It has recently been revealed that the DWP (Department Of Work And Pension) has profited by almost £5 million in the last four years directly from fining unpaid carers £50 each when they’ve been found to have been overpaid.
This is as well as being in receipt of £400,000 in penalties which were paid by carers to avoid facing prosecution.
So it comes as no surprise that Carers that considered appealing against overpayments are then threatened with even higher bills if they do so.
Not a surprise to anyone that’s had any dealings with the DWP
In over half the overpayment cases the failure of the DWP to act when warned by an HRMC system that these carers were over the earnings limit. Basically the DWP made the choice to ignore the warning and let the overpayments increase to enable them to benefit financially.
However promises made by the DWP to MPs to rectify this five years ago were as usual an empty promise. They failed to do nothing except continue to enable carers to become in debt and threatened with fines if they appeal their cases.
There’s no limit to the level of underhanded tactics and deceit that the DWP will lower themselves to whilst trying to benefit financially from the suffering of others.
Carers should be respected and instead of fining them they should be given larger payments for the hard work that they do and not be targeted by the DWP especially given the fact that they save the government thousands of pounds, possibly millions each year.
We need to support or advocate for carers’ rights and raise awareness of the need for this.
According to new data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) shoplifting offences in England and Wales in 2023 have risen to the highest level since records began in 2003.
According to the data there has been more than 430,000 recorded cases last year which had increased by 37% in the year ending 2023 when compared to 2022. This makes it the highest levels recorded since records started being kept in 2003.
James Cleverly responded by saying that although the police record it as a ‘sub threshold crime’ and it has a so called ‘corrosive effect’ on peoples confidence in the police. Its not surprising that he appeared to have zero sympathy for those effectively forced to shoplift due to various circumstances.
Julian Heyes, criminal defence lawyer and partner at Berris Law LLP went on to say ” The release of the recent shoplifting figures simply demonstrate that the years of austerity and cuts in policing have meant that the investigation of these so called minor offences have long since been neglected and ignored”
“The police cannot be blamed for this as they, much like the rest of the criminal justice system are on their knees. The cost to the high street is immeasurable and causing shops and businesses to close or restrict access to customers, not to mention the horrendous risks that members of staff have to take when challenging shoplifters”
The truth is that shop lifting is rising for various reasons including and not excluding others: The increasing cost of living, high energy bills, low wages, less than adequate social security payments, increases in mortgage repayments, social security payments being too low and badly paid employment.
Whilst many people with addictions shoplift to fund their habits there’s very little support given to them to conquer their addictions thus the circle of offending continues.
Let’s be clear, very few people actually want to shoplift its a situation they find themselves in through desperation and is usually the last option that they can take after exhausting other avenues, they’re desperate and see this as a last resort.
We all appreciate and acknowledge that there are foodbanks that help people but not everyone can access them or can wait until the next time they’re open. People are driven by hunger and distress and we live in desperate times which is entirely the governments creation.
The UK has a government hell bent on lining their own pockets and their business and personal friends with money that has been taken from the public purse. There’s been a sharp decline in the physical and mental wellbeing of the working class and mortality levels are rising. The constant stripping of funding to local councils has also paid a huge part in this and town centres aren’t being cared for like they should be because theres no longer the financial means to do so. This has a direct impact upon the high street.
The solution to this is quite simple and to be honest basic economics. For a society to succeed and thrive there has to be financial investment into the public, the more money they have to spend undoubtably benefits their general health it also helps to transform the areas that they live.
It’s easy to blame a shoplifter for shoplifting, and I don’t condone violence towards retail staff. The blame lies totally at the governments feet. Society as we knew it has been broken by the current government, the amount of desperate and hungry people are at their highest in modern times, desperate people are forced to take measures that they would previously have never dreamt of doing.
Hurl your anger at the government and not Joe Public.
And so the DWP cruelty continues and we shouldn’t be surprised.
Unpaid carers have been told by the DWP (Department Of Work And Pensions) to repay thousands of pounds of benefits after unknowingly earning too much money years ago.
