For immediate release:

LOCAL RESIDENTS COULD BE FACING ‘DESTITUTION’ DUE TO DWP SANCTION CLAWBACKS

The Tory government’s benefit sanctions may be forcing tens of hundreds of families across Rutherglen and Cambuslang into destitution, the local MSP has warned, after figures revealed the amount clawed back by the DWP through sanctions.

The figures, obtained by the SNP’s Chris Stephens MP, show that in August 2022 alone the DWP took £2.3 million off claimants in Scotland at an average of £250 per sanctioned household.

In the Rutherglen and Hamilton West constituency, £60,000 was taken from benefits claimants with an average reduction of £261. The Rutherglen Westminster constituency is the joint- fifth worst impacted in Scotland of total funds clawed back.

The figures mean that roughly 230 people across Rutherglen and Cambuslang’s Westminster constituency are seeing some of their benefits taken back from them.

Commenting, Ms Haughey said:

“We have known since they were introduced that the punitive benefit sanctions regime is causing hardship and pushing people into poverty, debt, destitution and towards foodbanks and emergency aid.

“These staggering figures show the devastating impact of the Tory government’s sanctions regime on local people, particularly in the midst of soaring energy bills and spiralling inflations which is already eating away at people’s hard-earned cash.

“In Scotland we’ve taken a much different, more progressive approach, opposing Westminster austerity and implementing our game-changing the Scottish Child Payment.

“The sad reality is though that these efforts to cut poverty is ever-undermined while we remain attached to the broken Westminster system and at the mercy of the callous Conservative Party.”

ENDS