UN urges UK government to scrap welfare cuts over human rights concerns
UN sounds alarm over Labour’s benefit cuts
- UN human rights experts have urged the UK government to scrap planned changes to disability benefits, warning they risk breaching the country's human rights obligations.
- The experts say that the reforms are motivated by fiscal considerations and negative perceptions of claimants, rather than genuinely supporting disabled people into work.
- Upcoming changes from April will see the health-related element of Universal Credit (UC health) nearly halved for new claimants and frozen for four years, which experts deem discriminatory.
- They expressed dismay at government officials using language that stigmatises benefit claimants, citing official statistics showing fraud in PIP and Universal Credit is “near non-existent”.
- The UN advisers recommend withdrawing the welfare reforms until comprehensive assessments, developed in full consultation with disabled people, have been conducted.