Farage finally confirms: A Reform UK government would slash spending on disability benefits

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage has finally confirmed that his party would cut support for many claimants of disability benefits if it won power at the next general election, with the cuts focusing on those he claims do not “genuinely deserve help”.

Farage’s comments to his party’s annual conference in Birmingham saw him follow other politicians who have tried to scapegoat disabled people for the country’s economic problems.

He later told ITV News that there were “too many young people being put on disability benefits” and there was a need for “significant welfare cuts”.

His comments show that a Reform government – his party currently has a significant lead in the polls – would slash spending on disability benefits.

He also drew ridicule from many disabled people this week for his ignorance of both the social security system and local authority support for disabled people.

In his comments to the conference, Farage (pictured) mirrored notorious comments by Tory chancellor George Osborne at the 2012 Conservative conference, in which he had talked about the unfairness of a “shift-worker” leaving for work early in the morning who looks up and sees “the closed blinds of their next door neighbour sleeping off a life on benefits”.

Farage echoed these comments by telling Reform members: “And we will, over the course of the next months, outline some serious cuts to the welfare budget in this country.

“It is not fair, it is not fair, on people that get up with their alarm every morning, go to work and pay their taxes, for those that choose the different lifestyle to earn more money than they do.

“It is morally wrong, it is outrageous, and we will be the party that backs working people.”

Farage later made clear that these comments were aimed at disabled people, when telling ITV’s Robert Peston of the need for “significant welfare cuts”.

Asked by Peston who would lose out through these cuts, Farage again mirrored years of political rhetoric that has suggested that disabled claimants unable to work lack dignity and do not contribute to society, saying: “There are too many young people being put on disability benefits, being literally cast out of the system, classed as victims, left there.

“It isn’t good for the economy, it isn’t good for them as human beings.”

He also announced the appointment of Lee Anderson – a Reform MP and GB News presenter who worked for many years in Citizens Advice Bureaux before he entered politics, and once declared it was possible to make meals for 30p a day – as Reform’s “welfare” spokesperson.

But Farage added, again mirroring years of disablist rhetoric: “He knows that there are those that genuinely deserve help but there are many frankly that don’t.”

And he repeated a misinformed claim he made in April about links between a non-existent national “disability register” and the disability benefits system.

He told Peston: “The current system is that you go to your GP, your own GP’s almost pressurised to put you on the disability register. All of that has to change.”

The House of Commons library has made it clear in a briefing for MPs that there is no such thing as a national disability register and that eligibility for disability benefits “does not depend on a person being on a register of disabled people”, although some local authorities run their own voluntary registers to help with social care provision.

Under the Care Act, all councils must also keep a register of sight-impaired and severely sight-impaired adults, but again this is not connected with the benefits system.

In his conference speech, Farage also attacked people seeking asylum, Net Zero policies, the Civil Service, and wealth taxes, while talking frequently about himself while offering almost no new policies, and applauding those putting “the cross of St George and the Union Jack” in public spaces.

Reform had not responded by noon today (Thursday) to a request to explain what evidence Farage relied on when he said too many disabled people were receiving benefits; whether he was aware that social security spending as a proportion of GDP was stable; whether a Reform government would slash spending on disability benefits, and by how much; and whether his comments suggested he had not consulted disabled people on his policies.

There was significant concern at Farage’s comments across the disability movement this week.

Merry Cross, a member of the national steering group of Disabled People Against Cuts, said: “Anyone reading about Nigel Farage’s so-called policies should understand that this man and his party are funded by the same sort of people who put Trump into power in the US.

“Indeed, probably many are the very same people and certainly they are only interested in one thing – making more money for themselves.

“Underlying all of Farage’s attacks is the theme of destroying public services in order to privatise them and put them in the hands of the super wealthy, many of them American.

“Disabled people are already bearing the brunt of the privatisation of care services and the NHS as well as cuts to welfare benefits. This has to stop.”

Kieran Lewis, rights and migration policy manager at National Survivor User Network (NSUN), said: “Farage’s comments on welfare are dangerous and intentionally misleading.

“Disability is not a ‘lifestyle’ choice, and our value does not depend on whether/how we can work.

“Disabled people face barriers to participation in society – just as those in the immigration system do – and it is the job of politicians to help us navigate them.

“What is truly ‘outrageous’ is Reform UK’s willingness to throw disabled people under the bus for political points, claiming to be for ‘the people’ while planning to decimate and privatise our public services.”

Kamran Mallick, chief executive of Disability Rights UK, said: “Disabled people across the country will rightly be concerned to hear yet another political figure talk about cutting the welfare budget.

“It shows again a complete lack of understanding of how the social security system works.

“We know from bitter experience what that means in practice: more poverty, more exclusion, and more people pushed into crisis.

“The suggestion that receiving social security is a ‘lifestyle choice’ is simply wrong.

“Benefits are not handouts — they are lifelines. Disabled people need this support to eat, heat their homes, and take part in society.

“Disabled people are calling out for real change: for a system that recognises our rights, supports our independence, and tackles the barriers that lock us out of work and opportunity.”

Last year’s Reform UK general election manifesto was short on detail but suggested that a Reform government would launch a new attempt to push disabled people into employment, suggesting that it would save £15 billion a year by forcing “1 million plus back to work”.

Although it did not explicitly say it would target disabled people, the manifesto said it would “ensure those who can work do work” and added: “Employment is critical to improving mental health.”

It also said that “all job seekers and those fit to work” would have to find employment within four months or accept a job after two offers. Otherwise, it said, “benefits are withdrawn”.

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