UK claimant wins right to legal challenge against DWP over disability benefits (UC)

[Indigophoton]

Background for those unfamiliar with the system: Universal Credit replaces half a dozen other benefits including means-tested ESA ('sickness benefit', intended to replace a wage for those too ill to work).

Disabled people who are considered sufficiently incapacitated, and who meet a couple of other conditions, currently get extra money (the Severe Disability Premium, and/or Enhanced Disability Premium). It's meant to help with the extra costs associated with being disabled.

Under UC that extra help is removed for all new claimants.

The government promised that no one currently getting SDP or EDP would lose out when transitioned to UC, but apparently a mere change of address is enough to count as a reason to withdraw the payments from the claimant.

A terminally ill man has won the right to launch a landmark legal challenge to the government over its introduction of universal credit after the controversial new benefits system left him significantly worse off.

The 52-year-old, known only as TP, a Cambridge graduate who once worked in the City, has non-Hodgkin lymphoma and the rare lymph node condition Castleman disease. Following a successful hearing last week, a full judicial review of his claim will take place next month, the first high court challenge of its kind.

The outcome could have consequences for thousands of other disabled people who claim that they are now experiencing financial hardship as a result of having had their benefits restricted under universal credit.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/feb/04/universal-credit-faces-judicial-review

Just when I think it can't get any more heartless, the government takes my breath away again. Let's hope this chap wins.