Councillor calls for urgent action to help disabled

A WARRINGTON councillor has written to the Department of Work and Pensions calling for urgent action to help and support any disabled person in the borough whose Personal Independence Payment (PIP) has been, or is at risk of, being delayed.
Cllr Hitesh Patel (pictured), the council’s lead member for equality, wrote the letter in the wake of a landmark ruling last week that delays in the processing of PIP claims are unlawful.
PIPs are benefit payments to help people aged 16-64 with “some of the extra costs caused by long-term ill-health or a disability”.
They are available to employed and unemployed people, and claimants can receive £21.80 to £139.75 a week, depending on how their condition affects them.
This is determined by an assessment, and claimants are regularly reassessed – though there have been claims of people being wrongly assessed as fit to work.
From April 2013, PIPs began replacing Disability Living Allowance.  This process is ongoing and the government says everyone who needs to switch to PIPs should have been contacted by late 2017.
This process
of transferring hundreds of Disability Living Allowance claimants in Warrington to the new PIP begins in October and there is now real concern that they too could suffer real hardship caused by long delays.
Cllr Patel said: “I acknowledge there is a need reduce the welfare bill, but the Government really should not be attacking disabled people in this way.  According to research by the independent charity SCOPE,
living with a disability can add an average of £550 to your normal monthly outgoings.
“Talking to some of my constituents during a recent street surgery I heard first hand of cases where disabled people were struggling to get by and had to rely rely on foodbanks.  Delays in processing legitimate disability benefits can put undue pressure on already vulnerable members
of our community and this risks adding further costs to the already under-pressure local NHS and council services because, inevitably, individuals’ health suffers.
“Come October, the Government is going to have to process thousands more claims as people transfer from DLA to PIP and I am urging them to get the staff and systems in place to avoid unnecessary and unlawful delays.”