Incapacity Benefit

[TwoIfBySea]

Do you think the reforms are enough? I'd just like to know what others think.

I know some people on incapacity benefit who really are taking the mick and some who should be entitled and are not getting what they need. I do hope they look into the Motability scheme as well.

More money for those who are in need and getting those who use it as an excuse not to work into work sounds good in theory. In practise though, this is Britain after all, screw ups will be commonplace. First thing is to change the name as to say someone is incapable sounds insulting.

Discuss, or ignore, I am killing threads without mercy tonight, might as well make it my own!

my DH's mate is on incapacity benefit. he has no intention of working. he had a back injury at work and is currently on paid sick leave from the company. it has been about 5 years since he worked last and is still getting paid plus getting icapacity benefit. he told us he doesnt want to work ever again as he is better off not. his back by the way, cant be that bad as he picks up his 3 year old twin boys that weigh nearly 3 stone each.
my grandfather who was in his 80's had severe asthma and heart probs couldnt even get a stair lift for his house, sorry im going off the rails a bit now but it annoys me so much.

SILs partner is on IB and has no intention of working. He's never worked in his entire adult life (he's 40 now). He gets it for 'depression' but my PND was far, far worse and I still went out to work. My FIL has insulin-dependent diabetes and hypertension and still goes to work part time, says it keeps him fit and keeps him from feeling low - he's retired and in his 60s.

My pal's husband in Argyll suffered a stroke and was retired early - at 57 - from his job as a headmaster after being in education since he was 21. He has vertigo and quick movements make him lose his balance. He also fatigues too easily to carry on being a full time headmaster.

But he still works part-time as a gas meter reader.

I'd like to see fewer people on IB and those who are on it getting more. It really miffs me when I read about people like SILs partner getting IB and people who have autism and CP getting a hard time trying to claim it.

In the US, it's very, very difficult to get IB.

My ex husband had horrible, awful clinical depression, inherited from his bipolar father. He has a full-time job as a project manager. I asked him how he copes. He tells me that in all honesty, he's glad he works, b/c if he stayed home he'd sink so low he'd top himself.

i will PMSL if they call peter in for an interview. his IB stops in june anyway as he will have been in for 52 weeks. his care part of DLA stopped in July, but his car is still being paid for, thank goodness.

Some people do take the pee, isnt back pain a common used line for IB? not saying all people not working because of back pain are fraudsters, but its pretty hard to test for. theree are some days when i can barely move (i have cervical spondylosis), cant pick up my eldest 2 dd's, and struggle to pick up dd3, but istill wont claim DLA for myself. i mean i could possibly be entitled to low/middle rate, but who will help care for me? my hands can be useless at times, (hence my bad typing lol), and i drop things a lot. i have dropped cups of tea for no reason, its like my hands just stop working. v v embaressing and dangerous.

so why wont i claim? cos i cant bear the thought of being targetted as one of 'those' families who are all on disability. dd1+2 and dh are on it atm. dont want 4 out of 5.

IMO - those who really can't work should perhaps have IB increased (no idea how much it is but I imagine it isn't enough) however those who receive it because it is paid at a higher rate than other benefits but can really do a job but can't be arsed for whatever reason shouldn't get it.

Oh this thread will probably start some rows!

think itsb about 75 per week for peter. not much ,seeing as when he was working he could bring home over 250+ per week.

I thought you had to be pretty bad to not to work at all, b/c of coming from another country, but it was surprising to find out that wasn't the case here.

Thing is, how do you get those who can work to work? Unless, you take away all their cash benefit and make sure their basic needs are met?

I dunno.

I've got a number of friends who could live on disability but who chose not to, including another friend who is completely blind and deaf in one ear who works as a counsellor. His wife is also completely blind and is a maths teacher for hte blind. His daughter has CP, is a hemisplegic, and is also a teacher.

Misdee - exactly - case in point that someone like Peter should be receiving more than a measely £75 a week. How is he doing?

I know a few on it who really could work, and they drive me nuts - they seem to think that they aer good people by staying on it and "voluntarily" helping friends with things (computer work, lifts places etc).

To my mind, if the back/leg whatever it is isn't causing enough problems to stop them doing the computer work etc, then surely a part time data entry job if nothing else is suitable? If they can manage to spend 3-4 hours on the computer each day anyway (probably more), then they could do it in an office.

