New Sanction Trap For UC Claimants With £250 Incentive For DWP Staff

The more that Tory governments do with regards to welfare benefits make it clear that welfare is not part of the process and punishment is becoming more and more its objective.

Rather than pay DWP staff incentives to do more, why not increase benefits for claimants, especially those who do get into work for a period of time, while they adjust to manage with work and assess any difficulties they could well experience.

Benefits should be there to help and not punish, the government needs to be educated, perhaps for the first time.

Same Difference

With many thanks to Benefits And Work.

Universal credit (UC) claimants are to be faced with a new sanction trap disguised as help to move into work. The scheme has been condemned by the DWP staff union who say the government is “hellbent on making it more difficult for people to claim benefits”, even though jobcentre workers stand to gain from a £250 ‘incentive’ if their office tops a league table.

UC sanctions are already at a record high. Over 98% of all sanctions are for failure to attend an interview, with over half a million claimants being sanctioned for this reason last year.

Yet, under the new Additional Jobcentre Support scheme claimants are being forced to attend  a jobcentre 10 times over a two week period.  In these obligatory sessions they will have “work search conversations” and “support sessions”. Missing a single session is likely to lead…

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More people face paying for care as means-test threshold is frozen for 13th year – Community Care

More people face paying for their care after means-testing thresholds were frozen for a 13th consecutive year, the government announced this week. The upper capital limit, above which people must pay the full cost of their care (in most cases)*, will stay at £23,250, for 2023-24, said the Department of Health and Social Care’s (DHSC) […]

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Is it good that we have to welcome the small mercies being offered by his Government, well it is better than nothing, which this government puts as its first action, but will still leave many people well below the ‘bread-line‘ to live on.

So, I do disagree with King’s Fund senior fellow, social care, Simon Bottery where he states ‘the government “deserves some credit” for its inflationary rise in the MIG’, for it is not credit they deserve for the little they are giving is an insult to all persons in needs of care, their families and all who work in Social Care.

This Government and really all previous governments, are and have refused to see what is happening within Social care and in doing so have all allowed the social care crisis to escalate to what it is now  and has really been for years. It is now being recognised by some that this social care crisis is seriously affecting the NHS, which it has been doing for many years, but ignored by many.

It is debatable whether this ignoring has been by ignorance or by design by this government and all previous governments, from what I see I really do believe the latter for it is so clear that none of these governments really cares about social care and to some extent, even the NHS. Is this because they have, personally, sufficient funds not to rely on social care and the NHS and if or when required they would source it privately, well that could be so, but is it that they only really care for themselves and not others below the level of their amassed fortunes, for many are so wealthy that, even the high costs of living are not of any concern to them.

This is well seen in how they are governing the UK and keeping many on just a level to live on, but in doing so many in the UK are well below a living level of subsistence.

Is there really a ‘Welfare State‘ anymore? Well there is a State. but it is well below Welfare.

Perhaps the real government policy is too keep people on a below subsistence level in the hope they will not survive, hence reducing the costs of welfare even further as there will be so many less people around to need welfare.

We see this in the level of benefits not, in many instances, keeping up with inflation, continued pay freezes in the Public sector and how all essential emergency workers are being treated, not just now, but so for many years previously.

We so, desperately need a Government for the People, but I can’t see this occurring anytime soon, if ever. The Human Rights of the people in the UK are continually being eroded, by our governments.

 

Source: More people face paying for care as means-test threshold is frozen for 13th year – Community Care

The DWP has become Britain’s biggest debt collector. Surely during an energy crisis it should press pause | Gordon Brown | The Guardian

Deductions to universal credit loans and bills will cause destitution as families struggle to keep up with fuel payments, says former prime minister Gordon Brown

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The DWP is supposed to be the Benefit Agewncy, a Government organisation that pays welfare benefits to claimants who have been assessed to be need of help to finaner their lives and those of their families.

But, the DWP as also beoe a debt collection agency as Gordon Brown is saying, taking money, uch needed money from claimants before payment of benefits have been made without any consideration as to whether the claimants can still afford to live on the reduced benefits being paid by the DWP.

This is Government policy, the same Government who intoduced benefits with such a delay in initial payments when delays should not be, so that claimants were forced to reuest advanced payments. The benefit syste should have been formuated so that payments were made immediately they were approved. This could have been easily done by processing eah laiant application as though it would be approed so tghat when it was payents ould be made immediately and not in some weeks delay.

This is as though there is some punishment when there should be none.

This is not welfare but a crime commited by what should be a  caring Government.

