March 26th and Green Paper Mega Discussion (ITV leaks, etc)

not helpful

Comments like this just reiterate the stereotypes that the disabled are easy targets

Throwing in the towel at the first sign of difficulty just reinforces this and makes government pushing for welfare cuts to fill treasury kitty (if that is the confirmed plan) carry on believing we are the easiest group to balance the books with

I presume I’m one of the preachers you are referring to

Have you ever heard the saying ‘survival of the fittest?’

I’ve navigated the system for a while now and (and some members will disagree with me) but you are better placed to be successful in disability welfare assessments if you have support, the more the better (it takes a village) even if it’s to share the load and reduce overload on MH (esp essential if you have to go through MR, tribunal or want to take a case to high court)

Support a individual may have are friends and family, carers, health specialists, charities and some wild cards (when a support system goes to extraordinary lengths (or just has ‘dumb luck) to obtain a helpful resource that could make all the difference in success or failure) - also some individuals on this forum may have 1 or multiple ‘break glass in emergency’ safety net available to them if the welfare safety net gets compromised (by things like cuts and tightened criteria)

I know there are many on this forum who don’t have a big support system or access to resources (or even have nothing and talking to other scope members is all they have in terms of support

most of us who consider ourselves lucky in terms of our ‘village’ most likely consider sharing personal circumstances as private but also distasteful knowing what others on this forum have got to go through

though I have many health conditions/disablities and my mental health is wrecked I still consider myself to be very very lucky with my village - the easy thing for me to do would be to step away from the scope forum and concentrate solely on myself and figure out how to adapt to possible reforms and find the way to get the highest possible welfare award (much easier to figure out this just for myself)

But I have a conscience and feel a duty to pay it forward as other members on this forum have spared their time helping me with answering my questions in past years

what I don’t have time for is those saying they are doomed and figuratively insist on ‘staying on the titanic’ rather than find a ‘life-raft’ or literally anything that may ‘float’ with added body weight. It’s even worse when you try and convince others that there’s no hope and to give up

(In 2025 2 individuals took the gov/dwp to high court and won huge victories - and we’ve had multiple David’s take on the dwp’s Goliath and won big big victories (result in fairer criteria changes and backpay payouts) in the last 15 years - I have a in depth list that may not be complete which I’ll post in the thread I started in the ‘other benefits’ sub topic)