Get your MP to act against cuts

You are welcome @noonebelieves 😊 I'm glad that other members are sharing this urgent warning ⚠️ to the community. It's very good to see. The more of us that share it, the more members we will reach. Honestly, the lengths the government will go to manipulate us to get us to give them information that they can twist, then use against us!! 😡

Another warning too. ⚠️ A survey for Carer's UK that I filled in after finding out about it on the Benefits and Works website was also asking for evidence of what you spend your PIP on and, at the end of the survey, asked permission to allow MPs to use the contents of the survey, anonymously. I found out from the Canary that the government are using these surveys too for their own ends. 😤

I am going to bring more attention to our community about this issue. Carers UK can't be the only DPO unwittingly doing this. 😒

Thank you for the links to Campaign For Disability Justice and for two petitions. I have signed up for the first one and signed the two petitions.

You really are to be commended for all the tireless campaigning and endless encouragement you show to me and all the Scope Community members!! 👏🏆🏅

This is all done whilst coping with your own severe disablities. You are an extraordinary example to us all! 😃💪

I do hope that you've seen the article that I've shared on here about the encouraging developments in government over the cuts. 🤗 If not, I've shared the link here.

It really does show us that the contribution that the community is making to campaign is really gathering momentum! 👌😊

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/apr/20/the-whole-policy-is-wrong-rebellion-among-labour-mps-grows-over-5bn-benefits-cut?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

‘The whole policy is wrong’: rebellion among Labour MPs grows over £5bn benefits cut

Labour MPs opposed to the government’s massive £5bn of benefit cuts say they will refuse to support legislation to implement them, even if more money is offered by ministers to alleviate child poverty in an attempt to win them over.

Legislation will be introduced to the House of Commons in early June to allow the cuts to come into force. They will include tightening the criteria for personal independence payments (Pip) for people with disabilities, to limit the number of people who can claim it. Under the changes, people who are not able to wash the lower half of their body, for example, will no longer be able to claim Pip unless they have another limiting condition.

A major rebellion appears to be hardening on the Labour benches rather than subsiding, despite frantic efforts by whips and government ministers to talk MPs round.

One idea being floated as a way to win over rebels is for ministers to publish their long-awaited child poverty strategy shortly before the key Commons votes, and in it offer additional money for poor parents of children under five. Work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall is understood to be examining a proposal focused on the youngest children that would cost less than the £3.6bn needed to scrap entirely the controversial two-child limit on benefit payments. It is now accepted in government that, given the state of public finances, the cap cannot be scrapped in the short term.

Many of the several dozen Labour MPs who are angry at their party’s cuts say they will refuse to get involved in any such “trade off” involving children in poverty and the disabled.

Rachael Maskell, the Labour MP for York Central, who is planning to vote against the legislation, said: “You can’t compromise with a trade-off under which you say you will take more children from poor families out of poverty by placing more disabled people into poverty. That simply cannot be right.

“The government really does need to start listening to MPs, civil society and the population at large because there is really widespread opposition to these policies.”

Ministers and the Labour whips have been holding talks with concerned MPs over recent days, only to find the strength of feeling is not abating. A group of MPs is understood to be preparing to break cover by calling for a complete rethink. One government source said: “If anything, I think there is more worry than there was. It is like this is non-negotiable for many of our people.”

Another major complaint from Labour MPs is that they will be asked to vote on the legislation to implement the benefits cuts before the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) has concluded an impact assessment on the effect they will have on getting people off welfare and into the workforce – the stated objective of the cuts. The OBR report is not due until the autumn.

Last month, Keir Starmer said there was a “moral” as well as an economic case for reforming the benefit system. “It is indefensible, economically and morally, and we must and we will reform it. We will have clear principles, we will protect those who need protecting.

“We will also support those who can work back to work, but Labour is the party of work – we’re also the party of equality and fairness.”

Another Labour MP opposed to the cuts, Neil Duncan-Jordan, who won the seat of Poole in Dorset by just 18 votes last July, overturning a Conservative majority of 19,000, said he had more than 5,000 Pip recipients in his seat.

He said he could not support any compromise or “trade off”. “There is not a hierachy of need,” he said. “The whole policy is wrong. It goes without saying that if these benefits cuts go through, I will be toast in this seat.”

Duncan-Jordan said it did not make sense that MPs were being asked to vote on the cuts before the OBR had reported on how effective they would be in returning people to the workplace. “We are being asked to take a leap of faith. It does not make sense.”

In its report accompanying Rachel Reeves’s spring statement, the OBR said that “the full impacts of these policies are very uncertain, given the complexity of how trends in health, demography and the economy interact with the benefits system (as our 2024 welfare trends report explored).

“Welfare reforms incorporated into previous OBR forecasts have in many cases saved much less than initially expected, such as the transition from disability living allowance to Pip, or taken far longer to implement than expected, as was the case for the roll-out of universal credit.”

The OBR added: “We will undertake a full assessment of the potential impact of the Green Paper polices on the labour market ahead of our next forecast.”

