A SCOTS MP will today urge the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) to lift the “baby benefit bar” and support parents of babies with terminal conditions.
Under-threes who have serious conditions are unable to access the full Disability Living Allowance (DLA) payment. The rule means families in this group miss out on the £58-a-week mobility component of the DLA.
However, around 3000 families in the UK, including 255 in Scotland, have children who will never reach their third birthday due to a range of life-limiting illnesses.
Charity Together for Short Lives says financial restrictions can prevent them fully enjoying their time together, with babies unable to leave home due to problems transporting ventilators and other issues.
The organisation says removing the age bar would mean minimal cost to the DWP, amounting to around £770,000 a year in Scotland.
Newly elected Glasgow East MP David Linden will today use one of the last sessions before Westminster’s summer recess to call on the DWP to end the “cruel anomaly”.
The SNP MP said: “There is nothing that can be said or done to remove the pain and distress for families of children with life-shortening conditions. What we are able to do is make life that little bit easier whilst their child is alive.
“This means giving the best possible support and ending the cruel anomaly which prevents children under the age of three from receiving the mobility component of DLA when it is something which is clearly essential.
“Children under three with life-shortening conditions often depend on ventilators and large equipment to stay alive.
“Some babies and young children have permanent wheelchairs and are not able to use buggies suitable for well children of the same age. These wheelchairs are heavy because of the equipment needed in order to secure them to a vehicle. Exclusion from the mobility component of DLA is just inherently unfair.”
Shaun Walsh, of the charity Together for Short Lives, said: “This is an important opportunity for the government to correct what we think has been an oversight in the application of the Disability Living Allowance.
“For the children we support, they can’t move from A to B without access to a specially adapted vehicle.
“They can’t leave the house safely. Changing this would open the world up to them and their families for the short time they have together.”
The DWP did not respond to calls.
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