Sorry, I clearly have a specific case in mind!!!

So, In general, I think clamping will be good if it is done properly.

lol flamesparrow. i cpuld do date entry but they'd have to puit up with my typos lol.

i am not on IB, am on CA for dd1 (who is off school again as a cold is irritating her asthma, several small attacks over the last week, poor kid is shattered).

i know you didnt mean me btw, but am trying to think of jobs i can do when kids are all at school and peter is well.

Lol - he probably wouldn't be very good at the job, but just bloody going would make me happy! (Tis good to see me being nice and hypothetical here ).

I'd even be happy if the incapacitated one was a SAHD, but no... both home. Sooo many families like it too!

I am on Incapacity Benefit. I had worked for 10 years for the same company, until their bad work practices left me with RSI. At first I was told that resting for two weeks would solve it. It didn't. Then they said rest for three months. That didn't help. Ten years later I still have very painful RSI, and I can't work.

Yes, I can type and use a computer - but only for 20 minutes or so at a time, not the constant use that my old job (or data entry) would require. I can write - but only for 10 minutes, because the pain gets too bad. I can't do repetitive movements, because I end up in too much pain.

I have good days and bad, and on a good day I could probably do some work - but on a bad day (and I have more bad days than good) I can't carry a handbag or brush my own hair. Some days I can carry my dd, other days I can't even carry a kettle of water or a bag of shopping. I can't iron or hoover (although sometimes that's not a bad thing ).

I hated being at home not working when I first had to stop, and I would still rather work than not. Having dd at least gave me a reason not to be unhappy being at home all the time. But who is going to employ someone like me - who wants to work, but who has a problem that many employers don't recognise actually exists, and which many others will run a mile from in case it got worse while I was employed by them, and I sued them.

My dh is on a good salary, and we could probably manage without my IB, although it would be hard. But the RSI wasn't something I chose to happen, it would have been preventable if the company hadn't used the working practices they did, and I feel that I'm entitled to something to recompense me for the fact that I am now not able to earn - through no fault of my own.

{angry] It ate my post!

We could almost do with a seperate company set up just to employ people who want to work, but need understanding about sudden time off!

After having just 6 months worth of a job with hyperemesis where they didn't really consider it a valid reason for sudden spates off work (I think they wanted me to come in, go be sick in the toilets every now and then, then come back all spritely and work again!), I can see it from the point of view of a non-constant but debilitating illness.

My last two posts have been very much coloured by the one case (and should probably be ignored what with a slight personality clash making it more personal again ).

It is sooo hard to judge who is deserving of what etc... I like the idea in theory, but don't see how they will manage it fairly

Misdee here is hoping that the reforms mean that Peter gets more and you should claim. This is the point, because so many people are fiddling the system genuine claimants don't want to be seen as scroungers when it is them (you!) who are entitled.

This is also what I was worried about, that people like Peter would get pulled in while those with invented ailments get a hell of a lot and seem to slip through the net. Tell me you at least get a Motability car!

There is a neighbour who stated that if she needed anything she just claimed that she was getting more depressed and she got whatever it was (some kind of loan thing, she didn't want to pay back.)

Flamesparrow I am biased on thinking of a couple of cases so know what you mean.

This person I know, her son is disabled too and her husband gets a carer allowance to look after him and her. But he goes out to work, despite receiving income support through her dla, and she with the bad back is left to carry her son, who is not walking at age 2 and is very heavy. It kind of makes a mockery of the whole thing. Best is she told me how much they rake in (not including the money he gets cash in hand) and it nearly made me pass out, so much more than what we live on and she said it wasn't enough!

There is another neighbour, who is only 18, who is also claiming depression and told another neighbour it was because she couldn't be bothered finding a job. This despite the fact both her parents work very hard.

I'm on IB. It's a stupid system for people on chemo because the majority of people do feel well enough to work for at least some time during each chemo cycle. I've filled in the 'permitted work' forms which allows me to earn a bit of money and have IB, but it's nowhere near what I was earning before I was ill. The first six months of IB is more like £57 a week - god knows how anyone lives on that alone.

I agree they haven't thought about this from an employer's point of view. Many employers simply do not want to employ someone who has been on this benefit because of the need for time off for medical appointments/ill health. In fact, I was listening to a radio 5 phone in about this and was appalled at some of the discriminatory practices out there.

