Welcome to Day Two of the Welfare Reform bill live blog. There are crucial votes in the House of Lords this afternoon which we'll be keeping an eye on:
• Crossbencher Lord Patel's ammendment increasing the elegibility of period for contributory employment and Support Allowance (ESA) ffrom one year to two. Labour is supporting this ammendment, where much of the focus will be on cancer patients who would lose up to £94 a week in sickness benefit as a result of this proposed change. The Macmillan Cancer charity estimates 7,000 patients could be affected.
• An amendment put down by crossbencher Lord Listowel to ensure those who are disabled at a young age (and therefore have been unable to build up national insurance contributions) will still be able to claim ESA. Labour peers are supporting this.
• Proposals to scrap the Social Fund, which supplies crisis grants to vulnerable people who need emergency help.
We'll be examining the issues in more detail over the day. We also hope to carry an interview with Lord McKenzie, Labour's work and pensions minister later on. We also hope to speak to protesters against the bill outside Westminster, and carry live coverage of the debates.
Please tell us how the proposed changes will affect you: leave a comment below, or tweet to @patrickjbutler, @lauraoliver, @hrwaldram or #wrbliveblog
The Guardian has some excellent coverage of the welfare reform bill today: Nick Watt's story sets out the political agenda in the House of Lords today, while Tom Clark's fantastic interactive puts the welfare reform bill in context and provides a guide to what's being debated and when over the next fortnight.
There's a moving first person account by Mark Sparrow on the prospect of losing £94 a week in ESA benefit.
Also check out our leader column on Ed Miliband, Labour and the cuts: there's an interesting passage on the welfare reform bill:
If Labour flashed a little cold steel on serious future problems, it would win a fairer hearing on the immediate deficit – and the most damaging immediate cuts. On Wednesday the Lords will debate two prime examples: the time-limiting of incapacity benefits and the abolition of the discretionary social fund. The former will shred the contributory principle which the party's welfare spokesman Liam Byrne recently hailed, even while he put Labour in a position where it is opposing the detail and not the principle of a time limit. The latter provides emergency loans for cash-strapped families – saving them from loan sharks. Labour is quite right to insist it should not be scrapped without a proper replacement being in place, and yet until it is listened to this will count for little. Credibility will not be earned by a cavalier embrace of cutting, but by adopting clear principles about what gets cut when – and then being resolute in resisting the rest.
Also worth checking out my colleague Amelia Gentleman's piece for Society Guardian on the "fit-for-work" tests undergone by sick and disabled benefit claimants.
A study by Citizen's Advice finds evidence of widespread innacuracies in the much-criticised work capability assessment programme. Millie's piece quotes Chris Linacre, who found herself turned down for sickness benefits and passed as fit to work, despite long standing spinal problems and arthritis:
"I think they [the assessors] expect you to be a Beano cartoon character, with ouch bubbles above your head, but people tend to be stoic. I try not to labour the fact that I'm in pain. I wasn't going to tell them that some days I can't even put my knickers on I'm in so much pain."
Linacre is now appealing the decision. As I've written before, the backlog of appeals against the test is growing rapidly.
There are fears that the same diagnostic problems that have dogged the ESA benefit test will affect the proposed assessments for disability living allowance (DLA) under the welfare reform bill's proposed new Personal Independence Payments.
The proposed scrapping of the social fund is debated this afternoon. We are keen to hear from people have used the social fund about their experiences, good and bad. We want to know:
• Will this affect you or a family member?
• Have you relied on the Social Fund in the past?
• Would the proposed cuts have affected you?
You can tell us in confidence using this confidential form
My colleague Randeep Ramesh, the Guardian's social affairs editor, alerts me to a damning verdict on the reforms by the children's commissioner, Maggie Atkinson, who has just published her assessment of the impact of the Welfare Reform Bill on children's rights in England.
She welcomes the idea that the universal credit will help incentivise work - and lift people out of poverty. However she takes a dim view of the bill, saying that there are real risks to the rights of children.
The UK is party to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, and Atkinson notes that in December 2010 Children's Minister Sarah Teather promised that the government would give "due regard" to the convention when making new policy and legislation.
Given this Atkinson says the "following risks are of real concern":
• An increase in child poverty as a result of the household benefit cap and housing benefit changes, resulting in poor health and educational outcomes for children
• The threat of a potential increase in household rent arrears due to reduced housing benefit payments
• Families living in poverty diverting money away from necessities for children's health and wellbeing such as heating, warm clothing, and nutritious food in order to cover their housing costs
• Children becoming homeless as a result of unaffordable housing for their families
• A disproportionate impact of some of the Bill's benefit changes on children from some BME groups, disabled children, and children of disabled parents
• Families having no crisis support in the event of flood, fire, or serious illness as a result of the Bill's abolition of the Social Fund.
Atkinson says:
"We have identified groups of children whose rights may be breached by the implementation of the Bill. Children whose families receive welfare benefits are particularly vulnerable due to the high level of poverty amongst this group. Children have no power to take up incentives in the Bill to find work or move to cheaper accommodation in order to have more money to live on. Creating such incentives may have a serious impact on them as independent rights-holders."
Randeep's full story will be up soon.
The Macmillan Cancer charity has warned that cancer patients face more financial difficulties if the welfare reform bill proposals to limit Employment and Support (ESA) allowance to one year go through today.
Mike Hobday, the charity's director of policy and research, said:
While we recognise the benefits system is in need of reform, if the Welfare Reform Bill goes through unamended it will have a devastating effect on cancer patients who are already struggling. We know many Lords oppose these proposals and hope they will show their support for cancer patients when it comes to a vote in Parliament.
