One in ten people of working age in Britain are claiming a sickness or working disability of some kind.
That number, unbelievably, is rising by 100,000 people every single day.
Already, the bill for this is about £75 billion a year. It’s due to rise, by 2030, to about £100 billion a year.
Perhaps it’s not surprising the Chancellor and the Prime Minister are trying to cut some aspects of this.
This is going down incredibly badly by the Labour backbenches. It would appear around 136 Labour backbenchers right now are in full, open revolt.
When you take out those with ministerial positions, it’s nearly half the backbench Labour Party.
I wonder what will happen. There’s talk the Prime Minister has changed his diary.
He will try to ease rebel’s fears by speeding up payment of funds to help them back into work and review the policies to see the impact of them after a short period of time.
But I wonder if any of this is enough? It’s not even one year since Starmer was elected and he really has a major problem with the backbenches.
I suspect this is not just about these payments. I suspect it’s about Winter Fuel Allowance.
I suspect he has upset large parts of his party, and the public too.