Some of the worst discrimination is to those who have mental illnesses. A schitzophrenic phoned up because he has finally got his schitzophrenia under control with the right medication but no-one will employ him unless he takes a minimum wage job (which he said he would) but he was a qualified engineer (think he was an engineer, can't quite remember!) and no-one will employ him doing the job he loves and is trained to do.

I think the government needs to do a LOT of work with employers and perhaps even incentivise them to help some of these people back to work before we see much effect.

This is such a difficult issue on many levels. On the one hand, many genuine people are going to be made to feel like frauds. On another hand, a huge number of employers don't want to hire people with histories of poor health. On a third hand, how is this going to be put in practice? Are GPs going to have to reassess all their IB patients on a regular basis?

I was on IB's precursor, sickness benefit, for a short period about 12 years ago and came off it voluntarily because I didn't want to completely ruin all future employment prospects. Employers haven't queried a small hole in my cv, but they certainly would have done if I'd left it longer. My GP would have been perfectly happy to go on signing me off no questions asked, but going back to work was definitely the best move I could have made.

I actually work within the benfits system and have a lot of involvement in looking at people claiming incapacity benefit etc. Did you know that the longer someone is receiving IB the more likely they are not to move into work as their confidence wains and it just becomes "easier" and TBH research has shown that eventually the original symptom that the person was signed off with changes to other things like stress or depression. In my area, the average time for someone to be on IB is 11 years.

I work in a disability centre where people with the worst disabilities you can imagine are in work and we can provide grants etc for them to get specialist equipment etc to help them do jobs like "normal" people. I am not just talking about your everyday and more common disability I am talking about things that most of us never have to face and don't even know about.
If they can do it then the majority of people currently receiving IB can do it too.
You don't have to do the job you did before, there may be other jobs out there that you can do without the health condition or disability being a big issue.
Being in work does improve some peoples health, more from a mental perspective e.g motivation, confidence, a sense of being worthwhile etc.
If we were to take out the people who could do some form of work from the IB client group then the government would reach its 1million people target straight away.
They are not meaning for everyone to be in work - far from it - they are not stupid, they know that some people cannot and never will work but there are plenty who can.

yes I can imagine that helsi - even as a SAHM without any medical condition, I can see how you lose your work confidence incredibly quickly once you are not in work for any length of time. I also think you get very used to being your own boss at home and dread the thought of having to do something at a set time every day and being a junior to someone potentially half your age.

the one i am worried about if i do claim for myself (not IB, DLA) is if i become too used to benefits. i want to work, i miss work tbh, even shop-work. i said to peter earlier than depsite what people say, we will be better on when we are both back working. i want to do soemthing, even volunteer work. but am worried about the amount of days when i am barely able to move or lift anything.

anyone who feels like they want to work orcould work can always see the Disability Employment Adviser in their local jobcentre or speak to companies like ShawTrust who are there to make sure that people know about all the options availale to you with regard to working. they know all about employers who have qualified and been awarded the disability symbol which means they are proactive and embrace the employment of disabled people.

I havent read all of the thread but i have just started to claim this but have yet to get any money but they did try and get me back into work with me before even getting anything and with a broken leg. It did make me laugh as i cant work at the moment even if i wanted too.

When I was unable to work cos of my hip problems, I was in touch with the local council's Rights Advisor, who was sorting out what benefits I could get.

My dh was getting loads of hassle at work, and what with the stress of our home situation, dh basically chucked his job.

The Benefit Rights Advisor told me to get dh to the doctor, say he had depression, and then he would help us to apply for IB for dh

Of course, we wouldn't even think about it (even tho he was out of work for 3 months). But if officials are giving out this advice, what hope is there?

Easy, my sister used to work at a doctor's surgery and she has actually heard a member of staff (nurse I think) advising teenage girls that they will get a house if they get pregnant!

I know a woman (lovely by the way, it's just this one thing about her that makes me livid)who has never worked due to a bad leg. She gets a car and everything. Strangely the bad leg didn't stop her having 4 horses! A couple of years ago she had an operation on the leg (at vast expense no doubt) but didn't do the exercises advised to regain full mobility because she didn't want to lose her benefits and have to get a job. Even when she got a boyfriend and he moved in, he reduced his hours at work rather than lose the benefit . Some people are so used to knowing all the fiddles and squeezing all the money that they can out of the system that they just can't imagine living or thinking any other way.