Not only is this cruel it was entirely preventable if the DWP had done their jobs correctly. But forcing unpaid to pay back thousands is unbelievable especially when they save the government millions every year.
The DWP system shows when carers have gone over the earnings limit but they failed to inform claimants instead allowing their claims to continue for months or even years before recovering the full amount owed.
This has also been highlighted in a series of articles by Patrick Butler in The Guardian which shows exposing the cruelty in how they treat unpaid carers
Along with this the folks over at Benefits And Work have raised the reasons why the DWP should never get the police powers they desperately want.
This also proves why the DWP should never be given police powers.
This has resulted in the DWP given free reign to threaten carers with jail terms. They have also used laws that were designed to strip drug dealers of their property to take money from carers.
The DEP have unlawfully ignored judges legal directions in order to increase the amount they can take back from carers.
The DWP have been shown to misleed MPs for years by promising that new technology meant large overpayments would no longer happen.
Alongside this they are refusing to publish a report on the effects of overpayment recovery on carers which was completed years ago.
Take for example the heart breaking case of Vivienne Groom who cared for her elderly mother who had dementia and suffered from a stroke is a disturbing example of how the DWP treat carers.
Vivienne was given incorrect advice from a social worker that she didn’t need to declare her part-time minimum wage at the Co-Op job to the DWP whilst still receiving carers allowance.
When her hours increased she did inform the DWP, who said they would get back to her.
Unsurprisingly they never did reply to her.
Years later she was threatened with prosecution and began repaying the overpayment at £30 a month.
This is a large amount of money for her to replay each month but she did so.
Her mother sadly died and left her a £16,000 inheritance. The DWP went on to prosecute Vivienne using the Proceeds of Crime Act.
This was created to take expensive cars and large houses from drug dealers, not people who have cared for loved ones
They also threatened her with up to seven years in prison in order to steal her inheritance.
Vivienne decided to take legal action and was refused legal aid because she had £16,000 in capital even though she couldn’t access it because the DWP had her account frozen the day the money went into her bank account.
The case ended with the DWP legal team ignoring judges directions on three separate occasions to make calculations that may have reduced the amount Vivienne owed and, instead, getting the whole of her inheritance.
It’s extremely disturbing that the possibility that a vengeful organisation as is the DWP could be given the power to search claimants homes, seize their possessions and prosecute them or impose fines upon them must be challenged whenever it is raised.
As proven time after time the DWP will ignore a judges ruling and will appeal any decisions made in a court of law.
It’s wrong, beyond cruel . The government should be thanking unpaid carers for the work that they do because ultimately they save the government millions of pounds each year.
It’s our job to challenge this whenever possible and share articles to raise awareness because believe it or not there are people that aren’t aware that this does and will continue to happen.
A huge thank you to Patrick Butler for his hard work in producing these interviews
It’s no surprise that the DWP (Department Of Work And Pensions) is continuing to punish universal credit (UC) claimants with their harsh sanction regime afterall it’s their favorite and easiest method of punishment that they use.
The latest official figures show that sanctions rate had remained to above 7% from August through to November of 2023 which are the most recent months of which figures are available.
However in in March 2020, just before the pandemic began, UC sanctions rates were at just 2.5% having fallen steadily since January 2017.
The DWP have unsurprisingly given no explanation for this almost threefold increase in sanctions.
I mean how on earth could this happen?
Sanctions are imposed for various reasons but the most common are for failing to attend or take part in mandatory interviews, indeed 95% are given for this reason.
What we do know from past experience is that sanctions are given for wrongful reasons.
These reasons vary but are often and not excluding others claimant not receiving notification of having to attend a meeting, being ill and notifying the DWP that they were not able to attend or already working at the time given and their employer won’t allow them to leave for their DWP appointment.
We know that sanctions can and should be appealed however many aren’t aware that they can do so and have the energy to fight it.
Sanctions are particularly cruel because not only does the claimant get sanctioned it also affects any dependants that live with them.
Combine this with the cruel benefit caps and this with the three child limit which directly impacts a child’s health and well being.
Are incentives being given for Job Coaches to refer people for sanctions?
