Thinktank issues warning over disability benefits

People living with disabilities such as multiple sclerosis could see their benefit payments cut over the next five years, it is claimed.

Leading thinktank Demos believes that the coalition government's new spending plans will see more than £9 billion less paid out to the 3.6 million registered disabled people and their carers by 2015.

Key to the plans is assessing whether people on Employment Support Allowance are "ready to work", and moving those that are onto Jobseeker's Allowance.

Reacting top the claims, the head of policy and campaigns at the Multiple Sclerosis Society, Laura Weir, said that the extent of these cuts is extremely worrying.

She went on: "The government has assured us that people who are too ill or disabled to work will continue to receive the support they need.

"However, we hear too often that people with multiple sclerosis are being wrongly classified."

Multiple sclerosis is the result of damage to myelin, a protective sheath that covers cells in the central nervous system.

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