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Tens of thousands of ‘NEETs’ have been hospitalised, mostly for mental health
New research has revealed that young people “not in education, employment, or training” (NEET) living with mental health or "behavioural conditions" are disproportionately likely to have been hospitalised compared to their peers living with other chronic health conditions.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) published the data on Friday (27 March), revealing that hospitals have admitted huge numbers more young people living with these conditions for inpatient stays - some for potentially over a year.
The Labour government has largely attributed the rise in NEET to the increase in the number of young people diagnosed with mental health and neurodivergent conditions.
But ministers and government officials have made repeated insinuations around 'overdiagnosis' of neurodivergence and questioned the severity of young people's mental health.
As a result, the government has been targeting young disabled people living with these conditions as part of its broader attack on disabled welfare claimants and its drive to coerce them into work. However, this new data casts doubt on government claims that many young people are somehow 'faking' their diagnoses.
The research brought together a range of datasets to put the numbers of so-called NEETs in the context of NHS statistics on “hospital episodes”.
The statistics linked this data with the 2021 census, and so provide a snapshot of hospitalisations for different groups.
In total, ONS found 239,340 young people aged 16-24 had been hospitalised for a day or more across more than 400,000 inpatient stays. This represents five per cent of all young people for that age group (as at the 2021 census).
Young people not in work, education, or training were more than twice as likely to have been hospitalised.
But it was young people living with mental health or "behavioural” conditions - neurodivergence - who accounted for the highest proportion of those hospitalisations.
46 per cent of young people of that age group who'd been hospitalised had experienced hospitalisations for these conditions.
This was the highest percentage of all chronic health conditions listed in the data, ranging from cancer, to respiratory, and cardiovascular-based illnesses.
Of that 46 per cent, a third were not in jobs, education, or training.
Next to admissions for mental health and behavioural conditions, the data revealed similarly high figures and proportions for self harm. More than half of NEET young people who'd had inpatient hospital stays had at one time or more been hospitalised for self harm. This was 40 per cent for non-NEET individuals.
After mental health and behavioural conditions, and admissions for self harm, young people entered hospital most often for neurological conditions.
Following this, young people living with “Metabolic, Endocrine, Digestive, Renal and GU conditions” undertook hospital periods most often. Approximately 26 per cent and 22 per cent of young people who'd had hospitalisations, had experienced hospital stays for these.
In November, the DWP announced a new “independent” inquiry to look into the “drivers of the increase in the number of young people who are Not in Education Employment or Training (NEET) and claiming health and disability benefits, including childhood experience”.
Former Labour health secretary Alan Milburn is leading the inquiry.
DWP secretary Pat McFadden said that this would have a “particular focus on the impact of mental health conditions and disability”.
But disabled activists have raised concerns about previous public comments Milburn has made minimising young people’s mental health.
In an interview for The Times, he said that anxiety and depression are “normal”, to argue that the majority of young disabled people should not be claiming benefits for these conditions.
The former New Labour cabinet minister, who currently holds a non-executive directorship at the Department of Health and Social Care, implied that young disabled people are exaggerating the severity of their mental ill-health.
He told The Times: “There’s a difference between a diagnosis and a disorder. And OK, so people might have anxiety or depression, but it doesn’t mean that therefore you should be written off for not being able to work.”
But the high rates of hospitalisations in the ONS data for these conditions challenge Milburn’s narrative.
The figures also rebuff the Labour government's contention that work is always positive for young people’s mental health.
At a speech in Waltham Forest College in March announcing new funding for youth employment schemes, DWP secretary Pat McFadden told the audience: “I have a simple message today: work is good for us.
“Not just good for earning a wage, but even more fundamentally, good for pride, purpose and identity that it gives us.”
His claim builds on previous government refusals to recognise how pressuring young disabled people into work can be actively harmful.
In March 2025, then DWP secretary Liz Kendall said in her foreword to the Pathways to Work green paper: “There’s clear evidence that shows good work is good for health and plays a vital role in recovery.”
The green paper referenced a 2006 independent review commissioned by the DWP. One of the co-authors - orthopaedic surgeon Gordon Waddell - was a key architect of the biopsychosocial model that formed the basis for the New Labour government’s “thinking on disability”.0 -
It's ok @Catherine21, technology is tricky! @bellatango has kindly posted the latest article from John Pring above and here's a link to all of his articles .
Looking through the download you shared and saw it's over 5,000 words long so may be a bit long for a post! Everyone can access his articles via the link I've just shared which hopefully covers everything in his newsletter. I'm struggling to find how to subscribe to the newsletter so if anyone finds it let us know please!
I'll change the title so it explains what we're discussing 😊
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One in three terminally ill people in deprived areas aren't claiming DWP benefits they're entitled to at the end of life
A third of terminally ill people living in the most deprived parts of England and Wales are not claiming benefits they’re entitled to in the final 12 months of life.
