'Myth buster' factsheet highlights tougher ESA rules

The Disability Benefits Consortium (DBC) has produced a ‘myth buster’ factsheet issuing a stark warning for potential future claimants about the realities of the impending welfare reforms.

It highlights five ‘myths' about incapacity benefit and employment and support allowance (ESA) that the charity claimed are commonly used by the government and media.

Should the reforms be passed in their current state, after one year means-testing of contributory ESA will mean people with a partner earning as little as £150 a week or savings of over £16,000 will get nothing.

DBC also noted that far from being easy to get UK benefits are among the strictest in the world.

An Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) report in 2003 said the nation's regime had been made "much more rigorous or have been made much more stringent in recent years", prior to the implementation of the Work Capability Assessment (WCA) which DBC said has further tightened the criteria for eligibility.

The other topics clarified by the charity are:

• the use of benefit claimant statistics by both government and the press,
• the time-limiting of contributory ESA to one year,
• and the demand from government that people in the work-related activity group should find a job within a year or risk facing benefit cuts.

The three page guide can be downloaded from the DBC website and is likely to prove a wake-up call to many people unaware of the rapidly reducing state benefit provision should they become too ill to work.