(UK) How much are disabled people who can't work expected to live on?

Saz94

Saz94

Senior Member (Voting Rights)
Hi, I need some numbers for a blog post that im writing about injustice towards disabled people. Need an idea of how much disabled people who can't work are typically expected to live on. I'm struggling to sift through all the information on the internet. I found the ESA amount, but I think people get housing benefit as well as that?

Personal examples are also welcome - feel free to drop me a private message if you don't want to share publicly.

Of course, I will also mention the fact that many disabled people are denied benefits because they are falsely judged as "fit for work".
 
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Universal credit: https://www.gov.uk/universal-credit/what-youll-get

And then for housing benefit (which is paid on top of the universal credit amount), or on top of ESA, it’s capped depending on where you live, as well as other circumstances (second bedroom etc):
https://www.gov.uk/housing-benefit/what-youll-get
https://www.gov.uk/housing-benefit/what-youll-get

For example in London, you’d be very very lucky to find a property that comes under the housing cap for rent. Social housing is cheaper so that often does come under the housing cap so is paid in full.
 
For example, I just put in Brent (Inner north London), and 2 bedroom property , it’s coming out with £365.92 per week as the housing benefit rate. But doing a quick google search of average rents in Brent, for a 2 bedroom property rent is £2,012 pcm and rents for a flat are around £1800 pcm..
 
Thanks but unfortunately I can't sift through all the information in those links, it's too much to process. I need people to just give me numbers, please. (For living on as well as for housing - preferably a number covering both!)
 
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Oh ok.. they change the amounts quite a lot depending on if you have savings, if you have a “spare” bedroom, where you live, if you’re in a couple.. if they assess you as disabled.. infact they make it as complicated as possible so it’s hard to just get one number.

I’ll just take it for a single person over 25 then, not in a couple, no savings (or savings under £6000),
£409.89 universal credit

then if you’re disabled/ill, you add on either £341.92 (if they assess you have limited capability for work and looking for work), or you add on £128.25 if it’s just limited capability for work but you can still look for work

Then If you’re severely disabled you get an extra 162.92 a month on top of that.

So it depends on your circumstances.. so we could say the minimum here is £409.89 a month. That’s if they assess you and say you don’t have any disabilities or illnesses.

then you add on housing which completely varies according to where you live, as well as spare bedrooms, and so on. I really don’t know how to figure out housing unless you type in a postcode. An example for Brent is above, that’s the housing cap - ie max they’ll give you for your housing. Let’s say the person lived in Brent, in a 2 bedroom place, with someone else who wasn’t working..they would get £350ish a week so £1500 a month.

So this person would get £409 + £1585 =£1994 per month in benefits; which includes housing.

Edit: this is for universal credit
 
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@Sarah94 It is considerable more complicated than that - sorry.


I'm on ESA, there is a newer benefits system which @lunarainbows is describing above, as mentioned below the main decider as to which people get put on it both geographical and temporal, with some people, in some area's, in some situations, being put on UC, and other people, in other areas, or more 'complex' cases, being on ESA.

The rules for both ESA and UC vary, as do the amounts paid.

For ESA - If they accept that you are disabled, and are unable to look for work (not the same thing) then you get one rate - around £73 per week, as living expenses, to cover everything other than rent and maybe whatever they call rates these days.

Unless you have claimed continuously for more than about the last 5 years, in which case you get a bit more (about an extra £25, without checking the current figures)

Then, if you are considered not just not able to look for work, but also not able to do anything which could move you in that direction, as it would be dangerous to your health to do so - they give you about an extra £15 a week on top - but only if you have had a continued claim for about the last 15 years.

I have been in the support group for at least 8 years, probably longer, and prior to that I was on incapacity benefit for about 20 years - so I get £128.45 per week - living expenses.

My rent is also paid, £84 a week for a one bed flat and I don't pay rates - in most areas I would have to pay at least part of them.

So for someone who is so like me that they are me the amount I may receive is anywhere between £158 and £224 per week, for everything, with the only variable being when my claim was started.

That's just the start of the system, there are many other benefits, some of which a passported (you can only get them if you get something else)

It is not as simple as £x per week.
 
Total figures can be misleading though because as you can see the London figures and perhaps in other cities, the amount of benefits comes out high because of the housing costs. But what people don’t see is that housing rents in London are absolutely ridiculous, and the housing benefit amount they give is too little anyway and you most likely need to top up quite a bit of your own money unless it’s social housing.. so even if someone is getting like £1900 a month in inner London, which is what makes the headlines or in tv programmes, they’re only actually getting a small amount of that to actually live on!
 
I only know about 'old-style' ESA, I haven't any experience with UC or the new style ESA.

Basic for single adult aged over 25: £74.35
Support group: £39.20
Enhanced disability premium*: £17.10
Severe disability premium**: £66.95

Plus housing and council tax benefits. As @lunarainbows says, there are problems with housing benefit – especially in the southeast – but in other parts of the country it will often cover all or most of the rent on a small property. Those who're below pension credit age and living in social housing are subject to the bedroom tax, though, unless they're in very specific circumstances. My HB covers all my rent, but the bedroom tax is about £15 per week.

Council tax benefit varies by local authority, but many people are expected to make some kind of contribution. I just pay £25 a month for 10 months of the year, which is pretty reasonable. I could potentially get a further reduction because I live in a disabled-adapted house, but don't want to pursue it because my bill is affordable.

