Tag: DWP cruelty

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Over Half Million Universal Credit Claimants Sanctioned In Year For Not Attending Mandatory Interviews

Earlier this month (May) the DWP (Department of Work and Pensions) released their latest Universal Credit sanction statistics. The statistics reveal that 541,000 UC claimants were sanctioned in the year to January 2023.

The greatest majority of those (530,000) were shown to have been sanctioned for failing to attend or failing to participate in a mandatory interview.

However these figures represent a very small fall from the previous peak sanction rate and the number of claimants sanctioned is shown to be still more than double the figures pre-pandemic.

In January 2020 18,462 claimants were sanctioned.

In January 2023, the figure was 44,888.

However the non attendance of mandatory interviews are mostly for genuine issues such as not recieving a letter or notification of having to attend an interview, I’ve blogged about this many times.

Other reasons for non attendance can be Not being able to get to their nearest Jobcentre for their interview because of cost, illness and appointments clashing with childcare obligations.

It is then that the claimant is left to the discretion of their work coach as to if they’re sanctioned or not.

This is incredibly worrying especially because the DWP is now planning to give work coaches the power to decide who is capable of work. Please see my previous blogs for details about this.

Please note that as already blogged it is planned that medically unqualified work coaches could be given the responsibility of making life changing decisions on behalf of UC claimants.

Decisions such as if a disabled or ill claimant is in their opinion able to take part in work-related activities.

Based upon their decision they could be given the power to recommend sanctions and suchlike.

As a result of not being medically qualified such decisions will be based purely on opinion and not fact.

Upon being sanctioned a claimant can try to show their work coach good causes for not attending a planned meeting. They can also do this if their work coach decides that even though they’ve attended a meeting but have failed on their eyes to participate as well as expected.

This can be for many reasons such as their disability preventing them for doing so or illness.

However the work coaches decision is purely based upon their decision or mood so it’s clear that unfair sanction decisions can be sent to the decision maker leaving the claimants payments being sanctioned.

Sanction decision can be appealed and their is an appeal process. Whilst the majority of appeals are successful the whole process is very long and extremely stressful, leaving the claimant in great distress and under enormous financial pressure.

The whole benefit sanction process is heavily biased against claimants, the balance of power unfairly being in the hands of work coaches and decision makers.

Once a sanction has reached the end of the appeal process and a decision made in the claimant’s favour the damage has already been done and many claimants never fully recover both mentally and physically from this.

Sadly this won’t be changing for the better any time soon and it would be nieve to expect this.

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No Legal Safeguards For Proposed WCA Abolition

As I’ve previously mentioned under the proposed DWP (Department of Work and Pensions) the WCA (Work Capability Assessment) will be abolished by 2026.

To replace this it is to be replaced by one assessment which will be the PIP (Personal Independence Payment) assessment. This will decide if a claimant will be eligible for PIP and if they are also eligible for the new UC (Universal Credit) health element.

Rather unsurprisingly the DWP plans to employ unqualified UC work coaches to make these decisions rather than qualified health professionals.

It will be those unqualified UC work coaches that will decide whether a claimant must undertake work-related activities

I strongly suspect, as we have seen in the past that disabled claimants will be judged upon the mood and attitude of their work coach. If their work coach is ok and in a good mood they might be judged fairly. If not then they could be treated harshly.

Basically their quality of life will therefore be dependent upon an unqualified DWP work coach.

At a recent debate at parliament Labour MP Karen Buck asked Tom Pursglove (who is the present DWP minister for disabled people) several questions about how the proposed abolition of the WCA will work in practice.

Buck asked Pursglove if there would be a substantial risk test which would be similar to the one already used in WCA assessments.

At the time of writing the WCA rules say that Claimants do not have to undertake work-related activities if there is a substantial risk to the mental or physical health of any person if you did so.

Needless to say thousands of appeals against WCA decisions have been successful on the basis that there would be a substantial risk to either the claimant or those around them.

Of course the DWP aren’t going to let this continue. How dare disabled people win their appeals and receive the payments that they’re entitled to.

Under the new proposed system the legal safeguards will no longer exist and all decisions will be made by unqualified work coaches, most of which might not have any or very little knowledge of  physical or mental health issues. These issues if ignored will put claimants at risk.