I can’t say for sure but we do know that they’ve been using these methods for years now and it’d be very out of character to stop doing this.
I do know that sanctioning people like this is cruel, inhumane and needs to be stopped now before more people fall victim to the DWPs cruel regime of punishment and blame.
At last the DWP (Department of Work and Pensions) has revealed the details of their appalling new system that assess claimants that are in the severe disability group.
As we know every person’s circumstances are different depending upon their diagnosis and entry to this group may be based on and is not exclusively
Having medically precise definitions that are not connected with the benefits system :
Having information that only a claimant or carer will know however a specialist will still have to provide details:
Having availability of specialist services and access to said services where the claimant lives
And unbelievably no clear criteria given at all.
There is also great concern that their distinct lack of clarity on the overlap between the Severe Disability Group and the light-touch review system for PIP will cause claimants to be wrongly assessed and treated.
We can only imagine how disastrous this will be for severely disabled people which gives me great concern for their well-being.
God help us they certainly have no regard for the lives and well-being of extremely vulnerable people.
Many claimants and disability charities are sharing their concerns that the creation of their planned separate group of severely disabled claimants will be directed purely at reducing future payments for those that they allege are not as severely disabled.
And there lies the real reason for the creation of this new group. It’s all about the money and how to take away as much as they can take away from vulnerable people to line their own greedy pockets.
It’s been a long while since I’ve focused upon the DWP’s enforced volunteering (Workfare) schemes so I thought I’d revisit it.
Myself and many others have been protesting against them for many years for the reasons below.
Enforced volunteering goes against everything that actual volunteering stands for and it’s so bloody wrong.
Here’s a list of reasons why Workfare is wrong, and what the knock on effects are for people employed at these work places.
Workfare actually puts claimants at an increased risk of sanctions If they can’t attend their Workfare placement for any reason albeit disability, Illness, childcare etc their DWP work coach can refer them to be sanctioned.
Enforced volunteering criminalises the unemployed, setting the so called deserving and undeserving poor against each other after all how dare people not work for nothing. (I’m being sarcastic)
Of course everyone should be paid a wage for the work that they do.
Work for nothing schemes perpetuate poverty and inequality. It’s soul destroying being forced to work for nothing whilst doing the same things as paid employees are.
Workfare schemes have displaced paid workers and workers. I’ve written about previous employees being forced to volunteer at their previous employment doing the same job.
They provide free labour for private companies. Why pay someone when they can fill those positions with unpaid workers. It’s a win win for them.
Workfare undermines the fundamental rights to social security, which gives the claimant free choice of employment, equal days pay for an equal day’s work.
It undermines a workers basic rights to pay and fair working conditions by introducing a claimant workforce doing the same job without the legal status as workers.
Workfare drives down wages and conditions for all workers by undercutting the labour market and undermining bargaining power. Once again why should they pay employees when they can get free labour.
It doesn’t help people into paid employment despite this being the premise of the reason why Workfare was created.
Enforced volunteering actually prevents claimants from doing their own job searches based upon the work that they’re qualified to do.
For a long time now Workfare schemes create false employment statistics because claimants undertaking workfare are counted as in employment.
Workfare undermines the values and practice of volunteering. It can’t be called volunteering if it’s not voluntary.
It’s shocking that this is still happening and that no one is talking about this anymore. I’ve called Universal Credit being a digital workhouse, claimants having to do everything their work coach says or face being sanctioned.
No one should ever have their main means of survival taken away from them. Every person deserves to have the ability to buy food to eat, to keep warm and have somewhere decent to live.
Sanctioning people is totally unacceptable, a sadistic way of punishing people especially taking the cost of living and energy cost crisis.
As I write this the temperature outside is -4 and I worry about everyone that is now chasing warmth every day. Job searching is extremely hard when your main focus is hunger and cold.
My thoughts are with everyone that can’t get out and can’t access warm spaces, not can they access food banks.
Whilst although I’m glad that these warm spaces have been created for people to use we should be protesting about the need for them in the first place.