Thanks for your kind compliments, @jul1aorways! Keep up the great work you're doing too 😊

PLEASE DON'T FORGET that the Local Elections are coming up on 1st May 2025. If it is possible for you do so I URGE YOU TO VOTE. 📢 Please don't think that Local Elections are for local issues, they can make a great deal of difference to national policy making too. ✊✊✊✊

It is vitally important as we have a chance to vote against the Labour government, with 80 MPs being in unstable swing seats where disabled people in each of their constituencies (each MPs area) can easily vote them out, as long as THEY DO turn out to vote.

Each vote in every other constituency IS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT THOUGH.

Whatever you do please don't doubt that YOUR VOTE CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE. ✊✊✊✊ PLEASE THINK COLLECTIVELY, THE MORE OF US ACT TOGETHER THE BETTER!!

For those of you who believe that none of the main political parties represent you and you would normally stay at home and not vote did you know THAT YOU CAN SPOIL YOUR BALLOT? 🤔

For the sake of keeping it simple, just write a big cross ❎ like that from edge to edge of the whole paper, right through all the candidates, like the example below. 👇👇👇👇

Please don't put a mark of ANY KIND by any individual candidate as it will be considered as a vote for them.

ON THE DAY PLEASE DO NOT FORGET TO TAKE PHOTO ID as you will not be allowed to vote without showing it!! You don't have to have a passport or driving licence, there are many other types of ID that you may already have or can easily acquire before the day. The full list is here. 👇

https://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/voting-and-elections/voter-id/accepted-forms-photo-id

I know by experience, of course, just how tough it is with our health conditions to even consider going out, for many of us (including me) and we all feel so ground down by the vile government treatment of the disabled but this is something that COULD MAKE A VERY REAL DIFFERENCE TO OUR FIGHT AGAINST THESE PROPOSED SADISTIC, IMMORAL AND POSSIBLY UNLAWFUL CUTS!!

THOSE OF YOU WHO HAVE HAD A POSTAL VOTE WILL HAVE SENT IT IN BY NOW BUT FOR EVERYONE ELSE.👇👇👇👇

Firstly, you must be on the ELECTORAL REGISTER, if not make sure that, when the letter comes later in the year to sign you up to it, you do so for future elections.

Please check that there is an election in your area (constituency) at the link below.

https://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/i-am-a/voter/your-election-information

If you have trouble with either of the links highlight the text and press OPEN on the menu that comes up beside it.

Unfortunately there isn't a Local Election in my constituency this year!! 😱😱 😱 😱 so please make a difference too for those of us who have no opportunity to vote at all at this crucial time!! 😒

Scope's 'The cost of cuts' campaign now has over 90,000 signatures - click on the link below, then on 'Add your name' (even if you have) to see that Scope have nearly reached their 'new' target of 100,000 signatures: https://www.scope.org.uk/campaigns/the-cost-of-cuts

Gremlins have been in the works for several hyperlinks for me today, so apologies I couldn't get anything better to work! However 90k thousand signatures in just over a month isn't bad.

⚠️ Government Phishing Alert!! ⚠️

If you see this on Facebook or anywhere else for that matter, don't fill it in!

Dav1D
I think he his just towing the party line with this nonsense 1 out of 10 claim, he obviously doesn’t give a rats **** about the 1.2million who will lose out. It’s not even going to be fair assessments because we all know they will not award 4 points even if it’s deserved. I will never understand the madness behind this, what a terrible country this is now, the harm this is going to cause so many vulnerable people is disgraceful. Makes me ashamed to be a human being.

Hi Martin. She actually completely ignored my letter, which was purely about the proposal

‘to merge ESA with JSA to make a new ‘unemployment insurance’ benefit, paid for a limited time’.

Do you think the MPs being lied to; or are they lying to us?

I meet the Govs 2008 severe conditions criteria for ESA, will never work again, they have that in writing from numerous doctors, including leading specialists, I have provided medical evidence proving I meet the criteria for entry into the support group under Risk and Mobility, but I do not believe I meet the proposed new 4 point rule.

I have a rare complicated multisystemic disease, (have been through 16 years of absolute hell) Ive only just, (finally) got access to ESA, last year. (After losing everything).

Up to 90% of patients with my disease were receiving delayed diagnosis.

(Cant describe how horrific its been)

If I were to try to work again, Id be collapsing, at first id keep trying to get back up, and then start collapsing again, going down for minutes at first, then comatose for hours, then days and nights consecutively bedbound, with increasingly serious very severe symptoms, etc, etc. They know this. Theyve seen it.

They wouldnt make a lame horse suffer and treat it so badly.

Are they genuinely Evil or highly ignorant? One wonders.

**** to my courage and dignity!

We need an effective way to fight them.

Thats the problem here.

Theres no way to fight back against them!

What your MP wrote was what the Labour government will admit to. They want to minimise the bad effects of this particular proposal hoping that MPs, the general public and the disabled will accept it.

The Freedom of Information request has the CORRECT figures, where it emerged that 87% or nearly 9 out of 10 of all standard daily living claiments would not get an award for failing to get 4 points in a descriptor.

This is the sort of manipulative misinformation that we are trying to fight. We can't trust anything they say so we must all keep up with what's going on so we can fact check and challenge their claims.