Basically unqualified DWP work coaches  will have sole power to make these life changing decisions.

God help us.

Buck  asked Pursglove if  there are  any plans to introduce a mandatory reconsideration and appeal route against these decisions made by work coaches.

Pursglove’s answer was to totally ignored the question No surprise there.

He went on to make outlandish claims that work coaches would adopt a tailored approach that will allow work coaches to build a relationship with Claimants which will determine if any work related activities that Claimants can or can’t do.

I struggle to believe that this will actually happen given the fast staff turnover due to the stressful conditions that they work under. Not to forget work coaches having to take sick leave or indeed leave their jobs altogether.

So basically, cutting away the word salad from Pursglove as I’ve said above,  decisions will be based upon attitudes and beliefs of any  work coach, without any legal safeguards to prevent dangerous or clearly prejudiced decisions.

But Pursglove didn’t finish there. He went on to say that Claimants might be asked to volunteer in the first place building it up to mandatory placements with requirements added at a pace to suit individual claimants.

So voluntary work is now supposed to cure a claimant of all disabilities and illnesses? It’s not the first time that they’ve claimed this.

So going off Purseglove’s statements  work coaches will decide the pace at which a claimant must increase their level of activity. As said above this will happen without any protection in place for claimants who are struggling to keep up therefore putting them at risk of being sanctioned.


When questioned about an appeal process, Pursglove would not answer, saying only that the DWP “will take time to carefully consider how best to implement these changes” and “ensure it provides the taxpayer with value for money and is accessible and effective in delivering for our service users.”

So if there won’t be any  legal tests to decide who is or isn’t capable of work based upon the opinions of a work coach how can any decisions be challenged via a social security appeal tribunal?

Buck also asked “whether a benefit sanction that reduced a Claimants UC standard allowance to zero would remove a claimants entitlement to their entitlement to the Health Element of UC”

Pursglove’s initial response seemed positive stating ‘Entitlement to the new UC health element will only end when the functional impact of a person’s health condition improves and they are no longer eligible for PIP or as claimants earn more money resulting in their UC claim tapered away making them financially better off in work’

However this changed when he went on to say that ‘ As we develop our reform proposals we will consider how some interactions with the UC system will be reflected in the reformed system’ 

In my opinion this suggests that the DWP have not yet worked out many things about the new system, as is often the case.

Sadly this is par for the course for the government and the DWP. They’re always in a big rush to implement more draconian ideas upon the most vulnerable that they forget to actually make important decisions within their plans.

Whether this is done purposely or not is up to debate but I suspect they do.

I’ll keep my eye on this so expect more blogs upon this important subject.

Huge thanks to Benefits and Work for their hard work and original source of information about this subject..

Massive thanks to everyone that likes, shares and tweets my blog posts. This makes a massive difference in raising awareness of subjects such as this.

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More On State Pension And Pension Credit.

Excellent blog from long time reader and supporter of my blog. You can find his blog over at thephisophicalmusehttp://thephisophicalmuse Thanks Mike!


I was started receiving Pension Credit at age 60 after having been on JSA for 18 months (sanctioned for the last 2 months). When I applied I was asked how I had learned about Pension Credit and I replied that DWP had told me 6 months previously that I would have a choice of staying on JSA or switching to Pension Credit – I would have been foolish to continue looking for work and receive half as much money even if I hadn’t been sanctioned!

I still receive some Pension Credit to top up my State Pension, but Independent Age https://www.independentage.org/ is campaigning to ensure more people are advised of their entitlement

I used to work for the Department of Social Security in Australia. If someone over 55 had been unemployed for 6 months they’ld receive Mature Age Allowance, which basically acknowledged that they were unlikely to find a job so were not expected to continue looking for one to continue receiving the same benefits.

Seems similar to what I found in U.K., except that I had to wait 5 years longer to qualify but got twice as much as on JSA.

As part of my last job I was required to attend a training session on pensions and was told that one needed to be paying National Insurance for most of our lives to qualify for state pension. I piped up and said, “Where does that leave me, I’ve been out of the country for 27 years?”

