Welfare reforms will leave ‘gaping chasm’ with 600,000 at risk of losing out

Think tanks have warned that someone who does not have a long-term disability will not necessarily qualify for PIP.

A radical change in welfare reform which could see a million people on benefits required to work and 600,000 lose hundreds of pounds a month has been described as a “purpose-built gaping chasm” in the system for disabled people (Mark Harvey/Alamy/PA)

A radical change in welfare reform which could see a million people on benefits required to work and 600,000 lose hundreds of pounds a month has been described as a “purpose-built gaping chasm” in the system for disabled people.

Analysis presented a day after the Government announced its planned overhaul of the benefits system warned the measures risk either “runaway spending” or sick, low-income people “losing out”.

The reforms, dubbed by the Government as shifting the focus on to what people can do rather than what they cannot, involve the scrapping of the work capability assessment (WCA), leaving only the personal independence payment (PIP).