Contrary to successive government and mainstream media narratives around the soaring numbers of benefit claimants, the new data backs up what many disabled activists have repeatedly warned: that the up-take of benefits is instead far lower than it should be.
In reality, many disabled individuals aren't receiving the benefits they're eligible for - as this new research once again proves in the context of terminally ill people.
On Friday (27 March), the Office for National Statistics (ONS) published the findings of a Marie Curie-funded research project exploring the take-up of benefits by those living with terminal illness.
Terminally ill people are eligible to access certain benefits faster, and without medical assessment, under the Department for Work and Pensions's (DWP) Special Rules for End of Life (SREL).
Those who are likely to have less than 12 months to live can apply for DWP to fast-track their applications for particular benefits. This covers non-means-tested benefits like personal independence payment (PIP), attendance allowance (AA), and disability living allowance (DLA), as well as means-tested benefits such as universal credit and employment and support allowance (ESA).
The new research sheds light on the rates that benefits go unclaimed in the final year of life. The analysis specifically explored this for non-means-tested benefits.
It revealed that more than 350,000 - 34 per cent of terminally ill people in their final 12 months - did not claim the benefits they were eligible for.
Significantly, the research found that more than a third of terminally ill people in the 20 per cent most deprived neighbourhoods who would be entitled to non-means-tested benefits, had failed to claim them within the 12 months leading up to their death.
Dr Joanna Davies, from the Cicely Saunders Institute of Palliative Care, Policy and Rehabilitation at King's College London (KCL), who co-authored the research, said: “Benefits can help people meet some of the additional costs of serious illness and the ‘Special Rules for End of Life’ are set up to provide fast-tracked access to that support.
“We know from this analysis that 1 in 3 people are missing out on that support and some groups are more likely to miss out than others.”
Davies pointed out that the findings show how “lack of need for support is not the only factor driving the take-up deficit”.
Take-up rates also varied across different terminal illnesses. People living with HIV were least likely to claim - with 59 per cent failing to do so. Those living with liver disease and heart failure were also less likely to claim the benefits they were entitled to, at 58 per cent and 46 per cent respectively.
By contrast, people with neurological conditions and dementia were more likely to claim, with just 10 per cent and 15 per cent not doing so.
KCL researchers carried out the analysis as part of broader study into the take-up of benefits amid people living with terminal illness.
The study says: “Around 90,000 people die in poverty each year in the UK. Better access to benefits for people living with a terminal illness can help to lift people out of poverty and improve dignity.”
It adds: “We don’t know how many people living with a terminal illness miss out on benefits, but in the wider community, benefits often go unclaimed.”
The project aims to find out more about the demographics of terminally ill people who are missing out on the benefits available to them, and so uncover “groups most at risk of underclaiming” in order to make policy recommendations for interventions “that could improve take-up”.
A 2024 study the KCL researchers carried out reviewed the campaigns the government, local authorities, and non-profit sector have in place to encourage take-up among “severely disabled people and those with serious health conditions”.
The report from this previous research called on DWP to “develop and fund a comprehensive strategy for actively promoting and monitoring take-up of benefits by severely disabled people and people who have serious long-term health conditions (including those with life-limiting (terminal) illness), their families and carers”.
But Davies also highlighted healthcare professionals’ role in ensuring terminally ill people access the benefits they are entitled to.
She explained that they are the “gateway to these benefits” and noted that “clinicians already work hard” to help patients “complete these forms”.
However, she argued that there needs to be “wider awareness” around “access to benefits”, and suggested that applications “could be better integrated into other processes, such as advance care planning and hospital discharge”.
Dr Sam Royston, executive director of research and policy at end-of-life charity Marie Curie, said: “Last year, Marie Curie's Dying in Poverty report revealed that more than 280 people die in poverty every day across the UK.
“A key step in addressing poverty at the end of life is to ensure the benefits system provides adequate protection to everyone who needs it. But this ONS research data, funded by Marie Curie, shows the extent to which people with a terminal illness are failing to be protected by our social security safety net.”
He added: “It's clear that further steps need to be taken so more people with a terminal illness are aware of, and able to easily access, the vital support that they need and are entitled to.
"Every dying person should be able to access the benefits they need, so they can spend their limited time focusing on what really matters: making memories with friends and family, and living their final months, weeks, and days as well as possible.”
People nearing the end of life can contact Marie Curie’s free support line on 0800 090 2309 or use its web chat service. The charity provides a free online benefits calculator to help those navigating the benefit system towards the end of life.1 -
Sorry yes it is a bit long. Do you want me to to the rest?
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Timms continues evasiveness on Access to Work cut evidence his own department admit exists
The disability minister has once again ducked questions on the Department for Work and Pensions' (DWP) covert programme of cuts to the Access to Work (AtW) disability employment scheme.