I got some attention as I was quite evidently closer to retirement age than anyone in the room, but I didn’t get an answer!

No chance of me building up a pension fund, I had to wait until after I retired to find that I would be entitled to State Pension because of a reciprocal agreement with the Australian government – not the full amount, but Pension Credit makes up the difference.

WASPI women should be complaining that their pension age was to be increased to 65, not that they didn’t have sufficient notification of the increase.

What does it matter if they tell you they’re gonna raise your pension age in 10 years time, unless you’re within 10 years of pension age?

We need to stop of thinking of ourselves and ask why anyone should be required to work beyond 60 years of age unless they choose to!

Those of us already retired can ask these questions because we’ve got nothing to lose, do we?

The triple lock on our pensions cannot be assured under a Tory government. Everyone should join a union, I joined Unite Community after I retired ✊

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DWP Deliberately Disconnects Calls To PIP And DLA Helplines


DWP (Department of Work and Pensions) minister Tom Pursglove admitted that claimants are waiting over half an hour on average for PIP and DLA helpline calls to be answered.

He also claimed that he is going to recruit extra staff to cope with the volume of calls on the helplines but gave absolutely no indication of how many are being employed and for how long they’ll be employed.

Nor has he confirmed if the extra staff he plans to employ are qualified to do so.



At the time of writing the average wait for a PIP enquiry to be answered is 37 minutes and for DLA enquiries it is 33.5 minutes.



However it is imperative that Tom Pursglove reveals the amount of callers that don’t get an answer at all because their calls are disconnected.



Earlier this year the DWP revealed that in March almost 90% of half a million callers to the Future Pensions Centre were faced with being call-blocked because they couldn’t cope with the rising call demand.

Implementing Call-blocking results in calls not being allowed to go on the call waiting queue because the queue is too long and they get cut off.

This is also happening to callers contacting the PIP helpline as reported to Benefits And Work by claimants trying to contact the said helpline.

We cannot ignore the fact that the claimants trying to contact these helplines are all vulnerable and are in great need of getting their enquiries answered.

The question also needs to be answered as to how many of these vulnerable people have given up trying to contact the departments. This could in some circumstances result in their payments being stopped leaving them more vulnerable than they already were. .

There’s no excuse for the DWP’s lax attitude towards the whole situation.

It’s clear that they don’t care about how this can impact upon the claimants lives and it is totally unacceptable.

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Thanks to Benefits And Work for disclosing this information.

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DWP Job Coaches With No Academic Qualifications To Potentially Make Life Changing Decisions For Disabled People


It’s been revealed in the publication of a government white paper and a subsequent report by John Pring from Disability News Forum that job coaches with no academic qualifications could be tasked with making life changing decisions as to whether a disabled person must carry out work related activities as part of their DWP commitments.

This is dependent upon whether the government goes ahead with its plans to scrap the “fitness for work” test.

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has told Disability News Service (DNS) that there are no minimum academic qualifications required to undertake the role of a work coach in a Jobcentre.

It has also been revealed that it will be these work coaches who will be given the task of deciding if disabled claimants in receipt of universal credit are able to carry out tasks such as attending training courses or work-related interviews.

Read the full report here. https://www.disabilitynewsservice.com/work-coaches-with-no-gcses-could-decide-on-fit-for-work-activity-dwp-admits/

Many thanks to John Pring for his continued hard work in revealing the latest news from the DWP and their scurrilous plans to hurt disabled people even more.

I’ve got no doubt that the government will try and push their plans through because as we already know they care little, if at all about the welfare of disabled and poor people.

They’ll continue to persecute disabled people until they’re out of government making sure that they can create as much damage as possible until they’re forced to leave.

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DWP plans reveal That PIP Claimants Could Lose Support Group Status In 2026


According to new DWP (Department of Work and Pensions) plans existing PIP (Personal Independence Payments) claimants may lose their right to be in the support group.

Under these new plans they could also lose their LCWRA ( Limited capability for work and work related activity) status and be transferred to the universal credit health element.

Once there they may be required to carry out work-related activities, as early as 2026.



The government also announced plans in March to axe the work capability assessment (WCA).



