Our response to UK Government’s proposed changes to health and disability benefits

We know that meaningful employment is important for establishing a sense of purpose and routine in our lives, promoting good physical and mental wellbeing, and in enabling financial security to live well. This is true for anyone, but it is especially true for neurodivergent and disabled people.

Whilst the UK Government’s ambition to support un-/under-employed people into appropriate work is needed, this cannot be achieved through changes to health and disability benefits.

Though the replacement of Personal Independence Payment (PIP) with Adult Disability Payment in Scotland will limit the effects of some of the proposed changes, we are concerned that the consequence of change in England and Wales will be significantly reduced budgets in Scotland, under existing funding frameworks.

These needless changes to the UK’s social ‘safety net’ will, if implemented, be built on the backs of the most vulnerable in society, including neurodivergent people and families. We know that neurodivergent people are disproportionately more likely to experience (often severe and enduring) mental ill-health, something that will only be exacerbated by the precarity this announcement has introduced. Speculative narratives, including from government, that projected rises in spending on social security stem from a growth in awards based on misdiagnoses of mental ill-health are reckless and unevidenced.

Governments in all four corners of the UK must redouble their efforts to invest in people, not lambast claimants and cut support where and when it is needed most.

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Read our response to the Scottish Government’s Review of ADP here, where we explored many of the themes neurodivergent people tell us are important to them when accessing social security.