Work
and pensions ministers are facing acute embarrassment after losing
their main excuse for refusing to assess the overall impact of their
welfare cuts and reforms on disabled people.
Ministers
have repeatedly insisted that such a cumulative impact assessment (CIA)
would be too difficult and the results would be meaningless.
To
defend their position, they repeatedly claimed that this view was
shared by the “authoritative” Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS).
But
this week – in a humiliating reversal for the Department for Work and
Pensions (DWP) – IFS published research which included just such an
analysis, which looked at the impact of 35 benefit and tax changes on
disabled people.
It was included in an updated IFS report on the “distributional effects“ of the UK government’s tax and welfare reforms in Wales since the coalition came to power in 2010.
Once
the package of reforms has been rolled out – including the delayed move
from disability living allowance to personal independence payment
(PIP), and the much-delayed universal credit – the report calculates
that working-age households in Wales with someone eligible to claim
disability benefits will see a loss of nearly £34 a week (or 6.5 per
cent of net income).
This compares to an average of nearly £10 a week (1.5 per cent of net income) among other working-age households.