Under the new proposed plans, claimants who get any element of PIP and who claim UC will automatically be eligible for an additional health element.

Sounds good doesn’t it…..

Shockingly at the time of writing the new system won’t automatically recognize any claimant as being unable to carry out any work-related activities.


Claimants might find themselves forced to undergo voluntary and mandatory work-related requirements by an appointed work coach.

Once there they could be subject to benefit sanctions if they don’t meet the mandatory requirements as set by their work coach.



At the time of the new plans announcement the government made a statement that current claimants would not begin being transferred to the new system until 2029 at the earliest.



Apparently only new claimants were said to be affected initially, with the system being rolled out by geographical area between 2026 and 2029.


Despite this announcement evidence given to the commons work and pensions committee by the DWP contradicted the above claim.


Conservative MP Nigel Mills asked: “What happens if I get a called for a new PIP assessment every couple of years and I get one of those in 2027? Does that drop me into the new rules or do I stay under the old ones?”

A senior DWP official responded:

“With the way we will roll this out, we start from 2026 with new claims only, but we will do it in a geographical, staged way. It would depend which area you were in in 2027. Yes, some people might come in under the new rules, and that means they would automatically get your UC health payment and would automatically get the support.”



As an ever increasing proportion of England and Wales will be moved to the UC health element beginning in 2026.

This suggests that thousands of existing PIP claimants when subjected to a review of their award will find themselves being forced onto the UC health element earlier than 2029.

So once again the DWP are lying.


However this does give us time to start campaigning against the new proposals but this needs to start now.

We need to prevent the DWPs plans to subject existing claimants to the attention of work coaches with targets to meet even though they deny this.

The government and their hench people will never stop persecuting disabled and poor people for their very existence.

Many have the view that they deserve to be persecuted like this. They’ll never change their opinions but we can fight them all the way.

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Sunak Launches New Attack On Private Rent Tenants

It appears that Sunak has been busy creating some extremely worrying new plans, rather predictably yet another so called crackdown on anti-social behaviour, promises to ban the sale of laughing gas and increasing fines for littering.

These plans also include a rather worrying proposal giving police extra powers to move on so called nuisance beggars with no details as to where the police are supposed to move them to and no plans to provide extra funding to give support needed for them once moved on.

I suspect he’s announced these plans to appeal to the ever dwindling Tory voters, after all theres nothing they like better than to attack people more unfortunate than themselves.



Hidden away amongst his list of proposals is an extremely worrying plan that would allow landlords to evict tenants with just two weeks notice if they are found to be disruptive to neighbours through noise, drug use or damage to property. This would automatically apply to all new private rental tenancies which are already becoming more restrictive than ever before.

Two weeks is a far too short amount of time for a tenant to find a new home, if this is indeed possible in todays climate with future private landlords requesting references from potential tenants and an extreme shortage of social housing.

Whilst I agree that no one should have to put up with neighbours that are behaving anti- socially, its extremely concerning that these tenants will suddenly find themselves homeless leaving them totally dependant upon their local authority to provide temporary accommodation.

Anyone that has either experienced homelessness can confidently tell you that getting temporary accommodation from a local authority can be nigh impossible. They’re often met with unfriendly and unsympathetic local authority employees which signpost people to local charities and organisations that are already working at maximum capacity which in turn puts extra strain on social housing.



These worrying proposals were first outlined last summer in a white paper published by the government. This new development proposes that as well as tenants that are found to be causing anti social behaviour, they could also potentially be evicted under the grounds that they might be regarded as being ‘capable’ of annoyance and disruption whilst not actually committing actual anti-social behaviour.



This is an extremely concerning development which is most likely to be published in the Renters Reform Bill, along with policies designed to protect tenants.

This Bill includes a renewed commitment to abolish Section 21 ‘no fault’ evictions as well as including a ban on landlords increasing rents more than once a year. However it’s not all good news. The private rented sector is heavily biased in favour of landlords, leaving these new proposals to be taken advantage of by landlords using these new proposals to evict tenants quickly and unfairly. After all how is a tenant going to prove that they don’t have the potential to be capable of committing anti social behaviour.