Macmillan points out that 40% of the callers to its helpline last year asked for advice on financial issues, compared to 2% who asked about death and dying. Calls about finances went up by a third last year, the charity says.
It estimates that 7,000 cancer patients stand to lose up to £94 a week as a result of the reforms. Lord Patel is proposing an amendment this afternoon to extend the ESA limit to two years.
The Department for Work and Pensions, however, has insisted that "everyone who has cancer will get the support they need."
Reader Mike Sparrow (the author of this morning's First Person piece on the removal of ESA payments) has tweeted me to point out that it is not just cancer patients that will be affected, but many other people with "chronic and debilitating conditions."
I've just been reading Declan Gaffney's powerful blog post on Clause 52 of the welfare reform bill.
The clause proposes to remove the provision that allows people under the age of 20 with work-limiting conditions to be treated as if they had "paid in" to national insurance and therefore able to qualify for Employment Support Allowance (ESA).
Declan points out that while the savings for the government from this could be considerable, they will be offset by the cost to the taxpayer of the likely rise in partners who give up work and claim carer's allowance. The burden of the savings will be found by shifting extra costs onto families and carers. He writes:
I don't believe that anyone of any political persuasion seriously believes these effects are desirable. For thirty years there has been a clear direction of policy on severe long-term disability, accepted and promoted by all the main parties: towards greater independence and community support, away from segregation, institutionalisation and constrained dependency on others. Nobody believes this process of change is complete, but until now it seemed clear that everyone was on the same road. Of course there will always be a need for debate about ways and means but unconditional financial support in one's own right is one of the more uncontroversial building blocks of any strategy for greater autonomy and integration for the most severely disabled. Clause 52 thus represents a major departure from decades of progressive policy making by successive UK governments.
Declan, a respected researcher, blogger and former civil servant is withering in his assesement of how the clause came about:
My guess, for what it's worth, is that this policy has never been properly thought through. It bears all the marks of the sort of quick and dirty proposal for cutting expenditure that every permanent secretary in Whitehall keeps in their back pocket to offer up if necessary in negotiations with Treasury: a price to be paid in the hope of getting the go-ahead for more important and expensive priorities (such as the massive administrative costs of Universal Credit to take a random example). This sort of thing goes on all the time, and many of the coalition's supposedly 'radical' proposals for welfare reform have been dug out of ancient inherited files that civil servants have scarcely bothered to blow the dust off. With civil servants under an imperative to put every possible expenditure cut on the table, this proposal was able to slip through when under less pressurised circumstances it wouldn't have stood a chance.
Lord Listowel's amendment to the clause, allowing disabled young people who are unable to work to qualify for ESA, will be debated in the Lords this afternoon. This could be a critical vote for the government.
The Lords debates on today's amendments start in around an hour's time. I asked Labour's shadow work and pensions minister in the Lords, Lord McKenzie, this morning about the prospects for this afternoon. He told me:
It is always really difficult to gauge. It's how the crossbenchers' split on this. The Employment Support allowance (ESA) amendment is being led by Lord Patel, so that helps. It also depends on the Lib Dems and whether enough of them will pull away.
Labour is backing an extension of the time limits for ESA for cancer patients to two years, not one year as proposed in the bill, as well as Lord Listowel's amendment to give disabled young people who are unable to work to qualify for contributory ESA. Labour is also seeking a ringfence for the social fund to ensure local authorities do not spend the cash on other services.
McKenzie said that while Labour supports the concept of ESA it is unhappy with the the government proposes to implement it. He was critical of the controversial work capability assessments which identify whether sick and disabled people are "fit for work. He was also critical of the backdating of ESA claims, so that if and when the bill is passed, many claimants will immediately lose this benefit
There will be 100,000 people who will lose their benefits overnight. It's extraordinary. It is clear the government is simply trying to claw money back. But on who should this burden fall? Half of the people adversely affected [by the ESA time limit] are in the bottom three percentiles of income. What is fair about that? What is fair about hard-working families losing £94 a week?
The Lords are beginning to file into the chamber now. What I've heard from my colleague Patrick Wintour is that the government may suffer a defeat on one of this afternoon's amendments. Here's his prediction:
• An amendment to extend the one year time limit on ESA to two is likely to fail
• A Labour amendment to exempt cancer patients from the one year limit may succeed
• There's a possible deal over ESA contributions for young people who are unable to work
It seems the Liberal Democrat peers have been allowed off the whip on the cancer vote, so some may rebel, as they have done before on the bill, or abstain.
You can follow the Lords debate live on parliament TV here
My colleague John Domokos has been to Parliament to talk to campaigners who are demonstrating against the Welfare reform bill.
Here's his report:
About forty protesters from a range of welfare activist groups such as Single Mothers' Self Defence, Mad Pride and Right to Work gathered at outside the House of Lords to protest the welfare reform Bill and lobby members. They handed out leaflets to passers by to inform them of how the welfare reform bill would affect them.
Kim Sparrow, a single mother said the benefit cap would badly affect mothers as it includes all child related benefits. She was also protesting the abolition of the social fund: "Many of us use this to escape violent and abusive relationships and set up new homes. The conditions of our lives are going to plummet with this bill."
Dave Skull from Mad Pride said the Work Capability assessment was "unfit for purpose" for mental health conditions, moving them onto Jobseekers Allowance and being forced into new 'Work for your benefit' schemes. A fellow member was worried she would lose the money she gets under DLA when it changes to Personal Independence payments, as it was "just a tick box excercise".