* Paid to those in support group or receiving PIP/DLA daily living component at higher rate
** Paid to those receiving PIP daily living component
 
I get approximately £113 a week ESA. The exact rates are on the gov.uk website. It's absolutely not enough to live on. I have to combine income from a number of sources (PIP, ESA, student finance, savings, husband's income, discounts such as disabled travel cards etc. to get by).
 
When I was a single parent with 2 children and moderate-severe M.E., I lived on about £160 a week after rent. This was the amount of income support at the time and included my child benefit. Their father paid no child support. It was not enough to live on - both my daughter's got part time jobs from the age of 14 (newspaper rounds, waitressing etc.) despite being on scholarships to a private school. Fortunately my eldest sister has no children of her own and would buy the girls clothes and treated them to other things - I don't know how I would have managed without this support. She also paid all their school related costs for me until they went to the state sixth form college at 16. At the time there was the Educational Maintenance Allowance for post-16 educational support, which gave them £30 a week each throughout their time at sixth form. I don't think they would have studied 'A' levels if they hadn't had this additional financial support (which is no longer given). They also both got Saturdays jobs from 16-18, and both worked part time during their university terms and throughout their holidays.

When I tried to work part time in a term time only job, I was no better off on Working Tax Credits as it actually costs money to work (clothes, transport etc.). Additionally, this made me very ill, I was on sick leave every few weeks and had to give up and apply for ESA.

For 2 years I lived on the basic rate of the WRAG ESA, which was about £100 a week at the time (this was after rent and council tax but before water rates, electricity, heating oil, car insurance etc.). I just about managed until they brought in the bedroom tax, which was £20 a week at the time. This forced me to apply for PIP (at the same time I appealed the bedroom tax). Then I got put in the support group for ESA, received the additional disability premiums for ESA and the enhanced mobility and care rates of PIP, so my income trebled.

However, I've not pursued social care, because I would have to pay a large proportion of my ESA and PIP income towards it, and it's just not worth it.
 
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Kitty said:
* Paid to those in support group or receiving PIP/DLA daily living component at higher rate
** Paid to those receiving PIP daily living component
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I'm sure *you know this Kitty, but just for the sake of the thread... The disability premiums are paid only to those with savings of less than £16,000. These premiums are what they call 'income related' benefits - ie means tested.
ESA itself can be either Income Related Or Contribution Based... the latter being paid solely based on the person's NI contributions in the 2 yrs previous to the start of the claim, & therefore not means tested. ie you paid your full contributions prior to becoming ill & therefore are entitled to ESA on that basis alone (assuming you qualify).
 
JemPD said:
The disability premiums are paid only to those with savings of less than £16,000.
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Yes, of course, they're all means tested – but few single people who've lived on benefits for any length of time have enough savings even to be affected by the lower floor (£6k) of the capital rules.

Even if you do, it can sometimes be ignored if you need to use it for specific purposes. On paper, I had £12k of income from selling my old house, but I was moving into a new-build with bare concrete floors and no kitchen appliances, blinds, etc. It cost nearly £9k to pay the sale and removal costs, and to set up the new house. I sent in a list of what I'd had to pay, along with the bank statements showing the transactions, and they accepted all of it.
 
adambeyoncelowe said:
How much do they need? Living wage plus £500, which is the average extra cost of being disabled.

What we get is much, much lower.
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Yes, this is why I have to use my PIP to fund my food, supplements, expensive shampoo/soap/cleaning products for my sensitivities, additional heating needs and basic household costs (and my mobility allowance for running my own car) rather than use it for 'care' or paying a cleaner etc. I can't afford to run both a car and have an electric wheelchair, there just isn't enough spare after my other weekly costs.

All your disability income gets taken into account when assessing your contribution to social care, but not any income from employment. But if you're too ill to work, then being allowed to keep all your earned income is not going to make your quality of life any better. The income you are allowed to keep is the basic rate of income support plus 25% (they use Income Support rates, rather than ESA rates), plus any mobility allowance. I think they also allow you to keep about £28 a week if you are on enhanced rate PIP care or high rate DLA care and are not asking for overnight social care support from the council (this is supposed to cover your costs to do this privately or through friends or family). Any other income is considered as available to pay for your social care.

Edit: The social care contributions is for England only - the devolved countries have different rules and eligibility criteria.
 
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There is a big difference in being 'disabled and unable to work' and 'disabled and able to work' (even if only part-time) because the government has set benefits and social care contributions to 'incentivise work'. This has left many of the most sick and chronically ill disabled claimants in absolute poverty, unless they have additional household income, such as from a partner, parent or adult 'non-dependent'. The circa £60 a week severe disability premium that is added to old style ESA for those single people without a carer living with them, is no longer offered under Universal Credit. Additionally, even under the old system, this premium was only added once the DLA or PIP claim had been approved. So many disabled people who lost their DLA when they were transferred to PIP (many didn't qualify for PIP despite being on 'lifetime' DLA awards) also lost their additional disability premiums from their ESA.
 
MerryB said:
I get approximately £113 a week ESA. The exact rates are on the gov.uk website. It's absolutely not enough to live on. I have to combine income from a number of sources (PIP, ESA, student finance, savings, husband's income, discounts such as disabled travel cards etc. to get by).
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Thanks for your response. Does that £113 a week include your housing benefit or is that separate?
 
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