As many of you already know the DWP never miss an opportunity to sanction claimants, however it was much harder to do so whilst the country was in lockdown because of the pandemic.

The drop in Universal Credit sanctions was as a result of changes to the conditionality rules that were implemented in March 2020 because of the pandemic.

Normal service seems to have resumed sadly with the rate of Universal Credit sanctions rising 15 fold in four months according to Benefits And Work.

This all changed in April 2021 when face to face meetings returned thus causing sanctions levels to rise. This proves that the decision to sanction claimants lies firstly with Job Coaches and often is influenced by their opinion and not fact.

Theres no other reason for this when online claimant were seen to meet the expectations of their claimant commitments, yet now they apparently don’t.

Benefit sanctioning is an extremely cruel way of punishing someone for apparently not reaching the DWPs expectations. Taking away a persons financial means of survival is wrong on all levels, it’s hard enough trying to survive on the meagre amount of monies given in the first place.

I’ve blogged about benefit sanctions for many years now, and I’ve also had articles published in newspapers etc.

My opinion is this, and it will never change.

No one should be punished financially by sanctions. Sanctions do not and never have encouraged people to find work or look for work more diligently.

When a claimant is sanctioned they can only focus on keeping warm, being able to eat and how they’re going to pay their rent.

Being sanctioned and refusing to pay ESA and PIP claimants their rightful payments directly causes mental and physical distress, often leading to long term illness and depression.

Whilst quite rightly we are told to leave an abusive relationship for our own safety a person can’t leave the DWP and everything that comes with it. It’s obscene that people are treated in this manner, being guilty before being found innocent. It’s gaslighting at its worst.


Prior to the pandemic the highest sanctioning levels happened back in July 2019, when 22,566 claimants were hit with a reduction in their benefit.
I have no doubt that this figure will be surpassed if it hasn’t already.

We must continue to hold the government and the DWP responsible for their actions.

Many thanks once again to Benefits And Work for their hard work for researching and gathering the data. They work extremely hard to help others.

If you want to raise awareness about these issues and more there are several ways that you can do so.

You can share blogs such as mine and likewise online of your preferred social media platform. You can also email blogs and articles like mine to MPs and other important people and influencers.

Every share, tweet, conversation etc helps to raise awareness and this is extremely important to do.

If you live in the Greater Manchester area and you’d like to get involved please join https;\\manchesterdpac.com You will find likeminded people and will be given opportunities to join in any activities that they are doing.

Unite community is another trade union organisation that is well worth joining. There is a small payment to join but you can get help and advice from them also. You can join them over at http:\\join.unitetheunion.org

Please read, share, tweet and email my blog posts. Like I said earlier every share helps enormously.

Huge thank you to everyone that has and does support my blog and campaign. Without you I really couldn’t do this.

How am I doing? Not good unfortunately a very good friend of mine died this week, and I’m struggling to cope with it because I’m still grieving for my son.

Financially I’m also struggling. I’m having to make the choice between heating and eating. I know that so many of you are struggling with this as well.

If anyone would like to donate to keep my blog and campaign going or to help me put some electric on the meter theres a PayPal donation link at the top, side and underneath this blog post.

I am trying to update my blog more than once a week as you might have noticed this week.