4 days ago
Terminally ill man proud of move to make access to benefits easier but says it is too late for him
A Jersey man says he is proud that new regulations have been passed by the States, allowing those with terminal illnesses to automatically qualify for the highest rate of personal care benefits.
However, he admits it has come too late to help him.
ITV News spoke to Wayne Lawson last December after he was made redundant just a week following his terminal cancer diagnosis.
At the time, he said he felt as though he had "fallen through the cracks of bureaucracy" as it took him seven weeks to receive any kind of income support from Social Services.
Despite making immediate applications for income support and impairment, it was almost two months before either claim was accepted.
Politicians have now unanimously approved an amendment put forward by the Social Security Minister, meaning those who have been assessed by a medical professional and are not expected to live more than 12 months can automatically access the highest level of personal care support available, worth £9,901 per year.
It also allows a family member, who is acting as a full-time carer, to claim Home Carers Allowance, which is £14,717 a year.
Previously, terminally ill islanders had to go through the standard process for claiming benefits.
Wayne has welcomed the move but says it came too late to remove the "panic" he faced trying to get much-needed support from Social Services.
He adds: "You need all your strength just to battle with the chemo. It gets that in your head where you think, 'I've got four months to live. I might as well do myself in now'.
"You're fighting the chemo, the illness. You could do without another fight.
"That could definitely push somebody over the edge."
Jersey's Social Security Minister, Deputy Lyndsay Feltham, says she brought forward the changes after becoming aware of individual cases like Wayne's.
She explains: "There were some cases that I was aware of where things seemed a bit more bureaucratic than they needed to be given a terminal diagnosis, so I did ask the team to look at ways that we could improve our processes."
When asked about what she would say to those, like Wayne, who had gone through significant stress and lost time trying to access financial support from Social Services, the minister adds: "We'll always work as hard as we possibly can to rectify things.
"I think it's really important that we look to how we can continually improve our processes and that's something I'm very keen to do as minister."
Tess Watson, a nurse who helps people with terminally ill family, says the law change could not come quickly enough.
She adds: "Like most of the things in our government, sadly, it's taken a long time to adapt.
"We ought to take on a new way of doing things to help the general public.
"Nobody really knows until they actually experience it themselves and at that moment where you experience it yourself, it's almost too late."
