FactCheck: Labour policy on benefits
The claim
“As I understand it, the Labour frontbench supports this change. On a previous occasion, the leader of the Labour Party said he supported our changes to disability living allowance.”
Prime Minister David Cameron, PMQs, 24 November 2010
The background
Mr Cameron was asked by Labour MP Willie Bain about the Government’s plans to scrap the mobility component of the disability living allowance (DLA) for people living in state-funded care homes.
DLA is a benefit for disabled children and adults, and is made made up of two components. There’s a care component – for those who need help looking after themselves or supervision to keep them safe. And there’s a mobility component – for those who have problems walking or need help to get around.
You can get just one component; or both. Payments vary from a £18.95 a week to £121.25.
The analysis
In the emergency budget, the government said it would reform disability living allowance with an “objective medical assessment” for people claiming it to find out if they are capable of work.
At his first PMQs , Labour leader Ed Miliband said: “Let me turn to the issue of benefits and say to the Prime Minister that we will work with him on his reforms to disability living allowance and to sickness benefits, because they are important reforms and they need to be done.”
The government subsequently announced another change to DLA – scrapping the mobility component of the benefit for people living in state-funded care homes (on the basis that their needs are already catered for).
A parliamentary answer last week revealed that this will mean 30,000 people will lose £49.85 a week (£2,592 a year) and 30,000 will lose £18.95 a week (£985 a year). The government expects the change to save £135 million a year by 2014-15.
On Monday, the Shadow Minister for Disabled People, Margaret Curran, made her opposition known. She said disability organisations had described the change as “callous” – and asked if the government would listen to those organisations.
The verdict
So, Mr Miliband had made clear he supported plans to reform DLA. But at the time, the government hadn’t announced it intended to take action on the mobility component of the benefit.
Today, Mr Cameron was answering a question from a Labour MP about the mobility component. He was wrong to say the government had Labour’s support.
There are 3 comments on this post
I am not sure whether they are confusing DLA with ESA (employment and support allowance) but really wish people would get this right. ESA is an earnings replacement benefit which is either based on the claimants NI contributions or is income based (i.e. means tested). Disability living allowance is not an earnings replacement benefit and receipt is neither contribution or income based, nor dependent on the claimant not working.
It was introduced under the Major government to assist people with a disability to live independently in the community (rather than in care homes), by allowing them to buy in care services to meet their own needs.
Many people who do receive DLA are in fact working, and use the money to provide the extra equipment or assistance that they need to allow them to do so.
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Confused – I think you may indeed be confused.
DLA was introduced as an acknowledgement of the extra cost of being disabled.
I think you may be confusing it with the Independent Living Fund which was indeed introduced to help people live in the community rather than care homes.
On the more general point about Ed Milliband – here’s a timeline to make it easier:
June 2010 – The Conservatives announce changes to DLA with the introduction of a “medical assessment” to assess eligibility
13 October – Ed Milliband’s first PMQs where he agreed with the proposed changes to DLA
20 October – The Tories make additional changes to DLA – proposing to take the mobility component off people who live in residential care
24 October – Willie Bain asks his question at PMQs and the Prime Minister says the Labour Frontbench support these changes.
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The Labour Party are vehemently opposed to the removal of the mobility component of DLA of people in residential homes-the Government -particularly the Chancellor and IDS are ignorant about the various entitlements-they do not know the basics-the Opposition are a little better-the confusion is because they lack a basic understanding-the Chancellor and IDS regularly relate misinformation about the amount of fraud,conflating ESA with DLA,the number of workless families when in fact a load do-stating Carers are not included when they are-I cannot work out if they are genuinely stupid or tapping into the ignorance of the general public as a cover for despicable cuts like this one.
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