Had a bad fright collecting my prescription today. The pharmacy told me my benefit - ESA income support - is no more and has been replaced by universal credit.
But I'm not entitled to universal credit, because I have more than £16,000 in savings. Which sounds like a lot of money, but my rent alone is £15,000 a year, and it looks like I'm not gonna be well enough to work for a really long time, if ever.
At the moment, I get about £12,000 a year from PIP and ESA. The ESA is roughly half that. If it goes away I start hemorrhaging money a LOT faster.
After I looked it up. The pharmacy is half right. ESA income support is a 'legacy' benefit. It is being replaced by UC. They will write to me at some point about migrating over, but because I am not eligible for UC I won't be.
I can apply for something called a 'transitional benefit', but I'm not clear that I'll get it.
As far as the pharmacy is concerned, my benefit has been transferred over. But the future...
I get that having savings at all makes me better off than most.
But I'm not going to be able to work when the money runs out. And there's no one else to support me and Garlic. I will have to move to somewhere smaller.
And I have lived in the smaller places you have to live in when you can't afford anything better. I don't know if I can do it again. Especially not sick.
When the government says they are doing this to 'help people back into work', know that that is a lie.
They are doing it to drain every last penny out of disabled people and then let us die.
OK, Visible says I have been in my exertion zone for over an hour now because of this bullshit.
Write to your MPs. Buy something from my Redbubble shop, maybe.
Ro Smith is an independent artist creating amazing designs for great products such as t-shirts, stickers, posters, and phone cases.
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