Fact check - "Sickness benefits have increased by 25%" - Actually 4%

x82

Reeves states the cost of sickness benefits has increased by 25% since pre-pandemic levels.

Fails to mention that inflation is up 21% since 2019, so the actual increase to sickness benefit costs is actually 4%.

And that is 4% after a global pandemic with long term health complications, and the 4.6% increase in the size of the UK population since 2019.

Considering that the lowest 50% of the UK population has 9% of the country's wealth, while the top 50% have 91%, I don't understand why Reeves is quite literally taxing disabled people by giving them less money, while having absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with taxing the wealthy, super rich, those on salaries of above £5m per year. She's not increased taxation for unearned income at all, she is in fact targeting the poorest in society. Be they elderly, be they disabled, or be they cash poor family farms.

But of course as soon as there's a threat from Russia, extra tens of billions are found by reducing the foreign aid budget. Why weren't we reducing the foreign age budget from the outset, instead of continuing to destroy the lives of British people?

Can someone please explain to me how we have managed into a worse situation than the previous lot? This is absolute austerity, and it's brazen.

luvpink

@x82

Hi and welcome to the community.

Scope have asked us to post benefit reform issues in the thread at the top of the page to avoid multiple threads on the same topic.

Holly_Scope

Hello @x82,

It's definitely on many of our minds right now. We're having a big discussion about it, which you can read here: Upcoming changes to benefits.

At the moment, no formal announcements have been made, so no one knows for certain what the changes will be or how they’ll be implemented. However, we're actively campaigning and raising awareness through The Cost of Cuts, and we’d really appreciate your support and signature.

We understand this is a difficult topic, and many people are finding it challenging. To keep the community a safe space, we're encouraging all discussions on benefit changes to stay in one place. For that reason, we’ll be closing this discussion, but we’d love for you to join the main discussion thread here: Upcoming changes to benefits.

Best wishes,