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LABOUR veteran Margaret Hodge yesterday derided Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) work on the new personal independence payment (Pip) as “nothing short of a fiasco.”
The Commons public accounts committee, of which Ms Hodge is chairwoman, has launched a report on the replacement for disability living allowance castigating the DWP for a catalogue of failures
Ms Hodge said that the DWP’s failure to pilot the scheme had meant that many assumptions, such as how long assessments would take and how many face-to-face meetings with claimants were required, were proven incorrect.
DYLAN MURPHY reports that far from helping people back into work, the sanctions regime is inflicting unnecessary trauma on working-class families
Labour will find increases in the state pension age are unacceptable, just as cuts to the Winter Fuel Allowance, personal independence payments and universal credit are — it needs to change direction immediately, writes PCS general secretary FRAN HEATHCOTE
A new report by Amnesty International pulls no punches in highlighting the Labour government’s human rights violations of those on benefits, says Dr DYLAN MURPHY