Source: The DWP has become Britain’s biggest debt collector. Surely during an energy crisis it should press pause | Gordon Brown | The Guardian

The Family Of Six In A One-Bedroom Flat Due To Inaccessible Social Housing

The housing market in the UK is far from good and even more so in respect of Social housing for many reasons

1. social housing stock has, over many hyears been reduced through the ‘right to buy’ scheme where social housing tennents were given the right to buy on a much lower price than the current market value dependent on how long the family have resided in the property, but Local Authorities, (LAs) were not allowed to use the resulting income from the sale of the property to buld replacement stocks

2. UK social housing stock is generally old, so not as acceptable to conditions of today, especially with regards to accessiblity and other aspects in regards to disabilities, but also many others such as use of energy and suitability of current climates

3. lack of available funding at LAs due to, at least 10 years of austerity cuts to Government grants to LAs, plus increased costs related to COVID, in a very changing market. This is not only reflecting on social housing, but many other LA resourses such as, education, social care and many others

4. too long timescales toprovide required adjustments and alterations and adaptations

5. state of repair of much social housing as repairs have not been done, effectively, sufficiently and within required timescales, leading t many social housing properties to be in a poor state causing many areas relating to causes of very poor health of tennents residing in them

When a family needs improved and more suitable accomodation is it required immediately and not in a year or years time as to do so puts more stress, and inconvenience on alrady very stressful and inconvenienced families so adding much more to problems within their lives.

This was not satisfactory years ago and even more so now, but this Government and may previous Governments have and are being shown to behave like the ‘3 wise monkeys‘, see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil’.

This is a major crisis, in addition to all the other major crisises within the UK and should never have been allowed to occur, but mismanagement or, in reality, no management by UK Governments for more years than there should have been, out of sight, out of mind, except for those of the population who are directly concerned, but Governments who are not and never will be concerned.

Same Difference

A family of six have been living in a one-bedroom flat because the social housing they were assigned was inaccessible to their disabled child.

Seven-year-old Joel Verala uses a wheelchair and is fed by a tube due to quadriplegic cerebral palsy.

The house has three bedrooms but the family have been told the adaptations he needs could take a year.

Croydon Council said it had always informed the family the work would take “some months to complete”.

Joel’s mum, Souskay Verala, describes her son as a “happy boy” on the BBC Access All podcast.

“He likes stories read to him, he loves his siblings playing around him, as well as walks outside,” she says.

The family – Souskay, her husband and three children – were excited to be offered the three-bedroom council property in March having lived in a small flat for the previous six years.

But, though the…

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DWP Refusing To Follow Recommendations During Cost Of Living Crisis – The poor side of life

Under the cover of Queen Elizabeths death the DWP (Department of work and Pensions) have been busy inflicting cruelty upon claimants. They never miss a chance to show their hatred of social securit…

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The DWP should be there to assist claimants, but, in fact, there whole agenda is to do the opposite, more than likely under the orders of this Government. This requires action in every way on every occasion to force the DWP to comply, as they will only do so after a formal legal decision from the Courts and even then they will fight all the way and when eventually ordered to do so, will do it as slowly as possible.

It appears to be run by robots who have been programmed to work in the most unempathetic and demoralising way possible.

This is showing they have no respect for human rights, safeguarding, just to punish claimants for being there.

 

Source: DWP Refusing To Follow Recommendations During Cost Of Living Crisis – The poor side of life

Scotland’s New Disability Benefits System Comes Into Force

One can only hope that this Scottish system will be better than the one for the whole of the UK, but, only time will tell.

The currently system is so clumbersome and the assessments appear to be ‘not fit for purpose’.

Where there is a willingness on Governments there are always opportunities for improvements, but with the UK Government this willingness appears to be not available. They appear to be more inclined to abuse disabled people rather than help them.

Same Difference

The Scottish government has begun taking over adult disability benefits from the UK government.

Until now, personal independence payments (PIP) or disability living allowance (DLA) have been provided by the UK government.

They are being replaced in Scotland by the new adult disability payment.

The process of automatically transferring recipients over is now under way, and the Scottish system is open to new applicants.

Scottish ministers have said that the process of applying for the new benefit will be “more compassionate”.

The changes have been welcomed by disability groups, although opposition politicians described them as “a missed opportunity”.

About 300,000 people in Scotland receive PIPs, while about 39,000 people are in receipt of DLA.

PIPs help people aged 16 to 64 cope with the extra costs they face due to ill health or disability, and are gradually replacing the DLA.

People already receiving either of those benefits will be automatically…

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Cost of living crisis: the UK needs to raise taxes not cut them – here’s why

Why tax cuts are unlikely to help Britain address its current crises.

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Tax cuts or increases, that is the question and not one to really answer, for when looked it is a generalisation and not one directed at certain communities.

In the UK there is much more of the population which is regarded as poor and on low incomes than there are the, so called, rich.

So a tax cut means more in the ability to spend for the poor, i.e. those poor who pay taxes as opposed to the poor whose income is below the taxation starting point.

While tax increases make the poor so much worse off, than the rich, especially if the tax brackets are not increasing in line with inflation, which they have not been, in fact for a few years they have been frozen, which effectively bring more people into taxation.

Ideally, taxes for the rich should increase, while for the poor they should reduced. Also, inline with all this welfare benefits should aways be increased yearly and, at least, inline with inflation.

