbreaking enough, without thinking about how they would afford basic neccesities like heating and food.

I also thought that a lot of the problem with this universal payment thing (which is what I presume is part of what OP is talking about) had nothing to do with people who are disabled. But I'm aware maybe I've been in an ignorant little bubble thinking that genuinely disabled people would never be attacked.

read

who would you cut ESA from?

no-one fills in a 48 page hideous form for DLA they dont 'need' ffs.
That child with Huntingdons is going to go through hell with her family shortly. The equipment she will need will cost more than her yearly DLA. Maybe they are saving it for that?
DLA is incredibly hard to get. Its not based on a diagnosis either but that your day to day living requires more help than a same age peer.

So which of the 4 kept the benefit? Or is this another made up scare story? Sorry to be blunt, but I still do not know what the cuts are and who they will affect.
Can you link to some facts please?

Thank you KalSkirata you have put it more eloquently than I ever could.

The whole point of DLA is that is is designed to help with the extra expenses that come with being seriously ill or disabled, Filofax.

In the case of your friend the question is - would he be able to stay in his well-paid job if he did not get DLA? Chances are he would not and that is the whole point. DLA is not an out of work benefit. I would like to give this government lines - write out 1000 times - 'DLA is not an out of work benefit' - because they just don't get it. It's as if they want disabled people who work to end up with nothing and ultimately costing the taxpayer more.

As for the little girl with Huntington's - I would gladly, gladly, gladly want my tax money to go to her and her parents so that they can actually save up for all the costs and hideousness she is going to have to deal with in her life.

I am not disabled, I receive no benefits. DH and I work hard for our every penny and we are not wealthy. We don't begrudge our money going to help those less fortunate than we are. I despair of people who do.

BTW I also despair of the way this government is hitting working people on low wages so disproportionately - can we see a pattern emerging yet?

youngermother I'd really recommend you have a read of this and then come back and tell me that DLA is easy to get - if this lady can't get it, who can? Someone in a coffin?

just looked at this www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/personal-independence-payment-faqs.pdf

Which states that the PIP, which will replace DLA, will:
a - not affect children under 16 or adults over 65
b - the criteria have not yet been decided, so no-one knows the impact will be negative.

Why does this need complaining against?

Erm - how about the way the changes will impact a hell of a lot of people between the ages of 17 and 64?

I await some wanker telling me my dd doesn't need DLA.
this government have targeted the disabled in away that shows them to be utterly heartless. shocking that people can post such ignorance on here,
it is better that 1 person gets DLA that they don't need than one person who needs it goes without, we can afford it, Dscam finds money for pet projects every week, we have millions going to other countries, yet a disabled person has to go without.
I do hope the shitheads that post (as 2 have) don't cry crocodile tears when their taxes go up to cover the high cost of residential care when families have no choice but to put their family member into care. or when they read about the deaths caused by these cuts

I don't really see the point you are trying to make with that link Kal, obviously all of those people deserve support. And there is no need to ffs at me, I just want to know what exactly it is I'm meant to be getting angry about.

I know what DLA is awarded for and I know what the form looks like, I thought about applying for DS who has AS but it looked like too much effort. If I need to keep doing things for him that his peers parents were able to give up a couple of years ago, then so be it. It doesn't cost me anymore and that's my responsibility as his parent. I think that with the right advice I might have had a chance of getting it, but that doesn't mean I really need it.

Same as this girl with huntingdons. Maybe the money is being saved for her, but wouldn't it be better if those things were provided anyway when they were actually needed? There is no difference between her and her peers at the moment, so I have no idea how she got it. It's not really any of my business, but the whole thing is something I would like to understand better. And if it's as bad as I have heard many on MN say it is, then there are lots of us that need to understand better.