'We'd have been prisoners in our home': readers help people hit by benefit cuts

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/sep/09/prisoners-in-home-guardian-readers-benefit-cuts

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‘We’re far from out of the trees but the Guardian article has massively helped us,” said Peter Sanford from his home in Redditch, in the West Midlands. “I want to thank everyone. It’s restored my faith in the kindness and decency of people.”

We are talking three weeks after Peter featured in the Hardworking Britain column I write for the Guardian: he and his five-year-old son, Gabriel, are one of the many families in Britain left desperate as a result of the government’s so-called welfare reform.

Peter, 48, has osteoarthritis – his doctor describes his condition as the arthritis of an 80-year-old – and Gabriel is severely autistic. For the past five years, the Sanfords have relied on their disability support to lease a car. Or their “lifeline” as Peter describes it: a BMW estate, big enough to take his wheelchair. In September, Peter had his benefit cut – and was told the family car would be taken away. As he told me when he heard the news: “Without the car, we’ll be prisoners in our home.”

When the Guardian reported on the Sanford’s situation, readers quickly started to donate to the family. Peter had set up a JustGiving page in the hope of raising support; within an hour of the piece being published online, it had collected £600.

“I had a moment when I thought the website for the crowdfunding had broken in some way as every few seconds, literally, there was an update sent to me that more money had been given,” said Peter.

Readers donated almost £4,500 through the site. Another sent Peter a cheque for £200, specifically to help with car insurance. “It was totally surreal,” he said. “I cried a little through joy.”

Peter was awarded ​the ​​standard​ rate PIP, meaning he is no longer eligible for the Motability car scheme

When you live like Peter and Gabriel, something as simple as a car is vital: it is how the family get to hospital appointments, travel to Gabriel’s therapy sessions, which help him learn to form words, or pick up Peter’s pain medication.

Moving even a short distance is a struggle for Peter: he needs a double knee replacement, and a double hip one as well, but a heart defect means he can’t have surgery. Public transport is impossible – Gabriel has no sense of danger near roads and Peter can’t walk to the bus stop. The effort would mean “I’d have to sit on the kerb for an hour,” he said.

The only way the two of them could afford to go out safely was with help from the Motability scheme, which lets disabled people swap disability living allowance (DLA) for the lease of an accessible vehicle.

As part of a plan to reduce public spending on disability payments, however, the government is in the final stages of abolishing DLA and replacing it with tougher and widely criticised personal independence payments (PIP). This has led to the mass retesting of disabled people such as Peter and Gabriel.

Over the past three months, both father and son have been summoned for assessment by private firms hired by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). Gabriel kept his benefits. But Peter’s were downgraded. Instead of being awarded the enhanced rate of PIP, he was awarded the standard rate, meaning he is no longer eligible for the car scheme. In effect this means he was judged as being healthier now than when he was last assessed for DLA, two years ago despite the fact his disability can only get worse.

The assessments don’t consider whether parents of disabled children are also disabled, so because Peter has been ruled ineligible for a car, Gabriel loses the car he needs too.

The DWP said: “PIP assessments are undertaken by qualified health professionals and decisions are made based on information provided by the claimant and their GP.” Claimants can appeal against a decision, it added.

Peter is appealing against his assessment. In the next couple of months he’ll have to attend a tribunal to try to get the DWP’s decision overruled. But, in an example of how perversely the system is designed, he was told to hand back his leased Motability vehicle first. When the Liberal Democrat peer Celia Thomas wrote to the Guardian highlighting the issue, she said almost 17,000 people had already lost their eligibility for Motability cars since being reassessed. That was in March.

Before the Guardian was involved, Peter had no hope that his JustGiving page would raise enough money for the reliable car the family needs. He hoped for “at best, an old banger that would probably break down first trip to therapist,” he said.

With their leased car likely to be removed in a matter of days, Peter has already used the donated money – added to a one-off charitable payment of £2,000 from the Motability scheme, introduced when the DWP first abolished DLA – to buy it outright.

The Sanfords are not the only family hit by benefit cuts to be helped by Guardian readers. In the Hardworking Britain column, each week I talk to one person affected by government policy. Since the column was launched in January it has become a regular occurrence for readers to seek to donate to those featured.

Readers made a crowdfunding page for Charlotte and Jayson Carmichael, a disabled couple hit by the bedroom tax, and raised £1,400. They helped Sarah Jones, a paraplegic with chronic rheumatoid arthritis who was struggling to feed her children after her sickness benefit was stopped, with a series of individual donations, including one for £500.

Readers contact me via email or Twitter to ask how they can help, and with permission I put them in touch with people featured in the column, or sometimes readers plan crowdfunding sites in the comment threads of articles.

Back in Redditch, Peter’s struggle isn’t over. If his appeal against the DWP’s benefit decision is successful, he’ll then have bought the car needlessly as he’ll be eligible to lease one – which, for disabled people such as Peter, who have a low set income, is a better option as it avoids the costs and instability of car ownership. The Motability package covers not just the car but also insurance, repairs, tax and – vital for disabled people – breakdown.

He worries too that he may have to sell the car even if he wins: “Motability would want the £2,000 back,” he said. “I’d have to sell the car to cover that cost.”

And if his appeal is rejected? Peter thinks he could afford to keep his car on the road for only a few months: he will have no way of finding the £1,000 annual insurance premium, £140 for tax, or the costs of general upkeep.

A cheaper vehicle isn’t an option: it needs to be not just reliable, but big enough for his wheelchair and Gabriel’s comfort toys. In that situation, the future is bleak. “Truth is, without the Motability scheme, no disabled person on benefits could ever run a car long term,” he said.