The DWP have no idea how many disabled people will be made homeless by the Green Paper proposals, the Disability News Service (DNS) has learnt. This is in spite of growing evidence that the effects could be catastrophic.
DNS made a number of Freedom of Information (FOI) requests after reading supported housing consultant Joe Halewood’s blog posts about the benefit cap.
The benefit cap limits the amount of benefits working-age claimants can receive, but claimants in receipt of PIP or the limited capability for work-related activity (LCWRA) element of universal credit (UC) are exempt from the cap.
Halewood has pointed out that loss of PIP will also lead to the loss of thousands of pounds more in annual income for many claimants who become subject to the benefits cap, especially those with higher housing costs in places like London. This will inevitably result in some disabled claimants becoming homeless.
However, in response to DNS’ requests, the DWP revealed that it did not have any figures on how many current claimants would become subject to the benefit cap because of the Green Paper cuts. Without this information, it cannot make any judgement on the effects on homelessness amongst claimants who lose PIP and/or UC LCWRA.
Nor could it provide any documents that showed that the issue had been discussed with ministers.
This comes at a time when homelessness amongst disabled households in England is already rising.
Analysis by Crisis shows that more than 60,000 disabled households in England faced homelessness last year, an increase of nearly 75% since 2019.
And only today, St Mungos issued an open letter on behalf of the homelessness sector urging the government to rethink the welfare reforms.
Thirteen organisations signed the letter, warning that cutting vital benefits will push more people into poverty and destitution, and make it harder for those already affected by homelessness to rebuild their lives.
The letter points out that between October to December 2024, just over a fifth (21%) of households facing homelessness had some sort of physical ill health or disability.
The government are asking MPs to vote on changes to the benefits system without having carried out even a rudimentary assessment of what effect the changes will have on homelessness amongst disabled households.
It is another reason for MPs to refuse to back these reforms until all the data they need to make an informed decision has been made available to them.
