Posted on July 10, 2025

As a country, we pride ourselves on compassion and a commitment to supporting those in need.

Yet recent rhetoric around welfare reform paints a deeply troubling picture—one that portrays disabled people as burdens and scapegoats for rising costs.

This narrative is not only deeply offensive, but also a calculated distraction from the real financial mismanagement taking place within the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).

It’s time to challenge this unacceptable blame game and demand genuine accountability.

The Stigmatising Language: An Attack on Disabled People

Just this week, Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch made comments that were, frankly, outrageous. In a speech on 10th July 2025, she criticised the Motability scheme, claiming:

“People are getting taxpayer-funded cars for having constipation.”

She further suggested that “food intolerances” and “ADHD and obesity” should not warrant support, and alleged that “90 per cent of its cars now have no adaptations whatsoever.”

Let’s be absolutely clear: these statements are demonstrably false and amount to a direct attack on disabled individuals.

The Motability Scheme is not about ‘free cars.’
It allows eligible disabled people to exchange the mobility component of their Personal Independence Payment (PIP)—a benefit awarded based on significant mobility challenges—for a leased vehicle. It’s a way to use their existing entitlement, not a giveaway.

PIP eligibility is based on impact, not diagnosis.

No one receives PIP simply for constipation or food intolerances. The assessment looks at how a condition or combination of conditions affects daily functioning over time—often involving complex and life-limiting symptoms.

“No adaptations” misses the mark.

A vehicle itself can be the adaptation. For individuals with invisible disabilities, mental health conditions, or fluctuating symptoms, a reliable car is essential for independence, accessing healthcare, employment, and participating in society.

Such rhetoric fuels harmful stereotypes, fosters resentment, and undermines the purpose of a welfare system designed to safeguard those in need.

A recent survey by Sense, a national disability charity, found that two in five disabled people feel demonised by government rhetoric, and over a third feel less valued by society. This isn’t just poor language—it creates fear and distress within vulnerable communities.

The Elephant in the Room: DWP’s Unaudited Accounts and Billions Lost

While disabled people’s lives are subjected to intense scrutiny, a far more troubling scandal continues almost unchallenged: the DWP’s longstanding failure to get its own accounts signed off.

For an astonishing 24 years running (and 35 years for certain aspects), the National Audit Office (NAO) has issued qualified opinions on DWP accounts—a damning indictment of chronic financial mismanagement.

The cost of this failure is eye-watering:

In the financial year ending 2025, £9.5 billion in benefits was overpaid due to fraud and error:

• £6.5 billion due to fraud
• £1.9 billion from claimant error
• £1 billion due to official DWP mistakes

Additionally, £1.2 billion in benefits was underpaid, leaving vulnerable individuals short of the support they were entitled to.

These figures far outweigh the supposed “savings” of proposed benefit cuts. Notably, the fraud rate for PIP—a common target of reform—is just 0.2%. Yet disability benefits continue to be unfairly portrayed as riddled with abuse.

A Deliberate Distraction

This strategy is all too familiar: politicians deflect attention from internal failings by stigmatising benefit claimants, especially disabled people.

The focus on “scroungers” or “fraudsters” distracts from:

• The DWP’s inability to manage its finances effectively
• Outdated and inefficient IT systems
• Complex, error-prone assessment processes
• The human cost of an impersonal and punitive bureaucracy

This is not about tackling fraud. It’s about scapegoating and masking institutional negligence. Millions suffer while billions are lost—not because of disabled people, but because of governmental inertia and broken systems.

It’s Time for Action

We must stand together and demand change. The combination of inflammatory rhetoric and long-term financial mismanagement is unacceptable—and it deserves public outcry.

What You Can Do

• Write to Your MP
  Express your concerns clearly. Reference NAO findings and challenge misleading political statements. Demand reform that addresses internal DWP failings, not cuts that target the vulnerable.
• Support Disability Charities
  Organisations like Disability Rights UK, Scope, Sense and the Trussell Trust are fighting for change. Share their work, support their campaigns, and amplify their voices.
• Raise Awareness
  Share this blog and other credible sources. Help combat misinformation with facts, empathy, and context.
• Engage with the Media
  Contact newspapers and journalists. Demand scrutiny of DWP’s decades-long accounting failures and highlight the real cost to society.

Our welfare system should be a source of security, not shame.

It must reflect our values—fairness, dignity, and compassion—not political convenience.

Let’s demand a DWP that serves everyone responsibly, transparently, and humanely.

The cost of silence is simply too high.