Home > News > Statement On UK Government Cuts to Disability Benefits

20 March 2025   |    News

Statement On UK Government Cuts to Disability Benefits

We stand with Scottish Disabled People’s Organisations Inclusion Scotland and Glasgow Disability Alliance in their criticism of the UK Government’s decision to slash benefits for disabled people, including significant cuts to who will be eligible for Personal Independence Payment (PIP).

Inclusion Scotland have a post on their website explaining some of the impacts these cuts will have on disabled people, which you can read here.

“These cuts will push disabled people further into the ‘trap’ of long-term poverty. The current situation for disabled people is stark; after years of austerity ‘welfare reforms’, COVID-19, and the cost-of-living crisis – all of which disproportionately impacted disabled people – these controversial cuts mark a new era of cruel political choices which directly and negatively impact disabled people.”

While disabled people in Scotland are able to claim Adult Disability Payment as an alternative to PIP,  it is uncertain how these cuts from Westminster will impact Scotland:

“The Fraser of Allander economists have suggested a potential £94 million funding freeze for Scotland because of these cuts, with devolved benefits such as Adult Disability Payment and Scottish Child Payment coming under budget scrutiny. While this is still speculative and depends on how the Scottish government decides to respond, what is clear is that these controversial cuts are both morally and economically indefensible and will only serve to cause hardship and fear.”

We are encouraged to see that the Scottish Government’s Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice has criticised the cuts, but she has also noted the impact they may have on Scottish budgeting.

Being able to access social security is not a privilege – it is an internationally recognised human right. It’s essential for those who need it to be able to access the support they are entitled to in order to live a life of dignity. The cuts announced by the UK Government come only weeks after the United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights reviewed the UK’s human rights performance, and made recommendations to the UK to increase the budget allocated to social security and to ensure that PIP adequately covers additional disability related costs in line with the human rights model of disability.

The choice to enact these benefit cuts not only fails to comply with the UK’s international human rights obligations, but it also breaches the individual rights of disabled people.

We know from our experience and research that many people in the LGBTQIA+ community are also disabled, and that the intersection of these identities can complicate claiming benefits and getting appropriate support. In our recent Scottish Trans and Non-binary Experiences Research Report, 67% of our 571 respondents considered themselves disabled, with 45% of those currently claiming benefits and only a third (34%) never having claimed benefits at all.

LGBTQIA+ disabled people face a wide range of barriers to accessing benefits, both interpersonal and systemic, as do the wider disabled community, especially those with other intersecting marginalised identities. It is clear to anyone who works with disabled communities that much more needs to be done to improve the benefits systems we already have, and that further cuts to already broken systems will have devastating and long-lasting impacts on some of the most vulnerable people in our society.

As Inclusion Scotland says:

“The UK Government must ensure that disabled people are not forgotten and take urgent steps to protect disabled people from the worst impacts of these cuts. They must also move to decrease, rather than increase, the stigma around disabled people, benefits, and employment.”

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