• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • About DNS
  • Subscribe to DNS
  • Advertise with DNS
  • Support DNS
  • Contact DNS

Disability News Service

the country's only news agency specialising in disability issues

  • Home
  • Independent Living
    • Arts, Culture and Sport
    • Crime
    • Education
    • Employment
    • Housing
    • Transport
  • Activism & Campaigning
  • Benefits & Poverty
  • Politics
  • Human Rights
You are here: Home / News Archive / Government must ease anxiety over DLA reforms, say MPs

Government must ease anxiety over DLA reforms, say MPs

By guest on 2nd February 2012 Category: News Archive

Listen

The government must do more to ease the anxiety of disabled people over its disability living allowance (DLA) reforms, according to a committee of MPs.

The work and pensions select committee report says the plans to scrap working-age DLA and replace it with a new personal independence payment (PIP) – and cut spending by 20 per cent – have caused “high levels of anxiety” among disabled people.

Dame Anne Begg, who chairs the committee, said many of those likely to be reassessed when PIP is introduced would already have experienced the anxieties of the work capability assessment (WCA), the eligibility test introduced in 2008 for the new out-of-work disability benefit, employment and support allowance (ESA).

And she said they may also face reassessments by their local council, over their eligibility for care and support services.

She said: “It is the same people who are getting hit each time. I am certainly concerned that the same people might have to go through numerous different assessments.”

The report, Government Support Towards the Additional Living Costs of Working-Age Disabled People, calls on the coalition to learn from the mistakes the previous Labour government made with the introduction of ESA and WCA.

Dame Anne said the new assessment for PIP – being developed by the government – would have to avoid the “mechanistic, box-ticking approach initially used in the WCA”, and that the eligibility criteria must take more of a “social model” approach that assesses the barriers disabled people face, rather than their impairments.

The committee says the government should not roll out the new PIP assessment nationally until it is sure – following a pilot programme – that it is “empathetic and accurate”.

The report calls for “tighter monitoring and regulation” of companies that carry out benefits assessments for the government, and says companies that secure the contract for assessing eligibility for PIP should be paid according to how few successful appeals there are against the results of their tests.

The report also calls for a more “responsible approach” by the government to releasing statistics on disability benefits.

Two weeks ago, work and pensions ministers were warned again – this time by disabled peers – that their rhetoric on disability benefits was fuelling an atmosphere of hatred and hostility towards disabled people.

Although Dame Anne did not go that far, she said: “I think the ministers could do a lot more in condemning the kind of scaremongering that goes on in the press. I have not seen evidence that they have condemned it.”

The report also calls on the government to assess the impact of the reforms on those disabled people who lose their DLA and do not qualify for PIP.

It says: “DLA is unique in providing a universal benefit specifically designed to contribute to the extra costs of disability.

“If it is removed from some claimants who still have these extra costs, they are very likely to need to draw on services provided by other public agencies [such as local authorities and the NHS].”

20 February 2012

Share this post:

Share on TwitterShare on FacebookShare on WhatsAppShare on Reddit

Related

‘Muddled’ blue badge reforms ‘are to blame for renewal delays’
6th February 2015
UN debate will be reminder of true inclusive education
6th February 2015
IDS breaks pledge on PIP waiting-times, as tens of thousands still queue for months
30th January 2015

Primary Sidebar

Access

Latest Stories

Government ‘bans’ thousands of disabled fans from sporting test events

Rail companies apologise after Prince Philip ‘mark of respect’ leaves websites inaccessible

Government rejects chance to promise inquiry into COVID deaths of disabled people

‘Concerning silence’ from government over disability ambassador roles

Atos, Capita and Maximus ‘send almost no safeguarding referrals to councils’

Campaign calls for supermarkets to scrap delivery charges

Apple ‘forced by EHRC to back down in face mask discrimination row’

DWP staff admit inflicting ‘psychological harm’ on claimants during coalition years

Government ‘treats disabled people with contempt’ by handing £2.4 million to charities

Legal threat to PM over lack of BSL interpreter in £2.6 million briefing room

Advice and Information

DWP: The case for the prosecution

Readspeaker

Footer

The International Standard Serial Number for Disability News Service is: ISSN 2398-8924

  • Accessibility Statement
  • Privacy Policy
  • Site map
  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Copyright © 2021 Disability News Service

Site development by A Bright Clear Web