John Packer, the Bishop of Rippon and Leeds, is a member of the house of lords and is due to table an amendment to remove child benefit from the benefit cap. The lords is playing a "very significant role" in the bill, showing were the bill is "really damaging, for instance for those who are disabled, single mothers, and to say 'come on government, we can do better than this'"
Labour MP John McDonnell addressed protesters and said "we need much more serious and severe opposition from the Labour party" to prevent parts of the the legislation going through, in particular the benefit cap.
We'll be putting up some of John's video interviews later.
The Lords are now up and running on the welfare reform bill debate. If, like me, you are baffled by the blizzard of references to amendments and technical terms, its worth noting that in political terms, the first important debate is expected at around 4.45pm, with a vote at 5.45pm.
This will discuss the Listowel ammendment which will enable young people unable to work to qualify for ESA.
The second important debate will then take place, on the time limiting of ESA. The key vote on the amendment exempting cancer patients from the one year ESA limit is expected at 6.45pm.
This is the key amendment Labour is hoping to get crossbench and Liberal Democrat support for, and which it hopes will trigger a government defeat.
You can follow the bill live on parliament tv here
Lord Freud says a few words about the controversial work capability assessments. He claims that the tests - which are notorious for misdiagnosis and have generated huge backlogs of appeals - are improving.
There's no data to prove this, he admits, but anecdotally "things are getting more "encouraging".
What do you think?
Meanwhile, campaigner Sue Marsh has tweeted this:
Can anyone even believe that we are arguing over how "terminally ill" you have to be to get benefits?
Lord Patel is talking about the "youth condition" or clause 52, which proposes to stop eligibility of contributory ESA for young disabled people. He says the bill fails to recognise that young disabled people are already hugely financially disadvantaged. Removing elegibility will have a "devastating impact" on disabled and sick young people.
Baroness Lister points out that 15,000 sick and disabled young people will be affected by the removal of elegibility for ESA. The average cut to their income will be £25 a week.
Around a tenth of those affected will be left with no entitlement to ESA because they have a partner who is working, she says.
Although the principle of welfare reform is that ESA is a contributory benefit, Lister says an exception should be made for this small but hugely vulnerable group:
"We can all agree that something-for-something principle can be suspended in this case."
Lord McKenzie, who is a co-signtary of the ammendement, calls the government's proposed abolition of the youth condition "spiteful". Lord Freud to respond for the government.
Lord Freud says the principle behind abolishing automatic elegibility for ESA for disabled young people is about focusing "scarce state resources" on the poorest. He thinks it is unfair that a young person who gets ESA without having "paid in" should continue to get it even if they were to inherit a lot of money.
But he doesn't say say how many children might theoretically be in line for such a windfall. Labour peers have pointed out how the bulk of this group are the very poorest and most vulnerable in society, some of them in care.
Significant numbers of disabled young people who might currently expect to be receipt of ESA when they enter adulthood are comfortably off with resources of their own, claims Lord Freud. But again he can't say how many.
This seems a familiar government welfare reform trope: conspiring to deny the majority of benefit claimants on the basis there might be an unspecified minority of claimants who are easily wealthy enough to look after themselves.
Lord Freud says the ESA youth condition reform would deliver savings £70m by 2016-17. Those savings would be jeopardised by retaining the automatic payment system he suggests, adding:
"It's a very hard thing, finding bits of money".
He adds that 90% 15,000 children affected would retain ESA after assessment, suggesting that 10% would fail on the grounds that they have sufficient financial means.
Baroness Meacher questions the £70m savings figure used by Freud. She says it is £10m. She calls her amendment:
"An attempt to protect the dignity of a very very vulnerable, severely disabled group of people at a cost of only £10m."
Meacher proceeds to a vote and they are voting now.
While we are waiting for the Lords votes to be counted, here's a video film shot by my colleague John Domokos, who went to Westminster today to talk to welfare reform bill protestors.
Government defeated! 260 votes to 216? That's a huge surprise. More detail soon.
This is a shock. Lord Patel's amendment to protect the automatic right of young disabled people who are unable to work to qualify for ESA has been carried, by 260 votes to 216.
This was supposed to be a "too close to call" vote but the margin of victory was extraordinarily comfortable. Labour can normally expect to count on 230 peers, so this means that around 30 crossbenchers and Lib Dem rebels came out in support.
I spoke to a Labour advisor just now and he described the victory as "totally unexpected". The opposition have got wind in their sails now, with two key votes to go. A humiliation for the Coalition. As my my Labour advisor exclaims:
"It's game on!"
Lord Patel is now talking about amendments that call for an extension of the proposed time limit for people on ESA from one year to two. He calls for a review of of the 12 month time limit.
He wants to cut the deficit, he says, but not at the cost of making the lives of sick and vulnerable people more miserable.
A second amendment to be considered will exempt cancer patients from the 12 month limit on ESA. With the mood the Lords are in this evening, there's a real chance this will result in another defeat for the government.
Lords now lining up to attack government proposals on ESA limits. Lord Low slams their "draconian" nature of the reforms and calls on Lib Dems peers to "search their consciences" when it comes to a vote.
The Lords are particularly exercised about the idea that people who have contributed to national insurance will see their "something for something" entitlements taken away.
Baroness Lister quotes from an account of the implications of losing ESA by disabled writer Mark Sparrow published in the Guardian this morning, in support of the amendment:
The satisfaction of being able to contribute to the family budget with a benefit that has been earned and paid for will be removed. The last shred of dignity will be stripped from people who have already lost a great deal in life and who may already feel a burden on those who care for them.