Unscrupulous landlords could use this loophole to evict their old tenant and then put the property up for rent again at an increased rent. Under these proposals theres actually nothing to stop them doing this.

Domestic violence cases are also often reported as anti-social behaviour in the rental sector and tenants with some disabilities or mental health problems could well display behaviours that neighbours or landlords find to be potentially capable of potentially displaying anti social behaviour.This in itself is very discriminatory.

To counteract these potentials the prime minister must make it so that courts are aware of the circumstances of the tenants facing the loss of their homes but will he?

Those evicted from private rentals or social housing due to so called nuisance behaviour are also likely to be classed as intentionally homeless by local authorities and are therefore unlikely to be offered help. However families with children are offered help but those without children and who are not classed as vulnerable will become street homeless. 

 

At this present time there are 1.25 million people on waiting lists for social housing, many of them being children. These proposals of reducing the time tenants have to look for a new home and to challenge upcoming evictions is going to increase the pressure on social housing and massivley increase homelessness. 

Polly Neate, chief executive of the housing charity Shelter, said of the developments: ‘Millions of private renters across the country currently live under fear of eviction, which can happen with only a few weeks’ notice and no reason given. It makes renting deeply unstable and turns lives upside down. The government has rightly committed to scrap these Section 21 ‘no fault’ evictions in the long-awaited Renters’ Reform Bill.

‘Once these evictions are finally scrapped, we can’t allow new loopholes for unfair evictions to open up. Private renters deserve genuine security in their homes. Without clear guidance and safeguards in place, there is a real risk that the new anti-social behaviour grounds for eviction could be abused by landlords’.

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Shocking Statistics Show 350,000 More Children in Poverty Than Last year

According to statistics released today by CPAG (Child Poverty Action Group) 350,000 more children are in poverty in the U.K than last year.



This shows that 29% of all children in the UK are growing up below what is regarded as the breadline. In total that’s 4.2 million children in the UK, I’ll repeat this again 4.2 million children in the UK are growing up in poverty.

One of the main contributors to this sudden rise since 2022 is the stopping of the ÂŁ20 universal credit uplift that happened half way through 2022.

At the same time ÂŁ3.1 billion has been spent on Pupil Premiums and Early Years Entitlement for two-year olds that were introduced in 2008 has risen since 2021 from ÂŁ2.5 billion to ÂŁ2.7 billion a year whilst spending on the Early Years Entitlement for two year olds has fallen from ÂŁ0.5 billion to ÂŁ0.4 billion.


Forecasts of continued growth in child poverty mean that the current estimated £39.5bn annual cost will reach £40.4 billion in 2027 in today’s prices.



Commenting on today’s DWP’s child poverty statistics and CPAG’s own research on the economic costs of child poverty, Chief Executive of the charity Alison Garnham said:

“Children pay the highest possible price for poverty – they pay with their health, their well-being and their life chances. Our research shows the country also pays a heavy financial price.

Today’s DWP figures show that investing in social security is the way to remove children from poverty. Indeed, the Government did lift many kids from poverty with the £20 universal credit increase, but it plunged them back again with a subsequent cut.

In the face of today’s grim figures, and with another rise in inflation, it’s inexcusable for Ministers to sit on their hands. The Government must extend free school meals, remove the benefit cap and two-child limit and increase child benefit. The human cost for the children in today’s figures is incalculable. The economic fallout for all of us is vast. But if the political will is there, child poverty can be fixed.”

Meanwhile as the cost of living and energy price crisis continues to worsen even more children will be plunged into poverty leaving many to go hungry and at the same time foodbank donations are falling as the price of groceries increases leaving many having to close their doors to those in need.

It takes a truly evil and callous government to knowingly put the health and wellbeing of those most vulnerable at risk whilst they continue to profit from doing so.

The sooner this government has left office the better, to deliberatlty cause the suffering of 350,000 children and more is totally unforgivable.

Those responsible for making these decisions sleep well at night because they don’t care one bit and it’s pointless reaching out to them for sympathy.







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WCA To Be Abolished But It’s Not Good News. Universal Credit Sanctions Set To become Harsher.

It was announced in yesterdays budget that the WCA (Work Capability Assessment) is likely to be abolished however details of conditionality agreements, sanctions and other conditionality details have nit been revealed yet.

