Chancellor fails to understand Welfare Reform Act – Jayne Linney
We’re spoilt for choice with this subject – so many people have commented on it. Here’s Jayne Linney‘s contribution, as hers was the first to reach Vox Towers:
I am totally unsurprised, albeit perturbed, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer and Second Lord of the Treasury George Osborne, has demonstrated his total lack of understanding of the Welfare Reform Act. In his Conference speech he announced ‘working-age benefits will be frozen for two years after 2015′ with an added proviso that “the elderly and the disabled will be protected”.
He then confirmed Cameron’s statement of yesterday, of a £3,000 reduction in the Benefits Cap; and this is where confusion arises. Despite his promise of protection for disabled people, individuals in receipt of the work-related activity component of ESA will be included in the cap. Clearly Osborne has failed to notice that many disabled people are in receipt of precisely this benefit; and frequently these are the same people awaiting mandatory reconsiderations and/or Tribunals.
For more of her observations on this, please read the rest of the article on Jayne’s site.
You might also wish to try the Same Difference blog, which links to Ekklesia‘s article on this.
Follow me on Twitter: @MidWalesMike
Join the Vox Political Facebook page.
Buy Vox Political books so we can continue
bringing you the best of the blogs!
Health Warning: Government! is now available
in either print or eBook format here:
The first collection, Strong Words and Hard Times,
is still available in either print or eBook format here:
Vox Political needs your help!
If you want to support this site
(but don’t want to give your money to advertisers)
you can make a one-off donation here:
Osborne what a greedy b*****d he is if he thinks he is taking my sick benefit away he can think again European human rights should stop this thing who is not a man. I wish that someone would drop a bomb on the houses of parliament that would be good
Well . . . it wouldn’t be the first time!
I have said this many times before, when ALL your local MP’s are useless, who do you vote for?
When NO party offers REAL soloutions to the REAL problems facing Britain (repeat, often uneducated offenders, souloutions for the those facing barriers to employment, why certain industries rely on immigrant workers, a desire to overhaul ALL benefits, taxes and pensions to make them fit for purpose, and an education system with small class sizes that focuses on vocational as well as academical subjects and qualifications.
Not to mention reversal of a too large centralized government. I could go on)
When the majority of people carry on with their lives for various reasons and remain either oblivious or otherwise to the problems of the “underclass”
Wait again until the run up to Christmas when there will be thousands queueing to buy the “latest” gadgets (think the iphone releases)
These problems need far more thought rather than shouting “yah boo rubbish” at the Tories.
Those problems do require thought, certainly, but that does not mean we should ever allow George Osborne off the hook for the fact that his economic theories are, to use the word you employ, “rubbish”. When the government of the day is proceeding from a false premise – not because it honestly believes that what it is saying is true but because it intends to use a cover story under which it may proceed with its real purpose of cutting public services in order to minimise taxation of those who are extremely wealthy already – there is no hope at all of them ever even bothering to consider solutions to the other problems you mention.
The failure of Osborne’s economic plan is a real problem facing the UK; if we had a proper, working economy, some of those you mention would disappear.
Which is where my point about Christmas/iphones come in, if only a handful were sold, THEN people MIGHT start to feel austerity (wasn’t the latest one the fastest selling again)
An example is, and I am far from criticising people who do this, those whose immediate families are affected by a major trauma, eg: cancer, then go on to set up charities raising awareness of the one that the relative suffered from.
Nothing whatsoever wrong with that, but we need to become a pro-active rather than re-active society to see any real changes.
As always Mike, Thanks – In Unity
ESA isn’t a disabled benefit and will be capped and frozen. Apparently the WRAG component will be capped and frozen, only the Support component escapes as probably PIP does, but it means everybody on benefits will be worse off.
As regards Universal Credit, well.
We’re discussing the difference between the specification of ESA, as written, and the reality. The WRAG part may not be a disability benefit but we have all read the evidence that shows disabled people have been put there (my opinion is, in order to fit government-ordered quotas regarding the Support group). The cap on WRAG means disabled people will suffer, no matter what the official line may be.
Precisely Mike. And, in my opinion, that’s how they are selling themselves to the electorate as being kind to the disabled! An election is looming. Now – I know, you know, and others know what the WRAG entails. But I bet the majority of the voting public don’t, if they don’t have to deal with disability benefit in any shape or form. I also think that the WRAG is used to distort employment and disabilty stats – quite a useful little ‘cohort’ for the DWP.