It’s brilliant that Esther McVey has seen sense and the Department for Work and Pensions is to re-evaluate all 1.6 million claims for Personal Independence Payment.

It’s amazing that the Department is preparing to spend £3.7 billion putting right the wrong that the government deliberately inflicted on these people – even though it took a court ruling to make it happen.

But I have a question:

If the government is starting with claimants who have died – or had their benefits denied entirely, will the DWP take this opportunity to find out how many PIP claimants have died after being told they did not deserve the benefit?

Long-term readers will know it took me two years to get an answer from the DWP on the number of people claiming the other benefit for people with long-term illnesses or disabilities – variously IB, SDA and ESA.

That answer was miserably inadequate because the DWP does not monitor what happens to people who have been refused benefits.

They are simply left to fend for themselves – and This Site has run article after article detailing how many of them have died as a result.

Now, the DWP has to find out what has happened to everybody who has claimed PIP over the period since it decided to restrict payments. That means civil servants will know how many people have died and what proportion of all claimants they represent.

I want those numbers published for everybody to see.

We need to know how many people are dying because of Conservative government policy.

The DWP said no one will have to endure a fresh face-to-face disability assessment. Instead case managers will review people’s claims using existing information, and bump up their benefits if appropriate. Case managers will contact claimants or their GPs if they need to find out more. Priority will be given to claimants who have since died, and those who had their benefits denied entirely. Officials will then move on to those who were paid PIP but got less than they deserved.

Source: Tory government will reconsider 1.6MILLION people’s disability benefits after offering higher payments in huge U-turn – Mirror Online

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