PIP is a disaster for disabled people. At last the full horror is emerging

Last Updated: June 8, 2016By
‘Between 400 and 500 adapted cars, powered wheelchairs, and scooters are being taken away from disabled people every week’ [Image: T.M.O.Pictures/Alamy].

‘Between 400 and 500 adapted cars, powered wheelchairs, and scooters are being taken away from disabled people every week’ [Image: T.M.O.Pictures/Alamy].

More to follow on this awful story. This is just a taste of “the full horror”.

When does reform become dangerous? Over three years ago the Conservatives began to roll out personal independence payments (PIP) – in essence, the mandatory, mass re-testing of disabled and chronically ill people – and the answer is getting stark.

A report released today by Muscular Dystrophy UK is the latest piece of evidence to expose an administrative catastrophe: appointments cancelled at the last minute, lost applications, year-long delays. Two in five respondents report being sent to an assessment centre that wasn’t accessible for disabled people. That’s in order to be tested for a disability benefit.

Make it inside the building and the picture is as dire: widespread reports of assessors – employed by private firms hired by the Department for Work and Pensions – who showed no respect for disabled people, while some didn’t even understand the condition they were testing (one man, with muscular dystrophy, pointed out that the word “progressive” means “muscles don’t come back”).

The result of this chaos is anything from rent arrears and credit card debt to mental scars. One woman, with a muscle wasting disease, said that she developed panic attacks after her assessment. She is now under care of a mental health team and doesn’t leave her house.

That the government deliberately built PIP with tightened criteria – and is sitting by as the system descends into disarray – becomes grimmer still when you consider that this is being done to a benefit tied to other essential disability services.

Source: PIP is a disaster for disabled people. At last the full horror is emerging | Frances Ryan | Opinion | The Guardian

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9 Comments

  1. NMac June 8, 2016 at 10:59 am - Reply

    I just hope that one day the Nasty Party is held to account for its crimes against the British people.

  2. Brian June 8, 2016 at 11:30 am - Reply

    This would be farcical if it were not based on hate. Who are these ‘Health Care Professionals’ that do these assessments, surely they to must be hateful. They know whats going on and yet they choose to get employment working for an organisation that brings misery to thousands. Worse, they are employed doing a job they can not not qualified for, any right thinking professional would uphold their tenant of doing no harm, wouldn’t they? Is there such malevolence in the world that one would choose to be the patsy of these reforms without sharing such hateful intent. Perhaps i’m wrong, and that these people working in this environment are well intentioned, but hoodwinked, or perhaps they are there with the thought they can make a genuine improvement to impoverished peoples lives. Whatever the answer, an examination of conscience is required, because sooner, rather than later, these ‘Care’-ers, will find their existence blighted with a legacy of shame.

  3. autismandate June 8, 2016 at 11:38 am - Reply

    Makes you wonder who is going to fire the first bullet in the revolution

    • Brian June 12, 2016 at 8:55 pm - Reply

      Every one knows what is about to happen, Boris will occupy number 10, IDS will be his scumbag b**ch, grinning idiot Gove will accede to chancellor, and all will be right in the world.

      We will go about our lives peacefully, pausing only to listen to the street tannoys singing how well the nation is doing. Our guardians will bid us well on the way to work, cheerfully reminding us to not assemble in more than two’s while our arm bar-codes are swiped.

      Revolution, not at all, for we are British, the most gullible wimps on this planet, willing to accede any freedom and rights to our betters, surely, we will doth our caps and tweak our forelocks as our masters compose their latest reforms to extract wealth before Armageddon. Who else are worthy of continuing the human race, certainly not those jobless sick and disabled serfs who burden the economy with their scrounging.

      No, if there is to be any revolution, it will be the coming of the New Master Race.

      • Mike Sivier June 12, 2016 at 11:44 pm - Reply

        Where you wrote “b**ch” – were you implying “bitch”?
        Good thing you put the stars in, otherwise Phil Woodford would be on your case about sexism!
        To be honest, though, it would have been fun to read his description of Iain Duncan Smith’s feminine side.

  4. joanna June 8, 2016 at 2:46 pm - Reply

    I know you didn’t agree with my opinion the other day, but this is truly disgusting!!! If this treatment can be meted out now, I dread to think what would happen if we do leave the EU!
    I sincerely hope that Does Not happen!!!

  5. jeffrey davies June 8, 2016 at 5:31 pm - Reply

    aktion t4 rolling along without much of a ado jeff3

  6. Hilary Halliwell June 8, 2016 at 7:20 pm - Reply

    Scum that have bullied the sick and disabled without mercy. They waged war on the ill and disadvantaged without pity. They drummed up hate against the sick and disabled by saying that most were scammers and that claims were fraudulent and the gullible believed them. Now the ytruth of this witch hunt is coming out and still they persist with the bullying because they think they are fireproof and the people of this country allow it! Beggars belief.

  7. mrmarcpc June 9, 2016 at 2:45 pm - Reply

    More of this revelation should be published by all avenues of the press and social media!

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