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Iain Duncan Smith dismissed hit Ken Loach film I, Daniel Blake as “unfair” and said he doesn’t believe people live like the characters it shows.

The film won the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival for its stark portrayal of a 59-year-old joiner facing nightmarish fit-to-work tests.

But the former welfare slasher said the film lumped together all the worst things that could happen to someone claiming benefits.

Asked to review it by the BBC’s Today Programme, he said: “The film has taken the very worst of anything that can ever happen to anybody, lump it all together and then say ‘absolutely, this is life as it is lived by people.’

“And I don’t believe that.”

(Image: Daily Record)

(Image: Getty)

Mr Duncan Smith, who is personally targeted for criticism by characters in the film, says he has been a fan of director Ken Loach’s previous work.

He said: “I happen to have high regard for him as a film director. I’m old enough to remember great films like Kes and stuff, which had huge take-up.

“But I did think that while on one level this was a human story full of pathos and difficulty, and I’m not saying for one moment there aren’t serious difficulties and issues when you’re under pressure and things like this happen.”

And he criticised the film’s portrayal of Job Centre staff, which he said was “unfair.”

He said: “I have travelled round so many Job Centres, talked to so many of them and genuinely the vast, vast, vast majority of them - you’re always going to get one or two that are not - but they’re there to help people sort themselves out. They go through their CVs with them.

“For example he’s told he can’t do anything, he has to do it all online. That’s simply not true. They can do all of that on paper and they would have helped them through this.

“This idea that everybody is out to crunch you I think has really hurt a lot of Job Centre staff. They don’t see themselves as that.”

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Presenter Nick Robinson said many benefit claimants live in fear of sanctions, which dramatically increased under Mr Duncan Smith’s regime at the Department of Work and Pensions.

A report published yesterday showed benefit sanctions are driving families to rely on foodbanks.

Mr Duncan Smith presided over the introduction of tough new rules in 2012, which drastically increased the length and severity of benefit sanctions.

Under his new rules, the maximum length of sanctions went up from six months to more than three years.

But Mr Duncan Smith said the number of people sanctioned was "very, very small. Less than 1% of people on Employment and Support Allowance ever gets sanctioned, and only about 5% of anybody on Universal Credit or Jobseekers Allowance.”

In the 12 months before Mr Duncan Smith resigned in March, 526,641 benefit sanctions were applied, according to DWP statistics.

Mr Duncan Smith insisted: “That number has fallen - and the reason is, and this is the thing that he didn’t like in the film, which is the ‘contract’ as it where, which sets out what you do - it actually sets out how it works.

“And actually Job Centre staff don’t immediately sanction. They warn people that if they do something this is going to cause a problem. So there’s a lot more leeway than is ever presented in that film.”

While the DWP say sanctions are only used as a last resort, jobseekers can lose their benefits for four weeks, even for a minor first offence.