Labour ministers have resorted to online scam techniques to try to force their PIP and UC cuts through the Commons on Tuesday. And there’s a strong chance that their dubious promise to exempt current claimants from the cuts is, in reality, only a two year reprieve.
But its not too late to for you to try to stop them, as one MP has confirmed.
Blank cheque
Ordinarily MPs would know what they were agreeing to when a bill is presented for its first vote.
And if they do vote in favour, there is then a committee stage at which a group of MPs look at possible amendments, consult with experts - -such as disability groups in this case – before presenting amendments to be considered by the whole House.
This process usually takes weeks or, for a bill that will affect millions of people like this one, even months.
There is then a final vote on the amended bill, at what is called the third reading. But it’s incredibly rare for the government to lose at this stage – the last time it happened was 48 years ago
After the final vote, the bill goes to the Lords, to be carefully scrutinised again.
But in the case of Tuesday’s bill, MPs won’t actually know what they are voting for.
Because ministers have promised there will be amendments which will exempt all current claimants, but they probably won’t even have been published by Tuesday.
MPs will just have to trust ministers who say that what they are actually voting for – the 4 point rule applying to all claimants – is not what will really happen.
Chaotic few hours
And then, a week after Tuesday’s vote, the entire months long committee stage will be shrunk into a few chaotic hours in front of the whole house, voting on amendments they have barely seen and with no chance to get advice from experts.
And, what is more, the government have applied to have the bill certified as a money bill. If the Speaker agrees, then the Lords will have no power to change any of it. Even if they do try, it will automatically be passed without change after one month.
Online scammers
Isn’t this exactly how online scammers work?
Promise to save you from losing all your money as long as you hand over your account details immediately. Quickly, quickly. No time to talk to anyone, don’t hang up the phone, do it now or it will be too late. You’ll lose everything.
And yet, in reality even if the PIP cuts are put into law this month, they don’t actually take effect until November 2026. That’s sixteen months from now.
So, why can’t they be properly discussed and put into a separate piece of legislation next year?
Unless Labour have things to hide.
Labour’s dodgy promise
Labour’s promise to exempt all current claimants from the PIP and UC cuts may not be all it seems.
Kendall’s letter says that in relation to PIP, “The new eligibility requirements will be implemented from November 2026 for new claims only.”
But she says nothing about what happens in 2028, when disability minister Stephen Timms has finished rewriting the PIP eligibility criteria and the new rules are put into law.
Labour says the new PIP rules will be coproduced with disability organisations. But who honestly believes those groups will be given a veto on anything, especially with the government determined to cut costs?
So, if Timms decides that the four-point rule is a good one and should stay, then under the terms of Kendall’s letter, it will apply to current claimants from 2028.
Kendall also says “we will adjust the pathway of universal credit payment rates to make sure all existing recipients of the UC health element . . . have their incomes fully protected in real terms.”
But she doesn’t say what will happen in 2028, when the work capability assessment is abolished and only claimants with an award of PIP daily living component are eligible for the UC health element.
If current claimants are not exempt from this change as well, then 600,000 who don’t get PIP daily living will no longer have their income protected. And if the PIP four point rule is also incorporated in the new PIP assessment from 2028, then hundreds of thousands more current claimants who don’t get four points, will lose their health element when they lose their PIP.
Contacting your MP will make a difference
Now, none of this may be what ministers intend. But MPs voting on Tuesday won’t have a clue what they do intend, because the whole process has become a chaotic shambles – in spite of the fact it has the power to plunge hundreds of thousands of disabled people into poverty.
So, please consider contacting your MP and asking them to vote for a planned Labour amendment – which, ironically none of us has seen yet – which will give MPs more time to consider the cuts. And if that fails, then vote against the bill in its entirety.
You won’t be wasting your time. There are still rumoured to be 50 or 60 determined Labour rebels, with many more unsure what to do.
And, as one MP told the BBC yesterday,
"it shouldn't be underestimated the potential effect of a weekend of emails from constituents, constituency surgeries etc".
Let yours be one of them.
