Hardest Hit comments on Personal Independence Payment (PIP) announcement
13 December
For immediate release
Hardest
Hit comments on Personal Independence
Payment (PIP) announcement
The
Hardest Hit, a coalition of over 90 disabled people's organisations and
disability charities, including the MS Society, RNIB and Mencap, has condemned
the Government's decision to press ahead with a £2 billion cut to vital support
provided by DLA/PIP. Today's statement by the Government on the Personal
Independence Payment (PIP) regulations is "crushingly bad news".
Steve Winyard, co-chair of the Hardest
Hit coalition, said:
"Just
a couple of weeks before Christmas, the Government has delivered crushingly bad
news for over 600,000 disabled people. Today's announcement of the PIP
regulations confirms that they will lose all help with the extra living costs
they face due to their impairment*. A further sizeable group will receive
significantly reduced financial support in order to deliver the £2 billion
saving that the Treasury is seeking from the abolition of DLA**. This is a
cruel and unwanted early Christmas "present" for disabled people
already hardest hit by the Government's austerity programme."
"Back
in 2010 the Prime Minister promised to protect the most vulnerable while seeking
to reduce the deficit. However this has
been totally forgotten as disabled people experience deep cuts to their
benefits, services and rights. Last week it was the reduction in the value of
Employment and Support Allowance, today it is entitlement to DLA/PIP."
The
Government makes great play of the fact that they consulted widely on these
changes. But as Kaliya Franklin of the Spartacus collective points
out:
"True
co-production means working in partnership with disabled people and both
parties agreeing upon all details, not asking disabled people what they think
and then only listening to answers the government like. So for Ministers to
claim that PIP has been co-produced is at best misleading and at worse untrue.
Many thousands of disabled people along with charities and Disabled People User-Led
Organisation's responded to the government's consultation on DLA - PIP; the
'Spartacus Report' which was written and produced by disabled people themselves
comprehensively disproved the government's claims to have consulted. Asking for
responses but ignoring the answers is neither listening nor co-producing. The
Spartacus Report resulted in defeat for the government in multiple votes in the
House of Lords, which were railroaded by the government using financial
privilege to get its own way. It is deeply disappointing to see DWP Minister's
once again claiming to have worked with disabled people, when all that means is
that disabled people were asked and any disagreement with the government was
ignored."
Hardest
Hit rejects the £2 billion cut and rejects the idea that there are more than
600,000 disabled people who do not need their DLA. In "The Tipping
Point" report, published by the Hardest Hit coalition in October, we
pointed to a number of alternative ways to make the £2 billion saving. The
Government should not be trying to reduce the deficit on the backs of disabled
people.
ENDS
For more
information contact Jenna Litchfield, Senior Press Officer, MS Society. Phone:
020 8438 0782 jlitchfield@mssociety.org.uk.
*By October
2018 if Government continued with DLA, 2.182m disabled people of working age
would be receiving some help with either daily living or mobility. With PIP the
number is 1.575m. So, overall the PIP caseload in May 2018 will be around
608,000 lower than the DLA caseload would have been without the introduction of
PIP.
** The DWP
estimates that by May 2018 510,000 re-assessed DLA recipients will see a
reduction in their award.
Notes to Editors
The Hardest
Hit coalition brings together the Disability Benefits Consortium (DBC) and the
UK Disabled People's Council (UKDPC).
4 comments:
As we all know, ATOS and the DWP are cures for everything!!
When is this nighmare going to end?
What more can we do to stop it????
It's so damn hard to cope as each week seems to bring me another step nearer to Destitution.
How do you fight the Cause when you're fighting the Depression?
Thank You for carrying the Torch
Was wondering, do you have Ehlers?
employee benefit trust
Legallly reduce corporation tax and avoid income tax with the successor to the Emplyee Benefit Trust (EBT) the EFRBS II. Employee Benefit Trusts.Announcement of a settlement opportunity for the users of Employee Benefit trusts, to obtain certainty quicker than by waiting for the results of litigation
Post a Comment