It is so wrong that the poor get poorer, while the rich get richer, it should be that all get richer, with the poor increasing quicker than the rich, there in doing so the gap between the poor and rich be reducing, whereas, it currently is increasing.

Salaries for so many in the UK are far too low, especially in care and this needs to change so much so that even low salaries are more than sufficient to live on, thereby reducing the need to claim some benefits to reduce the gap to enable reasonable living.

 

Source: Cost of living crisis: the UK needs to raise taxes not cut them – here’s why

MPs ask Coffey why she is hiding nine secret DWP reports – Disability News Service

MPs have asked the work and pensions secretary to justify her refusal to release nine potentially embarrassing reports about her department’s work, at least four of which focus on disabled claimant…

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Transparency, honesty, accountability and trust should be there in every aspect of public organisation governess, but the opposites non-transparency, dishonesty, unaccountability and distrust are usually evident in many instances.

This is so proving the case in respect of the DWP and certainly, it appears, with the Work and Pensions Secretary Therese Coffey MP.

This is all on top of the spectacle of ‘Partygate‘,  so it appears many elements of this Government are unwilling to abide by the concepts of transparency, honesty, accountability and trust and many within the UK feel this will never change.

The ‘House‘ needs to ensure that change will occur and be sustained, but will it, for no previous UK Government has abided by these concepts to any large extent, if at all, irrespective of which Party formed the Government.

Is it that ‘power’ corrupts or were there leanings to corruption to start with.

But this is not just confined to the UK and many would say that the degree of corruption is much more evident in some other countries than the UK, but that should not be seen as good for everyone deserves better. The ‘House’ should be doing all it can to ‘cleanse’ itself, rather than spending so much time doing the opposite.

So, I support Stephen Timms MP, chair of the Commons work and pensions committee and his colleagues and also the DNS.

Source: MPs ask Coffey why she is hiding nine secret DWP reports – Disability News Service

More than 2m adults in UK cannot afford to eat every day, survey finds | Food poverty | The Guardian

One in seven adults estimated to be food-insecure, up 57% from January, owing to rising cost of living

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The cost of living crisis in the UK has been bad for sometime, but with increasing costs, food, energy to name, but 2 more and more are having major problems feeding themselves and their families and very little is being done by this Government to help those in real need.

No increase in benefits, salaries if at all rising they are not inline with inflation, so more and more people are falling into poverty, even people who are employed.

Then we have the MP, Lee Anderson, criticising people who attend food banks, by saying they don’t know how to cook meals from scratch, but at food banks people are refusing food that needs to be cooked as they can’t afford the energy costs.

This Government could do more, but is currently refusing to do so. people health will continue to deteriorate, causing more pressures on the NHS and eventually many deaths will occur.

Could it be that this government is wishing for deaths as that will reduce the welfare costs.

 

Source: More than 2m adults in UK cannot afford to eat every day, survey finds | Food poverty | The Guardian

Non-domiciliary residency and paying UK tax

It is now in the news that the wife, Akshata Murty of the Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak, being of India origin is unable to obtain Dual Nationality and decided to retain her Indian Nationality rather than applying for UK Nationality. This means she does pay UK taxes on her income earned within the UK, which has been stated that she does, but not with regards to any income earned in India and this has been so for the last 7 years as this is paid un der India’s system

Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng also stated that this was not possible after 15 years, but didn’t take time to expand on this’

I would stress this is all perfectly legal as is the situation such as Amazon and paying UK tax, but is it ethical and only open to persons or companies of wealth.

Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng also states that the tax affairs of Akshata Murty should be treated as being private and this |I would normally agree with, but she is married to Rishi, the Chancellor you by them being a couple could well be enjoying the benefits of his wife’s earnings, so with this questioning should be done.

Many in the UK are suffering considerably due to the measures introduced by Rishi to gain more revenue, while revenue is being avoided by his wife as she chooses to retain Indian Nationality rather than obtain UK Nationality as she could do having been in the UK for 3 years.

A Tory prime minister, one David Cameron, once said ‘we are in it together‘, which reflected his comment when in Opposition.

Talk is easy, but actions are what are noticed and rightly so.

We are never all in this together for it is down to wealth, the less you have the less equal you are, when the true equality should be, in that for all to be equal, more needs to be done to bring people up to being more equal for it will never be that the wealthy give to make those less wealthy more so. Even, if the miracle does happen, the wealthy have the means to leave the UK, which the less wealthy have not.

Will a millionaire, ever need to attend a food bank, for if they do it will be because only millionaires and billionaires exist as all below have creased to exist and the millionaires will then be the new poor. No wealth redistribution only the extermination of those who have no means to exist, which in many instances are quickly approaching and for some already have.

It is said that there is a facility to voluntarily pay the tax you would have paid if you were eligible to pay, so as a gesture of goodwill she could pay voluntarily, for she can afford to do so, but feel she is unlikely to do so.

Click to access india-dtc_-_in_force.pdf