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5,000 people died before being repaid over benefits error
Guardian reporting that:
Five thousand people died before they could be reimbursed for a government error that left chronically ill and disabled benefit claimants thousands of pounds out of pocket, it has emerged.
Approximately 70,000 claimants were originally estimated to have been underpaid about £340m between 2011 and 2014, after being transferred from older benefits on to the employment and support allowance (ESA) during a government overhaul of incapacity benefits.
But figures released on Thursday, which showed 5,000 ill and disabled people died before receiving the money they were owed, were described as a “national scandal” by Marsha de Cordova, the Labour MP and disability rights campaigner.