They say ‘The greatness of a nation can be judged by how it treats its weakest member’. The UK is clearly failing those most in need. The only way of rectifying this would be a general election and a new government that would prioritise those most in need first.
Will this happen? I’m not sure but I hope that they do.
EDIT I forgot to thank Boycott Workfare for their hard work and campaigning which resulted in some charities from using unpaid workers.
Please take care everyone my thoughts are with you.
I don’t get paid for any of the work that I do. If you like my work and would like to donate to keep both myself and this blog going you can find a donate button at the top and side of this blog post.
I hope you all enjoy the festive period even though I know it’s tough for so many of us.
Here over at The Poor Side Of Life HQ it’s going to be a quiet one, to be honest I’m not really celebrating it.
Of course I’ll make sure that my daughter enjoys Christmas but as a single parent and having no family etc to celebrate with it’ll be quiet.
I’m going to take the time to reflect and maybe get some rest, it’ll be a welcome change.
Don’t feel pressured into celebrating Christmas if you don’t want to. Christmas is a tough time for so many of us, remembering times past and people long gone.
I’m here if you’re on your own and want to chat.
A huge thanks to everyone that reads and shares my blog posts it really does mean the world to me.
And as for the Tories they can get to feck. I have zero time for them.
It seems from years of experience in such matters that the DWP like nothing more than handing out sanctions during the festive period.
If that isn’t bad enough their reasoning for sanctioning people is mostly totally unreasonable, giving claimants targets that they can’t reach.
In my eyes sanctioning a person is the cruelest thing to do to a claimant. No regard is given as to the health and wellbeing of them either, once the decision is made by their DWP work coach and sent off for approval it’s down to the claimant to appeal the sanction.
Appealing a decision to sanction isn’t easy, it’s difficult and directly impacts their mental and physical health and a direct correlation between the two can be found. Please see my previous blog posts.
Here are some examples of the reasons why claimants have been sanctioned. It’s gaslighting at its worst but hey the DWP has targets to reach.
I’ve helped many people with sanction decisions. You might think that these are made up but they aren’t they’re the real deal.
Sanctioned because claimants father had just died.
Sanctioned because a claimants father had just passed away half an hour before the signing on appointment.
They phoned their advisor up and were told that they had to attend their appointment. The claimant was waiting for the doctor to certify the death.
Sanctioned because their baby died.
A claimant sanctioned because they couldn’t attend their appointment due to their baby dying. They asked their work coach if they could rearrange their appointment but was refused. Instead they were told to bring the death certificate in to prove it.
Sanctioned because a work coach made a mistake.
Sanctioned because a work coach made a mistake in their records for an upcoming appointment. Luckily the claimant had kept the proof on their appointment which was given on an appointment card showing the time and date that they were given to attend
The case of the missing letters
Here’s a very common reason for sanctioning people.
Sanctioned for not attending an appointment that they had supposedly been sent a letter for.
The letter was never sent.
The onus is on them to prove that the claimant recieved it. They couldn’t because they didn’t. Watch out for this one folks
Sanctioned for attending a job interview.
Sanctioned for attending a a job interview at the same time as a signing on appointment.
They requested that their appointment be changed so they could attend their interview but their advisor refused.
Important to know that they’d also sanctioned for not attending their interview.
It’s a catch22 a no win situation except for the DWP
Any reputable organisation would not threaten to sanction or indeed sanction people for the above reasons. They’d actually care about the people that they help.
The DWP do neither, they don’t even care for their staff and it’s scandalous that they’re allowed to get away with this.
As I’ve previously posted sanctioned rates are rapidly increasing.
It’s important to remember that sanction decisions can be appealed and you must do this.
A huge thank you to everyone for reading and sharing my blog posts. You make a huge difference when you do this and I can’t thank you enough.
Please share my blog posts it does help lots!
Like you I’m struggling to manage everything, I was hoping to be able to turn my heating on for a few hours on Christmas day for my daughter but that’s impossible now. Nor will I be able to provide a decent Christmas dinner.
If you can afford to and would like to donate to keep my blog going and myself there’s a donate button at the top and side of this blog post.
