Good News and Bad News

For the past eight weeks, we have been waiting for The Brown Envelope to hit the mat sealing Hubby’s fate following his assessment a couple of months ago.

In truth, we received a letter a fortnight or so ago saying they had all the information they needed to make a decision. More waiting, but at least the payment still went in.

It came today. Finally we knew what we were up against and could plan.

The good news is that he hasn’t lost it.
The bad news is he’s only allowed part of it.
The good news is that’s for his mobility issues and enough to keep the car on the road.
The bad news is it is only a third of what he was getting.
This means we will lose £40 per week / £2000 a year.
The good news is that this is valid until July 2025
The bad news is that we can’t appeal because the larger part of payment is for day to day living like breathing, washing and dressing himself, making himself understood, understanding other people, knows what’s going on around him, can manage his own medication, can plan a journey and follow a route (note: no consideration for length of journey and discomfort thereon), in fact everything listed are things he can do with the minimum of assistance, so according to TPTB, he does not need the enhanced payment.

I’ve run the figures, and Hubby has checked the Government guidelines for poverty.

The average household income is £35,000 (plus a few extra £££s).
If you are below 60% of that, you’re in poverty, so that equates to an income of less than £21,000.
If you are 40% to 50% below the average (£14,000 to £17500) you are in severe poverty, and if you are below that, you are in abject poverty.
So where does that put us?
We are currently in the severe poverty bracket thanks to our works pensions and another benefit as Hubby can’t work. Take that away, and we will be in abject poverty with less than £10,000 income between us.

I’ve worked the spreadsheets all ways, and with just our works pensions and this generous £23 a week mobility allowance, we will struggle should any unforeseen expense come to light, such as vets or car repairs (we’ve had to fork out £500 this month for those, so I’m glad we had a good month last month and hardly spent anything!).

The bad news is that because I did everything by the book during my working life, saved for a rainy day and have a pension fund, we will get NOTHING from the state to help us pay our bills.
But there is some good news!
Hubby gets his state pension in 2021, I get mine in 2022, the latter of which replaces NOTHING and will be gravy to our beans on toast budget and notch us into the poverty bracket (hurrah, promotion!).
Bad news: you watch some bastard in power move the goal posts for retirement age again.