You can read the full article here
The amendment is going to cost money, points out Conservative peer Lord Blencathra. It may be morally sound, but the amendment could cost between £200m and £400m a year. Who will lose out, he asks.
Lord Wigley points out that if the bill is unamended it will be disabled people who lose out. Why should they bear the burden of the financial crisis?
Here's the breakdown of that government defeat on ESA eligibility for disabled young people. The "contents" are those peers who voted in favour of the amendment.
Contents Total: 260
Bishops 4
Crossbench 68
Labour 178
Liberal Democrat 3
Other 7
Not Contents Total: 216
Conservative 144
Crossbench 10
Liberal Democrat 61
Other 1
The crossbenchers clearly came out in force on this. I'm told the three Lib Dem peers who rebelled were: Lord Taylor of Goss Moor, Lord Roberts of Llandudno, and Baroness Tong
Lord Freud says that the amendment to extend the limit on ESA to two years will cost £1.6bn over the next five years. He asks:
Where are we going to find those sums?
On the second amendment, which would exempt cancer patients from the one year limit, Freud claims that two thirds of cancer patients would retain their elegibility for for ESA after the 12 month limit.
That depends of course on those tricky Work Capability Assessments diagnosing claimants correctly. Freud says he is "absolutely committed to making the WCA more effective."
Then he loses his train of thought momentarily "I'm not sure where to go," he mutters in momentary confusion. Gentle Lordly laughter all round.
Lord Patel points out that we are talking about a reduction in savings, not extra funding. The amendment is not about adding to expenditure but refusing to take £1.3bn from the most vulnerable. He's quietly furious:
"If you are going to rob the poor to pay the rich we have entered a different form of morality."
Cancer patients, he points out, are not "not skivers, not benefit cheats".
The Lords now go to a second vote. This will be interesting.
The Lords are now voting on two amendments. The first will extend the time limit for ESA benefit from one year to two; the second will exempt cancer patients from the 12 month rule.
People who understand these things better than me are expecting the first ammendment to fall.
But the second, on which the Lib Dems are apparently not whipped, could be close. A lot will depend on how may crossbenchers stick around - it was they who triggered the first defeat of the day for the government.
They've done it again! 234 in favour of the amendment, 186 contents against. This is the two year limit. Again unexpected. Now voting on the cancer exemption. The government being slaughtered tonight!
There's a real buzz in the chamber tonight. The government has suffered two defeats already, and a third, on exemption for cancer patients from the 12 month limit looks distinctly in the offing. Twitter already on fire with the news.
Here's Sunny Hundal the Liberal Conspiracy blogger:
GOVERNMENT DEFEATED in limiting time-limiting ESA for disabled people! OMG! Lord Patel FTW!
It's a hatrick! For 222, against 166. This is astonishing. It is an incredible victory for campaigners, a real kick in the teeth for the government and a personal humiliation for Lord Freud
To sum up: the government has astonshingly lost three straight votes in the Lords. They are for the following amendments:
• To retain automatic eligibility for ESA for young disabled people who are unable to work
• To impose a two year time limit for ESA claimants, overriding the government's proposal that claimants be reassesed after 12 months
• To exempt cancer patients from the proposed ESA limit.
This is an extraordinary start to the welfare reform bill voting season. More votes will take place on similarly controversial issues in the next fortnight, including next week on disability living allowance.
Meanwhile here's a tweet from the Guardian's Polly Toynbee:
Remarkable triple defeat for government in Lords. Shame again on most LibDems, voting to cut benefits to dying and life-long disabled young.
Her's a tweet from disability campaigner and blogger Kaliya Franklin, who tweets as @bendygirl:
I can't believe it!!! Time for a little cry. We did it guys, we did it!!
Here's more reaction to that incredible triple defeat for the government:
Claudia Wood, welfare expert at the think tank IPPR tweets:
1 yr limit of ESA was least thought through aspect of #wrb, wholly abritrary weilding of axe. Defeat has restored my faith in parli process
Richard Murphy tweets
Isn't it absurd that it takes the Lords to stand up for the sick and disabled? Reform it? Not at this rate. Brave Labour peers!
My colleague Tom Clark has just filed this assessment of what's happened in the Lords this evening
There are more experienced Lords-watchers than me, but I can't remember anything like it. I've seen double defeats but can't recall a triple defeat in a single session.
The victories on crediting in disabled children was the kind of detailed measure of principle that the Lords like to get right. And with a price tag they are putting at ten million a year the government certainly wouldn't have attempted to reverse it.
The most recent vote on cancer exemptions was also, perhaps, predictable - my expectation is that this sort of popular rather than policy proposal can only have won with significant Lib Dem backing, many cross benchers may have voted with the government.
Again, however, I can not imagine that the government would want to pick a fight in the Commons on an issue affecting a small number of people like this.
The second vote, however, on increasing the time limit is different. Lord Freud has been said to be quoting some very large figures for the cost, and I can't check this immediately but (off the top of my head) I would expect it would make a significant dent in the £1-2bn which (again off the top of my head - perils of live blogging!) is what I would expect they will save from the time limit in the first place.
In other words we could be talking about hundreds rather than tens of million, and amount which could lead to the government being forced to go back to MPs and ask them to reverse it later down the line. Lib Dems in particular will find that hard to swallow if their friends upstairs have just said no to it.
OK. That's it, have to head home. What an evening! The live blog will be up and running again on Thursday around 10am. Lots to discuss!
