PIP literally saved my life. Now I fear Labour’s benefit cuts will take it all away

Without personal independence payment (PIP), Mike might not be here. “It saved my life,” he tells Big Issue. “It literally saved my life.”

The father-of-four relies on the benefit to pay for the therapy that keeps his depression, anxiety and suicidal ideation at bay.

But under government’s disability payment reforms, he fears he will become ineligible for it – one of hundreds of thousands to have their support withdrawn or cut.

Read more:

• ‘Dangerous’ DWP needs ‘deep-rooted change’ to stop benefit claimants from dying, damning report finds
• Here’s how to make your voice heard against the DWP’s disability benefit cuts
• Revealed: The areas set to be hit hardest by Labour’s PIP benefit cuts

“I’m not sure what’s going to happen,” he said. “it’s been very stressful. To be honest, I think it’s wildly unsympathetic. I can’t conceive of why the Labour government are doing it, other than trying to appease some of the cruellest people in the country.”

Proposed by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) in March, the benefit reforms would both narrow eligibility criteria and reduce payments for PIP and the health component of universal credit.

The cuts could have a devastating effect, research released last week shows – particularly on people already struggling with their mental health.

The Money and Mental Health Policy Institute – the charity founded and chaired by Martin Lewis – surveyed 223 people with mental ill-health.

A staggering 97% said that the changes would make their conditions worse. Of those who use PIP to fund therapy, counselling or personal care, 82% said they would reduce or stop this support altogether if they lost the benefit.

Mike currently uses PIP to pay for the private talking therapies that “saved his life”. He was once a successful retail manager – but during the pandemic, his mental health nose-dived.

Dealing with abuse from shoppers, breaking up fights over facemasks, managing social distancing: the job had some “really bad bits”. Mike was even assaulted by a shoplifter.

“My mental health degraded to a point where, like, literally on the commute to work, I didn’t want to go to work, so the answer was to just drive my car into another car and kill myself,” he recalls.

“I’ve got four kids, you know, my wife’s amazing. I’ve got a lovely family life. There’s literally no reason for me to end my life – I have so much good stuff. And it was this: I had this battle in my head going off between, like, ending my life, and my family.”

The Leicester local knew he had to quit his assistant store manager role. But financially, it left the family in a very difficult situation.

“We went from a situation where I was the main bill payer for the house, I was the sole money earner for the house. I was on about £40,000 a year. That went to nothing overnight,” he says.

The family started going to food banks, borrowed money, and applied for PIP. Mike received it – just. It was a “close award”, he says – because “the whole process is designed around physical disabilities rather than mental”.

“It was quite hard to sit and figure out what to put on the form,” he says. “Because, like, if you’ve got a broken leg, yeah, it’s easy to say, ‘I’ve got a broken leg so I can’t walk.’ But if you put, ‘I’ve got depression, so I don’t want to walk.’ Well, that doesn’t really work because, well, just walk. It’s just a choice, yeah? But it’s not that easy. The depression was that bad that I could barely get from my bed to my sofa.”

“My wife was trying to explain to the case worker: ‘It’s not a case of being lazy. He wants to do stuff, but he can’t. His brain is broken.’”

Mike’s depression worsened and his NHS-sponsored cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) was “ineffective”. The waiting list for talking therapies – a different type of more open-ended counselling – ranges from a few months to over a year, depending on where you live. Mike didn’t know if he could take it that long.

“I waited for about eight months or nine months for talking therapy [on the NHS] and I got to a point where I just said to my wife, ‘I can’t live like this anymore. I can’t live like this anymore. I’m so ill all the time.’”

They were awarded PIP, and Mike’s wife found a private counsellor who would take him on at a reduced rate. The sessions “saved his life”.

“I want it to be a positive story of what PIP can do,” he said. “PIP changed everything. But now, I don’t know.”

The government has framed the cost-cutting proposals as part of a “back to work” drive. But this could backfire, the survey released last week suggests. Roughly 20% of survey respondents receiving PIP are currently employed. Of that group, 63% said they would have to reduce their hours or quit altogether if they lost the benefit. Some said their mental health would deteriorate without financial support; others said they could no longer afford transport to work.

Mike echoes this. Two years on from the worst of his crisis, and he is doing much better. He’s started a small business as a commissions painter for Warhammer models, a creative outlet that helps him generate income for his family. But without the therapy that PIP pays for, Mike fears spiralling again.

“It’s very easy to sort of sit and say that people on PIP are lazy and don’t want to do things, but a vast majority of people want to do stuff in their life,” he says.

“I want to continue doing stuff, and PIP has been a big part of that. So I don’t know what’s going to happen.”

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