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Half a million disabled people may lose benefit
Wednesday 18 January 2012
Mencap believes that government plans for PIP “threaten the ability of many people with a learning disability to live independently”
The government opened its consultation into Personal Independent Payment (PIP) assessment criteria on Monday (16 January).
PIP will replace Disability Living Allowance (DLA) from 2013, ahead of which, the government has been looking at changing the assessment criteria for PIP. Ministers said that without reform, there would be 2.2 million people on DLA by 2015–16, but with the introduction of PIP, this figure falls to 1.7 million.
Minister for Disabled People Maria Miller said: “We are replacing DLA with Personal Independence Payment and introducing a new face-to-face assessment and regular reviews – something missing under the current system. Under PIP, support will be focused on those who need it most, with a greater proportion getting the higher rates compared to DLA.”
David Congdon, Mencap’s head of policy and campaigns said: “The government predicts that half a million disabled people will no longer be found eligible for support through PIP. This directly contradicts the coalition agreement to ensure that the most vulnerable are protected.
“In particular, it seems that those disabled people with lower level needs, but who nevertheless face extra costs associated with their disability, will lose out. For example, a person with a learning disability who lives independently, but who needs some level of help each week with things like cooking, shopping and sorting their household bills, may no longer be eligible for the benefit. The government’s plans threaten the ability of many people with a learning disability to live independently.”
The transition to PIP was confirmed, on Tuesday night, when the House of Lords rejected an amendment to the Welfare Reform Bill, which would have delayed the replacement of the DLA. Peers voted by 229 to 213, to reject an amendment tabled by Paralympian Lady Grey-Thompson. She proposed holding pilots of the new benefit before implementing it fully, but the government warned her plan would cost £1.4 billion.
In better news, the debate also saw welfare reform minister Lord Freud confirm the government’s commitment to protect the mobility component of DLA for people living in residential care, following the Low Review.
Mencap president Lord Rix said: “I would very much like, as president of Mencap, to thank the minister and his colleagues for accepting this situation and the Low report. I congratulate my noble friend Lord Low on his splendid research into this problem. It is wonderful to hear the government's change of tack.”
The vote on PIP follows another in the House of Lords, on increasing the time limit on contributory Employment and Support Allowance to two years. It was won by 234 votes to 186.
In February, the Welfare Reform Bill will return to the House of Commons and MPs will either reject or accept changes made by the Lords. The Hardest Hit group, which includes Mencap, is asking campaigners to email their MP to ask them to make benefits fair.
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Comments
Hi Mrs Bucknell,
Thank you for your post. I'm sorry to hear that your sister has had a difficult time regarding the assessment for benefits. The Mencap Learning Disability Helpline is an advice and information service for people with learning disabilities, their families and carers. The helpline can discuss the situation your sister is experiencing and may be offer further advice and information or sign post you to other organisations that may be able to help. The number for the helpline is: 0808 808 1111 or you can email help@mencap.org.uk.
Mentally handicapped person told to apply for jobs or get benefit cut off.
My sister has a mental handicap resulting in a mental age of approx 7 years. She lives in a flat semi- independently but with lots of supervision my motherand myself. She asked us to arrange a wedding for her and a mentally and physically handicapped man, which we did. (It is a platonic marriage, no sex.) He has a similar mental age to her, and they are great companions to each other.. Because of her inherited mental and physical disorders, she is on a lifelong near-starvation diet of only fruit and vegetables. Three times a day she takes vitamin pills and other supplements to make up for the missing protein and missing carbohydrate which her body is unable to digest. She does not have much energy and sleeps 12 hours per day. Her face looks fairly normal and does not show the classic Downs Syndrome facial characteristics because her mental handicap was not caused by Downs but by Phenylketonuria. Because she has been mentally 7 years of age for 49 years (she is 56), she speaks very well. Although she is unable to work for a number of reasons, just one of which is that she requires too much constant adult supervision, inexplicably she has been assessed as being able to work. The assessor was a foreign doctor who could not communicate well with her. My mother was with her, but she was not allowed to speak. My sister had no solicitor to speak for her. She is regarded in law by the benefit assessors as if she had the intelligence of a normal person. In fact she is on a level with a person suffering from quite advanced altzheimers or of a small child, a minor. She mixes up reality and non-reality, wishes, memories and an unfortunate desire to always say yes. As she is desirous to please others, she says "yes" to everything, eg yes she can add up numbers, yes she can do gardening, yes she goes swimming. Unfortunately it is just fantasy and not reality. But the benefit people as are only too happy to take it as gospel. She now faces having her benefit cut and being summoned regularly to job centres to demonstrate that she is looking for work. My mother and I are fearful that if she cannot demonstrate that she is applying for jobs her benefit and only income will be cut off. We have asked for a social worker but this has been denied. Are there any lawyers who represent people like my sister?
I could,nt agree anymore. it took two attempts and many reports to get my disability living allowance which is just under twenty pounds a week. Why do we keep on reading about dubious claims when it so hard for those who have valid reasons to have it? conditions such as autism is for life so why do we have to explain our disability time and again?