Comments
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11 January 2012 10:42AM
I'm very concerned that the move to PIP might result in my losing DLA of £78 a month (Low Rate Care allowance). As I have trouble cooking much of the time, this extra money allows me to purchase microwaveable "ready" meals. I'd starve otherwise
11 January 2012 11:16AM
There was a woman interviewed on newsnight last night. She was upset as the high speed rail project will pass just by her pile, and she mentioned that anybody might be upset when decisions are made which affect "one's home". I suspect these awful reforms will affect the " one's homes" of many people who have no other means of supporting their lives. There has been a truly callous crusade to besmirch benefits claimers and therefore to persuade people that it is okay to take relatively tiny amounts of money away from people who really need it. Let's hope the lords blow it completely out of the water.
11 January 2012 11:28AM
Good comparison ethelbrose. People tend to ignore what doesn't affect them then complain passionately when it does. Truth is these reforms will affect many many people in quite huge ways as we saw in the comments on yesterday's blogs. Here's a couple of experiences which were left by commenters yesterday to give you a flavour:
ephemerid:
MarxistLeninist:
And there was also a very moving story from a former weightlifter now on DLA which you can read here.
11 January 2012 12:07PM
How can there be any discussions on this principle.
Cancer patients need what they need, not in two months but right now this minute.
Some of them won't last two months.
The last thing they need is the worry of filling in forms or fighting for a small or large amount of money to help them survive.
When you are recovering from chemo your body aches all over, your are sometimes unable to swallow or eat so the last thing on your mind is filling in forms.
All you want to do is survive.
Anyone against this pittance of an allowance for cancer patients needs to hang their heads in shame.
These reforms were started by labour and are being pushed all the way by this kind caring bunch of posh boys.
Shame on all associated with this, I hope you never get cancer or second thoughts I hope you do. Yes, anyone who votes for these shameful changes to attack the benefits of cancer sufferers I hope you get the disease too.Then you will know all about filling forms and being punished just because you are ill.
I hope you get pain and suffering in great quantities.........Oh By the way I forget to say "We're all in this together"......bollocks.......
11 January 2012 12:23PM
Grim reading indeed. Trouble is the woman in the pile will never need to claim benefits, and 'one' really does have to ask how these people believe they have the right to propose changes which make people (adults and children) homeless, or without the means of eating or generally having some quality to their lives, or without dignity. I am truly shocked that people are not collectively angrier, but then, the groundswell of opinion is so manipulated and controlled I guess I should not be surprised. "I'm alright Jack" springs to mind.
11 January 2012 12:50PM
I am not ,I suppose , as ill as many others never the less I am ill.
I worked 44 years and paid NI contributions during this time which was handed out UNCONDITIONALLY now in my hour of need the Government intends time limiting claims, I and many others will lose our lifeline.
If I had paid to a PRIVATE company it would have been ILLEGAL for them to change the criteria after accepting my payments for 44 years, it seems this Government can make the illegal legal at will.
Also the NI contributions Fund is in SURPLUS to the tune of £48 Billion as ESA(C) is paid totally from this fund I cannot understand the PROBLEM, unless the Government intends STEALING this PUBLIC money.
It seems to me in this Big Society the people who have done the right thing and paid NIC get the least. This will just make partners pack in their work going against the principle of getting people back to work.
Sometimes the Public perception of what is being done to them is nil this bill will affect everyone.
NOBODY IS IMMUNE TO ILLNESS
11 January 2012 1:32PM
This is no longer the country I grew up in.
What price compassion in Britain today? Too much for this Tory Government , which the Liberal Democrats, to their everlasting shame, have supported in all their vile policies.
Never trust the Tories.
11 January 2012 1:37PM
The important thing about clause 52 or getting rid of ESA in Youth (the term often used for allowing young disabled people to qualify without paying enough NI contributions) as explained by Mr Gaffney is when talking about learning difficulties what should not be missed is we are talking about young people with conditions such as downs syndrome, autism etc. These are young people and adults who will not get 'better' and will always find entering main stream work difficult. Any work will usually be in a supported environment with a lot of help (this can be done and continue to claim ESA under permitted work rules - this is good we are talking about low wage subsidised work which helps the person to integrate whilst providing support - not enough to wages to live on unless also in receipt of benefit).
I sincerely hope that the lords are aware of these details and support the amendment to change this.
Fingers crossed
11 January 2012 1:39PM
Totally agree. I live just outside Wendover, the town that will be bisected by HS2, and the NIMBYs need to get some perspective. Having a bit shaved off the value of your quarter of a million pound (at least) house is not the same as being kicked out of temporary accommodation onto the street because you're in arrears. If only the issues which affect the poor and sick could command the same level of media attention and public sympathy as those affecting a handful of Tory-voting b******s in the home counties, we wouldn't be in this mess at all.
11 January 2012 2:22PM
As I have trouble cooking much of the time, this extra money allows me to purchase microwaveable "ready" meals. I'd starve otherwise
Ditto
My disability is Cerebral Palsy.
I also have an aged mother with cancer and blindness,she is up all night with terrible pain. I'm up all hours of the morning 1am-onwards giving her 10 mg of Oramorph (morphine)
The microwaveable "ready" meals really help because we eat at irregular times.
11 January 2012 3:09PM
House of Lords looks busy. The debate can be watched on Parliament TV
Lord Bassam on twitter last night said that Labour peers are on a 3-line whip to back the extension to ESA so iit is very much down to the LD's & crossbenchers.
11 January 2012 3:33PM
These 'reforms' are cruel and unprincipled: their intent is to curry favour with the majority of the self-satisfied middle class (the eponymous Taxpayer) and to ensure that their natural, 'me first' right wing bias continues to support the Tories. We are in an increasingly dangerous situation for the vulnerable. This 'de-humanising' of even cancer patients and certainly of the disadvantage by implying their unworthiness for whatever reason will have increasingly frightening consequences......one does not a great deal of imagination to discern what these consequences might be ...... recent history has vivid examples. These Tories are not simply loathsome, they are poisonous.