According to the latest DWP statistics that have been released reveal that 522,690 UC claimants have been sanctioned in the previous year to July 2023.
They show that in July 2023 49,000 new sanctions were applied.
These figures are very concerning with 6.48% of the claimants sanctioned is now almost reaching the peak rate in October 2022.
According to the statistics 96.5% of sanctions were applied for failure to attend or participate in a mandatory interview.
However these statistics don’t reveal the claimants reasons for not attending or participating in mandatory interviews.
One of the most common reasons for the above is not receiving any communication from the DWP that would inform them of these appointments. For more information about this please see a previous blog post titled ‘The case of the missing letters’
Other reasons for non attendance include illness, childcare commitments and not being able to physically attend an appointment.
Of course claimants can appeal these decisions but it isn’t easy to do and many still don’t know that they can do this.
It’s also important to know that sanction decisions are made by work coaches and are often based upon opinion not fact.
For example if they explain to their work coach that they couldn’t attend because of illness, the work coach will decide if this is a good enough reason to do so.
Also in the event that an appointment letter hasn’t been received by the claimant the onus is on the DWP to prove that it’s been delivered.
Of course they can’t prove this, indeed I’ve helped in cases when the letters hadn’t been sent in the first place and I actually saw them still in a claimants paperwork.
It’s especially concerning that we are going through a cost of living and energy cost crisis. The prices of everything appear to be rising daily and many essentials are no longer affordable.
The cost of turning heating on is also impossible for many, and as we are heading towards what will be an extremely cold winter being sanctioned is unnecessarily cruel.
Despite the right wing media portraying the amount of Universal Credit is too much in reality payments are already barely enough to survive on.
It’s also vital to know that debts such as council tax debt repayments and suchlike are garnished from UC payments before they receive them. This leaves claimants with barely enough to buy the very basics needed.
As a result of this an ever increasing amount of people, working and not working are becoming dependent upon food banks. Food banks are also struggling to keep up with the increasing demand because of the cost of living crisis, leaving many that used to donate food unable to do so anymore.
Sanctioning already vulnerable people in the midst of a very serious cost of living crisis and a cold winter is beyond cruel.
Taking away a person’s very means of survival is totally unacceptable, with the ramifications of this lasting a long time, some never recover from it.
We need to start campaigning against sanctioning again because there’s never been a more important time to do so.
After writing last week’s blog their cruel plans were confirmed and I fear it’ll be worse than I initially thought.
Please read my previous blog post for more details.
I’m angry, well I’m beyond angry and I’m scared for every single person that will be affected by these proposed changes myself included.
I wrote this on X, formally known as Twitter, #autumnbudget #budget social murder by design.
Honestly I don’t believe I’m wrong about this I wish I was. I couldn’t publish my blog yesterday because I was finding the enormity of this too much. I went from anger to worry and back to anger.
I can imagine you doing the same.
Let’s be honest it’s already horrendously difficult for disabled and unemployed people. If they don’t appear to satisfy their overlords the DWP potentially could be sanctioned or worse.
Disabled people being diagnosed as ‘fit’ for work by medical professionals not qualified to do so which causes immense distress and often a decline in their health.
The government’s proposal to take claimant’s ability to access medication and other benefits will undoubtedly cause many deaths. No one takes medication when it isn’t needed and it’s essential to their well- being.
It’s horrifically cruel but I don’t need to tell you that.
They shouldn’t be forced into jobs when they’re not fit for work and employers shouldn’t be expected to employ people that can’t do the work in the first place.
They also proposed that disabled people can work from home for telephone work and suchlike.
Not every disability is visible and not everyone can do this work. It would cause them great distress and physically and mentally they can’t do it.
Of course they suggest this under the assumption that everyone has access to the internet at home already having everything they need to do this work. You can bet the DWP won’t offer them any support either.
It’s important to remember that these changes will not affect existing claims and will only affect new claims. However they will be moved to the new regime in 2025.
Am I still angry? Yes I am because they’re literally handing a death sentence to the most vulnerable people and they can never be forgiven for this.
The poor side of life 