As someone living with Cerebral Palsy and Hydrocephalus who uses a wheelchair to navigate daily life I welcome the proposed extension of the benefit reassessments from 3 to 5 years.
My disabilities mean that I will never be able to walk unaided so I rely on the Personal Independence Payment’s (PIP) to live my best life and do not understand why I have be reassessed for the benefit every few years when nothing is or will change for me.
Those of you reading this will know that Sir Stephen Timms, the Minister for Social Security and Disability at the Department for Work and Pensions is currently leading a review into the benefit, following an announcement last year that reforms were needed into the the benefit by the labour government.
It is fair to say that the announcement caused upset, anger and distress amongst the disabled community because it was unclear if people like me were set to lose the payments we have relied on for years in some cases.
At the time of the announcement my message to the then Work and Pensions secretary, Liz Kendall and the Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer was this,” the way this process has been handled since the announcement has been shocking and I urge you as key decision makers to review how you handle these types of announcements in the future so that this level of upset isn’t repeated”.
The message that I would like to give the new Secretary of State for Work and Pension’s, Pat Mcfadden is this ” There needs to be some level of reassurance given to our (the disabled) community prior to any changes to the benefit system being made following the (Timm’s Review) being completed.
” Hopefully this time you will not cause any upset when making an announcement with regards to any changes to the welfare benefit system, lessons should have been learned from last year”.
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Cam
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