PIP process made mum Dawn feel ‘lowest of low’
A MOTHER-OF-THREE with multiple sclerosis says she was made to feel ‘the lowest of the low’ when fighting to get her disability benefits reinstated.
Dawn Lancaster, 50, who lives in the Buxton Road area of Macclesfield, was diagnosed with MS in 1995 and received Disability Living Allowance (DLA) after having to stop work.
She was given a lifetime award of the higher rate mobility component and middle rate care.
But in May 2017, Dawn faced a reassessment to be moved onto the new benefit, Personal Independence Payment (PIP). This resulted in her support being cut to the lower mobility rate and no care component.
She appealed this decision and won when, in December, a tribunal reinstated the benefit to what she was originally entitled to.
Dawn said: “Going through this made me feel the lowest of the low. I felt so guilty for having an illness through no fault of my own.
“The stress of appealing put me in a right state, the fatigue and depression paralysed me.
“I think PIP would be a much fairer system if the assessors understood how unpredictable MS is.
“You can look fine one day, then the next you’re so ill you can’t leave your bed.”
Dawn’s plight comes as new analysis by the MS Society says the vast majority of people with the condition who appeal their PIP decision after moving from the old benefit go on to win.
The MS Society says the government has unnecessarily spent almost £1m of taxpayers’ money on this process.
Recent figures show that in the past five years, independent tribunals ruled in favour of 83 per cent of people with MS who disputed DWP decisions.
Genevieve Edwards, director of external affairs at the MS Society, said: “We are consistently hearing from people with MS about how distressing it is to lose support and then spend months fighting to get it back.”
In response to the MS Society’s claims, a DWP spokesman said: “We’re committed to ensuring that disabled people get the full support that they need and, under PIP, 52 per cent of people with MS receive the highest possible award, compared with 39 per cent under the previous benefit DLA.
“We work closely with organisations such as the MS Society to ensure that PIP is working in the best way possible.”