Mr phoned Welfare Rights this morning. They've been with us since June, when we stumbled across them whilst looking for support for Mr's ESA claim. They invited us in and talked through our finances and benefits claims; and since then have phoned us occasionally to see how things are going for us. Despite being a government organisation, they have felt the most concerned for our welfare.
Over the phone, they were able to give Mr advice on his medical this week, just grounding him in how to approach it, really.
Mr asked about a representative for my DLA tribunal... We can go in nearer the time and have some help preparing, but there is no longer funding to provide a representative to tribunals. And this is where the funding cuts hit the poor and disabled first.
The only suggestion given was to go to the Citizen's Advice Bureau. Sadly, this just isn't an option for us. Aside from the fact that appointments at our local CAB are gold dust (the only time we went, we booked an appointment, but only got in the door because someone had forgotten to lock it, and were then forced to sit there for 3 hours), the quality of the service is... dare I say it... unacceptable? Please don't shout at me, I am fully aware it's volunteer based, and I am sure there are many caring, knowledgable and supportive volunteers... I just haven't met one yet.
We first used a CAB for Mr's ESA tribunal (for his first claim - he's claimed twice now), and the lady we had there barely believed he was ill, and instead of basing the tribunal argument on his serious health conditions, she was encouraging him to lie about being suicidal or having uncontrollable anger. We were not prepared to lie, his health says it all, and thanks to her we lost the tribunal.
We went to a CAB again when we moved in together (which is when we snuck in through the unlocked door...!) and wanted to know what we were entitled to. They informed us that because I was on Incapactiy Benefit we couldn't get any other income related help. We lived off £106 a week for over a year, until Welfare Rights came on the scene, and informed us we were entitled to an Income Support top up, bringing our income to a point that we can actually survive. (We managed to get 3 months back payment after some strongly worded letters about the CAB, but we still lost a year's worth of Income Support, and we lost our savings, since we had to use them to survive.)
And so, thanks to funding cuts, we shall be making our health worse, to fight for DLA, which is about to be revamped and probably taken away from us anyway, just so we have a little bit of money left over when we've paid all the bills.
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