11 January 2012 3:55PM
Yes loathsome Tories but do not forget the LOATHSOME LABOUR PARTY ,who I have voted for all my life but NEVER AGAIN they are as bad as the Tories.
I will vote for anyone against the three pigs who are only interested in what they can get from the trough.
Shame on Miliband , Balls and Yvette Cooper, the latter two supposedly from Castleford a town that will suffer more than most from their Welfare Bill.
11 January 2012 4:00PM
Thanks John :-)
11 January 2012 4:09PM
House of Lords cleared shockingly fast once the WRB was being debated, which is rather ....actually, no I have no words.
11 January 2012 4:10PM
thanks for posting the link to Parliament TV. What do people think so far?
11 January 2012 4:15PM
So, we are returning to a locally-administered, even voluntary, Poor Law. This bill abolishes the Social Fund, the meagre safety net at the bottom of the means-tested benefit system, and transfers the responsibility and the money paid to claimants for Crisis Loans and Community Care grants to local authorities “in order to meet severe hardship in the way they think best” (DWP). God help the poor of Knightsbridge or Kensington and Chelsea.
Helpfully, the government has suggested that local authorities might like to co-operate with voluntary agencies – it’s consultation paper on the change suggested for example food banks – in carrying out their task of supporting the destitute; but then again, they might not, since the change involves no requirement on local authorities to do anything, or even a need for the money they are to be given to be spent on the poor at all. God help the poor of every cash-strapped local authority.
The government has simply washed its hands of the problem, and with it goes the last shred of the right of the poorest to be helped in time of need. God help the poor. Let us be clear; crisis loan means what it says. It is firstly available only in a crisis which poses “serious damage or risk to health”, and will help people with essential short-term needs if, for example, they have have nothing to meet an emergency, or have been robbed, or suffered fire or flood. The amounts are not large: last year the average payment was £82, but for the nearly three million people sufficiently destitute to claim, even that is a lot.
Secondly, it is a fucking loan: claimants get the amount clawed back from their future benefit. This is hardly the scroungers’ charter: who but the desperate would go to the state for a loan that will leave them even poorer?
So where do you go now when, uninsured and unsupported, your house burns down and you lose everything you have, or, perhaps more typically, your cooker explodes and you have no means of feeding the children? There is no one left who has to help you.
11 January 2012 4:19PM
It seems people who have been fortunate enough to not need illness and disability benefits believe this welfare reform will just 'trim' and cut back on the amount people will receive. So that recipients cannot live too comfortably and therefore incentivise people to get back to work.
I just don't understand how the government can justify cutting the ESA payments after one year? As people have already said it is a very tiny majority that manage to claim illness/disability payments fraudulently (0.5-1.5% ?). Meaning the almost 100% of claimants that genuinely cannot work will be left with nothing. Clearly, that will not result in simply a change in lifestyle but is about survival. If you are housebound or bedbound and unable to look after yourself and have no money coming in, how can you survive?
I feel very frightened about the changes. As someone has said in a previous post, many might seem reasonable on paper but the effect on people who are vulnerable and cannot fight will be devastating.
I have had severe health problems since childhood, spending long periods in hospital (age 12/13 i spent over a year in one stint). I have a chronic blood disorder, severe immunodeficiency problems, history of bone marrow disease and mental health problems as a result of social isolation etc. I'm now in my twenties and am trying very hard to get through a university degree. I'm unable to work because of the problems which result in chronic infections, hospitalisations and being bedbound, chronic pain etc. So I thought rather than just be at home, not doing anything I would try to study. This is taking me longer than normal because of absences and dropping down a year due to illness etc.
I have never been able to work but would love to be able to, but who would employ me with this history? Who would take on someone who will have to go into hospital frequently and be unable to get out of bed so much of the time? Yet the odd days I can make it into university I appear to look like any other healthy student that should be able to work. So I would be deemed capable for work and benefits would be cut. But I'm not able to.
For me and like so many other thousands of people this is not a lifestyle choice, we rely on the illness/disability benefit to survive. For food, heating and essentials. If or more likely when my benefit is cut I won't be able to survive.
Its possible if I cannot afford food and heating costs and lose the housing benefit I currently receive I just won't survive the mental and physical strain. The next infection could just finish me off.
My worry a while ago was just well I won't be able to live so close to university, so as I cannot walk far due to physical weakness and mobility problems I will have to give up my study which I really don't to want to do as I thought its something to focus on, a lifeline when I am well enough to do something. But now I'm just scared about survival.
11 January 2012 4:25PM
I concur with the other cancer sufferer, my illness , cancer of the bladder is manageable as long as i do exactly what my doctors say and follow the instructions given to me by my oncologist.and soon the surgeons
When your 3 weeks away from major life saveing surgery the last thing you need is financial worries its like your bollocks being tickled by a red hot poker.
I too hope certain MP'S and goverment advisors and other twats who work in the uk administritive system get cancer then they will understand what it feels like to wake up everyday wondering is this shit terminal ? or am i onto a cure.
I cannot emphasise my gratitude enough to my team here in Belfast and would normaly use my own name but im banned from cif.
For the welfare minister whose wife is also a cancer sufferer i say to you , Are you human or what ? whilst i genuinly sympathise with his wifes condition , i feel the man and his team are an insult to the people in the cancer wards up and down the country.
