Luxury cars removed from the motability scheme

[AutumnLeavesandKnittedJumpers]

https://news.sky.com/story/luxury-cars-removed-from-motability-scheme-ahead-of-budget-13475029

too little too late. As a full time worker I can’t afford to run a car, let alone a luxury car. Motability should be a standard car - available in automatic and manual, an option for wheelchair users, and that’s it.

Wow. Just putting it out there that any disabled person paying the extra to upgrade their car probably is working.....

so fucking fed up of people on this forum treating me and people like me, like we're subhuman, and worth less just because we're disabled.

May anyone with those kind of views have the life you fucking deserve... and may you hope to all hell you're never disabled.

You're ALL one illness, one accident away from being one of us.

Fuck y'all.

What like getting rid of the 2 child cap? Thats going to cost the country 15 BILLION.

i see more people being outraged over the disabled than I do the 2 child cap being removed. Albeism at its finest! 🤢

Sounds like we need to rethink that then. Clearly some people aren't happy with that.

I became disabled in an accident.

my current car is thirteen years old and costs me half of what a motability car would. It was bought as a big family car (xc90) and will take two wheelchairs in the back (me and my daughter are both disabled).

when it stops working I’ll get a motability car but for the moment mine is cheaper.

You can sit there, pissed off, because you see a disabled person getting something you don't have, but I can guarantee you don't envy the disability they have to get a little extra.

I worked my whole life until 5 years ago, all I had to do was get cancer and have a stroke, and now I'm raking in the benefits, it's a great lifestyle choice. Sometimes Im sad about my disability, but I just wipe my tears with £20 notes, and watch my 75" TV while eating caviar funded by you personally, and Im ok.

Funnily enough, yes, I have. He's my BIL. He has epilepsy, he can't drive. More accurately, he's not safe to drive, so he shouldn't even be eligible for the Motability scheme. He's also autistic, very, very low functioning, and on the most basic level of PIP simply because he can't figure out how to use public transport and he'd burn the house down if tried to cook or clean. He recently laughed about a 70 year old losing their driving licence because of a sight test that they didn't pass first time, but passed on the second attempt.

So indeed I've spoken to one, observed one lash out about it and mock those who lose their licence to state meddling, about driving.

It would be much more sensible to have a free choice of vehicles for motability, but for the mobility part of PIP to be restricted to physical difficulties. This should also be tested by an in-person assessment which should be brought back for all PIP claims and renewals.

The PIP rates only started rocketing when in-person assessments were dropped. I wonder why?

This doesn't save any money though, and seems like it is just for the look of it. People were paying an additional payment for the luxury car.

It just feels into the daily mail etc. narrative that these aren't legitimate claimants.

I agree. At the very least it should be means tested. Our neighbours already had a decent car each and appeared to be relatively wealthy. Wife got diagnosed with a long term health condition. Next thing, a brand new open top, top of the range Mini appeared on the drive. They were boasting they got it on Motability as their "fun" car! Barely used it as they both continued to drive their own cars mostly and just seemed to take it out for a spin on sunny summer days! That kind of thing is abuse and needs to be stomped out.

This post is ridiculous and obviously has no real idea of how the Motability scheme works. In order to pay for their lease, the recipient of the car uses the motability component of the their PIP or DLA which they are entitled to because of their disability. They aren’t given additional funding for the vehicle. If they decide not to have a vehicle they get the money instead to help with their mobility needs.

Very few motability cars are available without a sizeable deposit, the luxury cars you are talking about will have a deposit of many, many £1000s. When the car goes back at the end of the 3 year lease they don’t get any of that deposit back. The motability scheme has propped up the British car industry for decades, without it lots of dealerships would go into administration and many 1000s of workers will loose their jobs.

The motability scheme is not funded by the government, they are funded mainly through receiving the motability component of someone’s PIP award. If the scheme ended, the money would just go directly to the recipient of the PIP, it wouldn’t save the government money.

This is just disabled bashing, and frankly bad for the car industry as a whole. It’s whipped up to cause discontent and isn’t based on facts. I really wish politicians and journalists wouldn’t let these untruths run without fact checking.

"so he shouldn't even be eligible for the Motability"

OFFS, the fucking ignorance.

If he got the mobility part of PIP he might still be eligible, but would have to nominate someone to drive for him. The rules are the car has to be used for the benefit of the claimant.

This thread shows how unthinking and horrible some people are. I like to believe that the majority of people are able to care about other people but it appears I may be wrong.

This is the thing, it's not even economically sound, just politics based on envy. I wouldn't opt to be disabled to get a nice car, who actually would. It's totally incomprehensible. My legs for a shiny beemer, er no.

He lives with his parents who are well into their 70s. He gets rides to everywhere.

Well yes. My mother didn’t drive when I was young. I remember hanging around waiting for buses in the brutal winter weather. I resolved that I would have a car way before I had children. I scrimped and saved and worked two jobs to get my first car (at 24).

But I never begrudged a disabled person decent transport.

I agree that people are arguing at cross purposes.

The argument (some) people are making is more “if you can afford the luxury car with gov payments (of PIP) then maybe you don’t need the gov payments and can just afford the non-luxury car on your own”. So the responses of “it doesn’t cost the taxpayer more” isn’t actually relevant to the argument that those people are making. It’s more an argument around the principle of means tested vs non means tested.

Of course, that argument isn’t actually addressed by taking luxury cars out of the scheme. So I’m not sure who that decision would appeal to - mostly people who don’t really understand the scheme and think it’s just “here’s a free car” I assume.

I have also reported the thread.

what does that have to do with anything i just said?

you said he can't drive so wouldn't be eligible, i just explained that isn't the case, and how it would work if he did have a motability car.

I genuinely can’t believe the amount of posters who still think this a basically a free car scheme 🤨😡
Whether a disabled person chooses a high end car, or a fancy third car to their household … they’re paying monthly for it! Why not also complain about workers spending their wages on a pcp car each month? It’s the same thing!

My Dad has become severely disabled in recent months. He's also pretty well off after a lifetime of professional work. He'd pay for whatever adaptations he needs, but it's actually quite difficult to find the help outside of "the system".

Until recently I assumed the scheme was only for people who need adapted vehicles. I had no idea that people who can drive a normal car were eligible.