News

In yet another attack on sick and disabled claimants, work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith has claimed that 7 out of 10 disability living allowance (DLA) claimants ‘​fester’​ on lifetime awards of the benefit.

This latest show of hostility to claimants comes after Duncan Smith’​s attack earlier this month on Remploy workers, whom he accused of sitting around drinking coffee all day.

In an exclusive interview for the Telegraph this week, Duncan Smith claimed that DLA had grown by 30 per cent in the past few years because it is ‘​very loosely defined’​ and ‘​lots of people weren’​t actually seen’​.

According to Duncan Smith the result is that:

“​Something like 70 per cent had lifetime awards, (which) meant that once they got it you never looked at them again. They were just allowed to fester.”​

Claimants have grown used to the accusation by ministers that they used to ‘​languish​’​ on incapacity benefit before it was replaced by employment and support allowance (ESA). But the allegation that disabled people now ‘​fester’​ on DLA brings a new low in the prejudicial language to which ministers will stoop to in order to sell savage benefits cuts.

Full story in the Telegraph