00:00I don't know what disabled people have to do in order to be believed by the people that they voted for and that they put into government.
00:10Dartford's kindness community is normally a space that allows for disabled people in the town to find joy and community.
00:20But ahead of a vote on Labour's welfare reform bill on Tuesday, anger and anxiety are instead at the forefront.
00:30It is worrying about these reforms. Before them retracting a little bit, I would have lost my pip.
00:44You know, I voted for Labour and I've always voted for Labour to see that change and to be supported by a party that I believe in and I believe is for people like me.
00:54People who worked, people who have worked, but people who also cannot work through no fault of their own.
01:03Where is that support? Where is that care?
01:07The bill was intended to save the government billions of pounds and relieve stress on a creaking welfare system by making it harder for those with disabilities to claim benefits such as personal independence payments with hopes of encouraging more people back to work.
01:31But political opponents say those savings come at the cost of the most vulnerable.
01:39I mean, any one of us could become disabled at any moment in our lives and going forward, we need to ensure these future payments are protected for people.
01:47It's a lifeline. It's not it's not a luxury. It's people need these payments to get by.
01:51The controversial plans have been watered down with a rebellion of more than 120 Labour backbenchers, including two Kent MPs, convincing the government to protect personal independence payments for those who already received the benefit.
02:13And into the future, there will be a new system and that will mean that people will be assessed under that system and will hopefully get PIP if they qualify for it, but also get very significant support to get into work and increase their incomes, which is in the end how we keep people living a good quality of life with decent incomes.
02:35But for those trying to claim PIP in the future, the required assessments are expected to be much tougher.
02:44It's absolutely going to be a true system under these current proposals with the concessions that they've just made.
02:49This will mean like potentially people in the room today. We've had people that have got genetic issues in their family.
02:54So they could have one child who is then getting PIP and the other child despite exactly the same difficulties, the same challenges, the same diagnosis, the same prognosis.
03:03One child could get it, one child won't. How is that fair?
03:07There is still uncertainty about how many Labour MPs will support the bill.
03:13But with the number of those claiming PIP having doubled since the pandemic, the future for welfare is set to be hotly contested, no matter what.