Whilst we are on the subject of preconceptions and things arnt what they seem looks wise, the other day a patient in her early twenties came in and she was as good looking as any model , a realy bonny looking lass. believe you me the last thing you would think was she had cancer so trust me looks are very very deceptive on this one.
11 January 2012 4:26PM
Why should they care they're at deaths door.
Those asleep looked dead until as you stated
House of Lords cleared shockingly fast once the WRB was being debated, which is rather ....actually, no I have no words.
Those seats look damned comfortable.
11 January 2012 4:33PM
Ditto me also with the problems cooking.
The care DLA rate i get allows me to purchase ready meals like you. I would also starve without that extra money. Cooking a meal you put together yourself costs less.
11 January 2012 4:36PM
There are a huge number of good causes and cases of hardship which need money. However, money is a scarce resource and it is simply not possible to satisfy everybody, or anything like everybody.
So hard choices have to be made, and is no good saying that you can't cut any welfare benefits. Personally, I think that cancer suffers are a greater priority than most other welfare claimants. But something has to give - and that is just a hard economic fact.
11 January 2012 4:46PM
bill9651
What a brilliant idea. I'll just die then because of "a hard economic fact" !
Do some research before spouting out such cruel opinions.
11 January 2012 4:46PM
Of course something has to give and choices have to be made in this economic climate. But these changes being made are targeting society's most vulnerable who are already struggling a great deal. If these changes go through people basically living a hand to mouth existence will struggle even more.
Cancer sufferers unable to work clearly should receive benefits, but how can you say they are a greater priority than most other welfare claimants??!
Is that because you have more awareness of cancer as a disease that can severely affect the quality of someones life? What about muscular dystrophy, MS, lupus, schizophrenia, intractable epilepsy, severe blood disorders, ME, immunodeficiency disorders..... the list goes on.
You saying that suggests that claimants without cancer are somehow more undeserving of benefits, on what basis can you make that claim?
11 January 2012 4:50PM
Fraud says it is getting better? Must be a lie then.
Osborne on the front of the Times is supposedly wanting to take £140Bn from local authority pension pots for infrastructure spending.
Yes, that's right, those same pension pots that are empty and cannot afford the gold-plated pensions to which public servants contributed.
Bill9651 needs to think a little more deeply, as in my own case I care for someone who will be thrown out when these cuts come into being. The £67 a week saving will then be replaced by a £4K plus a week hospital bill.
Before I paid 45 years tax and NI there used to be a saying about ships and ha'porth of tar. They have not quite got the hang of "cuts" as we are worse off than before they began and the "cuts" have cost the nation a bloody fortune.
11 January 2012 4:54PM
Your spite against sick & disabled claimants will not be easily forgotton. I sincerely hope your post remains in place despite the feelings it invokes - it does you no credit.
11 January 2012 4:56PM
Lord Freud says: "There's no data to prove this [that the WCA is improving], he admits, but anecdotally "things are getting more "encouraging".
Hmmm, I work for a mental health charity and I've been hearing some very different anecdotes to him clearly...
The WCA is still not fit for purpose and it is making peopl ill
11 January 2012 5:15PM
Does anyone know how much do peers get daily for just turning up and signing in at the House of Lords ?
Sickening hypocrisy on the part of those who are happy to vote other people's benefits away.
Shame on them, and shame on the Lib Dems for propping up this wretched government.
Yes New Labour were crap for a lot of reasons, but that's no excuse for the way this government is just pushing it further in such a cruel and callous way.
11 January 2012 5:19PM
"lord" Freud is one of the vilest creatures in the country, and with this current govt, that's saying a lot. Evasive,duplicitous, mendacious and cruel.
11 January 2012 5:21PM
One thing the government has not really thought through is that cutting 100,000 ESA claims, along with all the other cuts to housing, tax credits and DLA, will take a massive amount of money out of the economy.
People stop spending on utilities, which believe me, when the last Cons were in and they cut housing benefit to very low paid working families, people could not afford heating at all, and barely enough food for each day: there was absolutely no disposable income to spend on even a pair of pants!! It is also really miserable being so cold and covered in chilblanes; as a 48 year old chronically ill person, even more so.
More than 10% of the population, if not more, are going be affected by the various cuts, so this adds up to a massive amount of people not spending on, well, living! Look how the energy companies were moaning because we had a mild autumn; this will affect all kinds of business across the board.
The government are not only determined to target the poor and vulnerable, but it doesn't seem like they want this country to recover economically at all.
If we have got this far along in history in the West in order to look after those who most need it, as all civilized countries have, what was the point if a 100 years down the line most of that progress is swept away, and what is left will reduce year on year?
People need homes, people need jobs that actually pay, and if there are no jobs and you are ill, you cannot just magic up some money to survive, and the next generation of low paid people, the unemployed and ill are not going to disappear by magic either. I hate to say this moreover, but has anyone also thought that women who become pregnant and find out about a disability in time may choose abortion over having a child knowing that there will be no financial support whatsoever? This is just one aspect of these reforms, there are many more that are just as cruel, so the implications of this welfare reform are quite frankly, evil.
The whole stinking financial system that caused this, focused on a very few privilaged people, doesn't work any more: even the capitalists can't get it right, and all of this tinkering, cutting, and borrowing will not save it now.
The poor will be the first casualties. The legacy through history will disgrace all of the major parties who are associated with this, and hopefully one day, the Con/Lib/Lab political system will be so disgraced that no person will ever vote for them again.
11 January 2012 5:23PM
£300 just for turning up - you shold have seen how quickly they left after the car park was discussed yet every single bloody one of them would have claimed £300.
