Disabled left with no money

[CFSKate]

Under new rules introduced by the Department for Work and Pensions in October, anyone wanting to appeal a decision that they are fit to work first has to have all their paperwork looked at again, while receiving no sickness benefits. The Citizens Advice Bureau believes this will result in thousands of people being wrongly forced to survive on no income at all.

I guess the thinking is that then they will look after themselves and get a job somehow. There is so much hatred from this government

Yep. I'm a CAB advisor and seeing this a lot. Claimants used to get ESA paid while they put in appeals against ATOS decisions, now they don't. I've got clients going weeks without money, we give them foodbank vouchers but can only give 3 so 9 days worth of food in total.

We're also getting a lot of people stuck in the 'too sick for JSA but not sick enough for ESA' trap.

"The Government said that this "mandatory reconsideration" would cut down on bureaucracy and take just two weeks"

So, they've introduced a new layer of bureaucracy and described this as cutting down on bureaucracy.

IIRC, they've also removed the requirement for appeals to be dealt with in a certain timespan. So now they can be delayed indefinitely - potentially years.

I am not even going to try surviving this. I've been planning for a while now. The next time they cut me off and I have to start the cycle of complaints, reviews, appeals again, I'm just going to take the pills. They've made it perfectly plain I have no place here. I have some personal business to finish for someone else, then I'm done.

I nearly didn't namechange to post this. I'm ceasing to care who knows.

Last time they fucked up my ESA, it took them over a year to reinstate it. ATOS got the re-assessment in just under the year - then the DWP just sat on it and made no decision for months.

I only survived because of family and friends. I don't know what will happen next time. And I just can't keep fighting. I don't actually get to live the tiny, little, housebound life that remains to me, because I have to spend it all fighting the DWP.

BurnBabyBurn - I don't know what to say to you, because I know that it's true.

Yet they all cheer when the 'unemployment figures' go down and the 'claimant count' is reduced. Reducing the welfare bill (otherwise known as screwing every last penny you can from the poor) is the way to solve this country's economic troubles.

I've posted before about how I've had my JSA stopped because I can't take the jobs that are available due to my DD's SN. She has a full statement in school 9-3. They won't accept her for breakfast/after school clubs. I'm expected to travel up to 90 minutes each way for a job. So that leaves 3 hours per day as long a school doesn't phone to ask me in cos DD is in meltdown, which happens 2-3 times a week. No employer in their right mind would take me on.

But I can't get income support because she is over 5 and I'm not sick (except through the sheer stress of it all) so we are only able to claim child benefit and tax credits for us all to live on. It's just not enough. This month I've had to do the worst thing and spend my rent money. It was that or sit in the dark and go hungry. So now I'm short with the rent, we get a lovely new worry about being evicted, yay! So glad I can help fix the problems caused by the financial greed of others.

My BIL was left with no money for three months while he appealled the poor bloke can't walk to the end of the garden let alone work he also has socialising problems so spends all day everyday in his bedroom.
Luckily he lives at home with my PIL but he is is nearly 50 and they are heading towards 80 so living on their state pensions.
I don't know what will happen to him when PIL are gone. He can't come here, we don't have the room PIL rent so we won't be able to move into their bigger house and sell ours nor will we get an inheritance to extend here.