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The government abandoned proposals for an independent review of its much-criticised sanctions policy, the latest example of how a minister watered down plans to prevent suicides and learn lessons from the deaths of benefit claimants. The decision to further limit the […]
The “aggressive attitude” on benefit sanctions that was taken by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) in the coalition years of 2013 to 2015 is “back with a vengeance”, MPs have been warned. A debate on DWP’s policy on benefit […]
Disabled campaigners have described the government’s decision to reintroduce benefit sanctions – in the middle of a pandemic – as “barbaric” and “life threatening”. The decision meant an end to the three-month suspension of benefit sanctions and conditionality* in England, Scotland […]
The number of disabled people on the main out-of-work disability benefit who are being sanctioned by the government for failing to meet strict conditions has fallen close to zero, following years of criticism of the harsh regime. Department for Work and […]
The government’s mainstream benefit sanctions regime has been discriminating against disabled people throughout nearly the whole of the last decade, according to new figures secured by Disability News Service (DNS). The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) figures, obtained through a […]
The minister for disabled people is refusing to apologise to MPs for misleading them about a report by a UN human rights expert on the UK’s record on causing and addressing extreme poverty. Professor Philip Alston, the UN’s special rapporteur on […]
A minister has suggested that the government would be doing a “great disservice” to disabled people if it stopped sanctioning their out-of-work benefits. The comment by Alok Sharma, the employment minister, came in correspondence with the Commons work and pensions committee […]
Imposing benefit sanctions on disabled people is counter-productive, ineffective and “probably too dangerous”, a trio of experts have told MPs. The Commons work and pensions committee also heard that the failure of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) to research […]
A disabled campaigner has told MPs how she was thrown out of a shelter and forced to sleep in her college library after she was unfairly sanctioned by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). Jen Fidai described yesterday (Wednesday)* how […]
Ministers have quietly dumped their promise to test a gentler approach to dealing with claimants who breach strict benefit conditions for the first time. The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) agreed in October to trial handing out warnings instead of […]