Still, the WRB debate is being led by a man who believes that sick & disabled kids are going to have substantial inheritances but who has absolutely no evidence of his claim.
Some liike Lord Patel have shown perfect understanding of the effects this bill will have & who are perfectly prepared to say so - thankfully.
11 January 2012 5:33PM
They are paid £300 a day, gosh.
That would pay for almost 18 weeks of my lower care rate DLA which helps me to be able to eat. When they abolish it I'll seriously struggle to pay for my meals.
A little perspective... one day of pay for them, 18 weeks of for me. Thats what they want to abolish.
11 January 2012 5:38PM
I know that there are some honourable people in parliament by the way; just too few of them.
Voting now; hoping that at least some people, like disabled children and disabled adults with low paid partners, get a reprieve.
The ammendments don't go far enough though; what happens when you are disabled for life after the 2 years are up?
Have they considered that many low paid people will have to give up work to be carers so that their partners can then apply for income related ESA, which means they will qualify for Carer's Allowance, the new Universal Credit, and the housing payments under UC? Not much of a saving there then.
Badly thought out from beginning to end.
11 January 2012 5:42PM
Hi showmaster
I have saved the NHS thousands but am about to be ATOSed I expect to be migrated onto JSA Jobseeker’s Allowance
The state can then pick up the tab for my mothers care.
It is not what my mother wants but I can’t be two places at once
Remember this?
Chancellor George Osborne’s assertion last year that the government was going to put an end to the “benefits lifestyle” - where he said some claimants were able to lie in with their curtains closed while “hard working families” headed off to work.
My curtains are closed George because I have an aged mother with cancer and blindness,she is up all night with terrible pain. I’m up all hours of the morning 1am-onwards spoon feeding her 10 mg of Oramorph (morphine) when she need it
Btw George We contacted the Mcmillan nurse for the second time in 2 years, then arranged a 1st home visit. I was told that I’m mentally and psychically exhausted.
She has arranged for me to see a psychiatric and specialist because I have developed diabetes and neuropathy to add to my Cerebral Palsy.
bill9651 and George Osborne can go hang.
11 January 2012 5:44PM
RESULT OF VOTE: Bns Meacher amendment on youth/ESA passed by 260 votes to 216 On that ammendment the Government was DEFEATED!!
Come on Lords - do the same for the rest of it, including DLA
11 January 2012 5:45PM
Sorry
psychiatrist not psychiatric.
I told you I was tired ha ha.
11 January 2012 5:46PM
Thank God!!
Cmon!!
11 January 2012 5:47PM
What will people who are disabled for life do then?! People who are severely chronically ill/disabled, will just receive nothing to survive?
How can this be justified?! So just because economic cuts have to be made then people who cannot work will be left with nothing to survive on, in effect left to die. I'm very scared.
11 January 2012 5:57PM
I think he's misleading the House, as he's been caught doing before. There's not a shred of evidence assessments are improving. Here's an example from today's disability thread:
It ought to be a national scandal that vulnerable people are being treated in this way.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/discussion/comment-permalink/14073931
11 January 2012 5:59PM
Government defeated. 1-0.
11 January 2012 6:01PM
I have a horrible feeling that whatever changes the Lord's vote on, the tories and their libdem cohorts will reverse in the commons!
I'm quite sure they take perverse pleasure in the stress and worry they will cause the vulnerable in society and pay lip-service to tax evasion!
11 January 2012 6:08PM
No argument from me on that score.
What I think is utterly apalling is the media blackout on anything to do with this bill - until of course, it suits their purpose.
The Guardian is, I think, the only paper that has covered it. If only we could get them to investigate the abomination that is ATOS......
11 January 2012 6:13PM
There's no data to prove Bigfoot exists but there are anecdotes. What a clever and nice man Lord Freud is.
11 January 2012 6:13PM
Oohhhh just found this:
11 January 2012 6:16PM
Thank God for Lord Patel! To the 216 Tory Lords that voted for the bill shame on you you greedy shower of Tory Shit!
11 January 2012 6:19PM
Surprisingly The Mail had a supportive article in its online edition!
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2084706/David-Camerons-Welfare-Reform-Bill-Hiding-truth-way-achieve-it.html
11 January 2012 6:20PM
Well, it's a relief to have the compassionate members of the unelected house who seem to have far more empathy than the elected representatives of the people. I just hope for the proper and just outcome for all our people - our neighbours - with disabilities. I cannot conceive how Freud can advance this bill - it is terrible and mean in spirit. In the context of the above, what is £70m in the greater scheme of life, even politics? All the political parties - with the exception of the Greens - have revealed a lack of decency and moral sensibility and so we depend on individuals in the Lords, despite their parties' formal positions, to constrain and revise.
11 January 2012 6:20PM
Hate to say it, but thank goodness for the Lords.
As others have said, it is shameful that the ill and needy (or even just the ill alone) should have to sufffer ignominy, discomfort and worry for the sake of a paltry sum. When all is said and done, if you are ill with cancer or any disease that affects you mentally as well as physically (and which ones don't) then the last thing you want is some form of legalised censure.
Just some caring thought in the form of financial worry free help. Anyone who thinks this is an abomination is abominable themselves.
11 January 2012 6:21PM
They MUST act to stop the time limit of ESA. This will throw so many people into poverty and will put massive strain on families and relationships. The ESA is, for many, the only independent financial means they have. To take that away from them and force them to be reliant on family and friends is horrific.
11 January 2012 6:24PM
Just before PM Questions,Questions to the Scottish Minister there were a couple of questions about ATOS,one from Tom Greatrex