Disability benefit cuts in Norfolk are set to make life ‘very difficult’

Norfolk County Council are proposing to reduce the Minimum Income Guarantee (MIG) as part of measures to save over £52m in the next financial year.

However, this news has come as quick a shock for various local residents. Campaign groups and families are attempting to reverse the decision.

The MIG is an amount of money people with a disability can earn before they have to start paying for their own care. As it stands, this amount for Norfolk County Council is set at £187 per week, but authorities are considering lowering this to £171.25 a week, to bring it in line with neighbouring authorities such as Suffolk, Essex, and Hertfordshire.

Speaking to the BBC, a couple, Ms Taylor, and her husband, who live in Buxton, Norfolk, said the decision ‘will cause social exclusion’. The pair are responsible for setting up the Disability Network Norfolk Group which represents people with a disability and their carers.

Ms Taylor said: ‘I do not think the public understand how people with disabilities have so much more to spend.

‘We all know what it felt like to be locked in during lockdown. Well, that is what is it going to be like for disabled people if this goes ahead.’

News of the local authority trying to lower the MIG is the second time the council have tried to do such a thing. In 2019 authorities proposed to lower the benefit rates, but in December 2020 a High Court judge ruled that the council had been discriminatory by making people contribute more for their own care.

‘Under its present circumstances with the cost of living and the way services have been cut, people are having to provide more and more for themselves,’ Mr Taylor said. ‘If the council is leaving them with less and less to do that with, then things are really difficult for some families and individuals out there.’

Image: Yomex Owo

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