In a parliamentary written question, Liberal Democrat work and pensions spokesperson Steve Darling asked the secretary of state to confirm what data it was that prompted the department to direct staff to reduce AtW grants.
Another Darling question, also tabled on 18 March, queried whether the DWP has “conducted a review or internal audit” to assess staff consistency in decision-making over AtW awards.
But Sir Stephen Timms failed to provide a clear answer to either line of enquiry.
Instead, the minister’s responses conflict with information senior civil servants at the DWP recently disclosed over the cuts.
Sir Stephen told Darling that the department “routinely focuses on strengthening case manager learning”. In his stock response, he claimed this is so that staff have the “skills and expertise required to apply Access to Work policy and guidance fairly and consistently”.
Replying to the internal audit query, he said that the department holds “regular consistency meetings with all Service Assurance Managers”. Sir Stephen told Darling that it is during these meetings that DWP reviews cases and “discuss[es] any instances where inconsistencies may arise”.
He added: “This ensures that all managers apply processes and guidance correctly and uniformly, helping to support a fairer process”.
Darling first challenged DWP on its cuts to the scheme via a written question in July 2025. It was then that Sir Stephen first insisted that the department had issued no guidance to reduce support.
Instead, he suggested that the cuts disabled campaigners had exposed were because of work to “improve [AtW] decision-making by applying the guidance with greater consistency, to provide a fairer process”.
Since then, Disability News Service (DNS) has been in a protracted battle with the department to find out when and how it told staff to make this change.
At Labour's annual conference in September, Sir Stephen admitted to DNS that he had signed off on a proposal from senior civil servants to require AtW staff to more “scrupulously” apply this guidance. He also agreed to confirm to DNS the date he approved the order that appears to have led to widespread cuts to AtW.
But the minister has since twice refused to provide that date.
DWP's freedom of information team later disputed the claims made by Sir Stephen, telling DNS there was “no submission regarding Access to Work training for case managers”.
The minister's latest responses now also contradict evidence the department’s senior civil servants gave to a recent parliamentary inquiry.
On 12 March, the public accounts committee (PAC) held an oral evidence session for its inquiry into AtW.
DWP permanent secretary Sir Peter Schofield told the committee that references to the lack of consistency in staff decision-making revolve around their failure to apply the five “principles of Access to Work”.
Cathy Waller, founder of Decode - which supports thousands of disabled creatives in navigating AtW applications - has spoken out on how AtW staff have been using one of these principles in particular to justify cutting AtW awards.
Specifically, the AtW staff guide sets out how the scheme should provide support that meets disabled people’s “minimum needs”. Waller previously told the Canary how in interactions with multiple case managers, none were able to explain to her what this principle means.
Crucially, during the PAC session Schofield told MPs the DWP had “identified” these failures “through a management investigation” and “an internal audit report”.
During the same evidence session, Neil Couling, DWP's director general of services and fraud, told the committee that the department had been “making mistakes” on cases throughout 2023 and 2024. He suggested disabled people were now seeing a lower award at renewal because AtW staff were correcting these mistakes and applying the guidance more rigorously.
Couling said that “over the next three years, as we work through the cases that were made without the consistency that Peter's [Schofield] been talking about, you will see those awards fall, not to zero, but to what the scheme actually provides for".
The National Audit Office’s (NAO) February 2026 report into AtW also made reference to an “internal audit”. According to the NAO report, DWP carried this out in August 2024. This reportedly found that “DWP’s guidance for Access to Work is high-level and limits what case managers can do to challenge applicants”.
It seems to corroborate Schofield’s evidence to the committee.
The internal audit took place just weeks after the Labour government came to power. Disabled people widely reported substantial reductions to their AtW awards in the months after the audit.1 -
Thanks for posting the information @bellatango 😊 As it is quite lengthy, it may be difficult for some of our members to read. If anyone would like to read the rest let us know, otherwise I've linked all of his articles in the post itself.
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@Rachel_Scope No problem 👍️
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John Pring no longer runs DNS.
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Yes of you look back on my posts i stated that he sold to canary and works for them now
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Hi @Catherine21
John did sell DNS to The Canary a few months ago, but he is still the editor. In his own update he said he was asked if he would consider selling DNS and remaining as a salaried editor, and that he would only sell to an organisation that guaranteed editorial independence for himself and DNS. So the change is ownership, not who edits or runs the journalism.
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Thanks MW123 hope your well
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Hi @Catherine21
I am fine thank you, had a really good last few days and I’m very much looking forward to catching up with friends over the Easter holiday and having a few hours binge watching something on Netflix.
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Lol, it was probably your post I read! I stand corrected.
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Oh im glad to hear that Enjoy x
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