Ministers are facing calls to abandon the “cruel and nonsensical” fines levied on tens of thousands of unpaid carers for unwittingly breaching earnings rules by just a few pounds a week. The Centre for Social Justice (CSJ), a centre-right thinktank, said the government should end the “persecution” of carers and accept that it was to blame for allowing overpayments to run up to huge sums, in some cases more than £20,000.That's like saying we won't prosecute burglars if the homeowner has failed to apply all the locks on their back door.
The DWP should be able to identify when a carer’s earnings have exceeded the £151-a-week limit and notify them, but in many cases the government fails to do so, meaning people unwittingly rack up huge debts.We all appreciate that rules are sometimes byzantine and complicated to follow (eh, Ange?), but let's not forget just who's money this is in the first place. It's the taxpayer's.
The former justice secretary Robert Buckland told the Guardian that the DWP “shouldn’t be treating these carers as criminals”, adding: “It’s utterly repugnant and wrong.” He said: “They need to accept they’ve made a mistake and accept the money is gone. Take it on the chin. The carers are going to be under immense pressure already and it’s not their fault. At the very least they [the DWP] could claw the money back over a long period of time so the carers aren’t put into immediate crisis. But it’s the DWP’s mistake so they should cover the lost money.”
And how would they do that, since any money they have is also our's?
5 comments:
I know, let's instead reduce the pay of DWP staff (at all levels) until the overpayments are recovered. That will both absolve the recipients stress of the need to repay and encourage the DWP staff to take more care in the future. No?
I agree with all that you say Julia but also have some sympathy for the carers. In my case I took early retirement to care for my mother for seven years. Her carer's allowance did not cover the two hours a day attendance to dress and wash her morning and evening. My allowance was a mere pittance meaning that I had to to dig deep into my savings. If the allowances were more realistic, perhaps variable according to circumstances, and if tax breaks could also be tailored things might be better for the carers. Of course that will increase administration work and costs. In short whatever system is in place some good people will be left to struggle and some others will be free to cheat.
"The Centre for Social Justice (CSJ), a centre-right thinktank"
Centre right? The name says 'far left' to me
also? It IS our money.
"I know, let's instead reduce the pay of DWP staff (at all levels) until the overpayments are recovered. "
I like that plan!
"I agree with all that you say Julia but also have some sympathy for the carers."
I was a carer myself for a time before getting my mother into the care home, and I well remember the reams of paperwork, and the insabe and often incompetent bureacracy that went with it, such as the DWP writing to me because I 'hadn't provided the name and address of the care home'. The care home to which they'd actually sent one of their officers to intebview her.
"Centre right? The name says 'far left' to me"
Anything with 'social justice' (as if such a thing is real!) in the title will be stuffed so full of soft-headed lefties it'd be like a Lib Dem conference!
"also? It IS our money."
Indeed!
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