Theres also been rumours of the introduction of automated sanctions possibly implemented by bots for UC (Universal Credit) claimants

With the abolition of the WCA the small protection from conditionality that exists for those who are placed in the support group has been removed but the question is how soon they can enact this and is it a done deal?

From my knowledge this can’t happen without it first being in the white paper which it already is but this then has to go through parliament as a bill and then become an act so none of this is a done deal and it’s uncertain that they’ll have time to do this before a future general election.



If all of the above is successful and the WCA is abolished there are no details as to how the DWP will make decisions upon who will qualify for extra payments because they’re unable to return to work because of illness and disability.



Theres also the question of will the LCWRA (Universal Credit Work Related Activity) continue to stay or will they remove this as well in the future?

Theres also no details given as to who or what will decide if you should be subject to sanctions if you can’t look for work because your condition prevents you from looking for work and attend meetings.



As well as abolishing the WCA, the DWP (Department of Work and Pensions) is allegedly already planning to ‘strengthen’ UC sanctions, with rumours of using possible Bots and specially trained staff to do so. These measures could automate the issuing of sanctions notices.

If these rumours are correct, this could mean that sanctions which are already at a record level high could well increase even more when DWP bots possibly send out sanction notices. Sanction notices are notorious for arriving late leaving the claimant with no idea why they haven’t received their payments.

Not to forget that bots aren’t programmed to ask for and look for reasons as to why a claimant has allegedly missed an appointment and they certainly don’t take into account a persons ability to attend meetings.


Whilst any changes to the WCA are very likely to take years to introduce and there is time to challenge these decisions, changes to sanctions could well be introduced rapidly and without warning.

Another question that needs answering is will these changes apply to existing claims? If so this will most likely take a long time to transition. So don’t panic nothing is going to suddenly change if you are currently in support group / LCWRA.



So when will these changes happen?

They will be rolled out geographically for new claims first from 2026/27 to 2029. Only then would existing claimants begin to be affected. There will be some transitional protection for claimants who have LCWRA but do not get any element of PIP.

The degree of change in our proposals will require primary legislation, which we would aim to take forward in a new Parliament when parliamentary time allows. These reforms would then be rolled out, to new claims only, on a staged, geographical basis from no earlier than 2026/27

Below is a government link to their proposals in their white paper.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/transforming-support-the-health-and-disability-white-paper

I’ve tried to be concise and to word things simply, I don’t want anyone to panic and think that these changes are going to happen soon because they aren’t and theres time to oppose these proposals and protest against them.

Regarding Universal Credit claimants they’re most likely to bear the brunt of this much sooner and we still need to continue to support them and campaign against the extremely harsh treatment being thrown at them.

It’s no surprise that the government has yet again chosen to target the most vulnerable and I can see no end to their cruelty. We need to support each other in these cruelest of times.

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300% Increase In Disallowed PIP Awards

According to Tom Pursglove DWP Minister For Disabled People, 42,000 claimants lost their PIP Personal Independence Payments) awards in 2021 because they allegedly failed to return their AR1 PIP review forms.

This has caused an astonishing unexplained increase of almost 300% in just two years.



Theres a strong probability that many of the claimants that have been disallowed their payments have indeed returned them in time and the inept and archaic DWP system could be either losing them or taking far too long to record that they have been received.


Not to forget that some claimants may have failed to return the review form because the distress that completing these forms can cause triggering physical or mental health conditions.



As I reported a couple of weeks ago the tragic death of Laura Winham who’s disability benefit was stopped without any welfare checks by the DWP and other organisations after she failed to return her PIP claim form after being told that she needed to transfer from DLA to PIP.

Please note that all agencies involved were aware that she had a severe mental illness and needed support to do so.



According to Pursglove, claimants with serious mental health or cognitive conditions or who are vulnerable in other ways should have their files ‘watermarked’ to show they need additional support. Clearly this isn’t happening in all cases.

According to DWP policy claimants such as these should not have their PIP stopped because of a failure to return a form.

Are the DWP ignoring their own policies and procedures?Unsurprisingly this appears to be the case doesn’t it.

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