On 8 July 2026, a major review concluded that England and Wales's disability payment system is broken and needs a complete redesign. The system, called Personal Independence Payment or PIP, gives money to people with long-term illnesses or disabilities to help cover the extra costs they face. But the way it decides who gets the money—a points-based test—doesn't work anymore.

Here's the problem. The system awards points based on what someone can do on the day of their assessment. But many conditions change dramatically from week to week. Someone with depression might be able to cook and clean one week and unable to get out of bed the next. The points system can't capture that. It was built for a different world, when fewer people claimed benefits and their conditions were more predictable. The review, led by disability minister Stephen Timms, found that this approach is "in effect worthless."

The government asked for this review after backing down from planned welfare cuts in 2025. MPs had threatened to vote against those cuts, and the government gave in. The review started officially in June 2025. It is the first thorough examination of PIP since the system began, a point the Department for Work and Pensions highlighted when it appointed disability experts to lead the work in February GOV.UK.

Who did the review and how

The review had two main leaders and a steering group of 12 people, all of whom have disabilities or long-term health conditions themselves. Disabled people and disability charities were involved throughout the process. The review asked for public comments over 10 weeks and received more than 38,000 submissions. Most people described bad experiences with how the system assessed them. Progress updates came out in April and June 2026 GOV.UK.

But there is a catch. The steering group was told it could not recommend changes that would cost more money than the current system. Yet its job is to fix a system that experts say is unfair and actually stops people from looking for work. This creates a real tension—the group must redesign a broken system without a bigger budget. The full recommendations come in autumn 2026 GOV.UK.

The interim findings also show that the assessment process itself discourages disabled people from working. This matters because another big reform is happening at the same time. The government plans to scrap the Work Capability Assessment—an earlier test used to decide who gets benefits—but has paused that work to wait for the PIP review's results UK Parliament. The two reforms are now linked. One cannot move forward until the other is finished.

The numbers

PIP goes to anyone with a long-term physical or mental health condition. You don't need to be poor or working to qualify. Around 4 million people now receive it—that's twice as many as in 2019. About one in six recipients has a job. The sharp rise in claims is what prompted the government to try cutting PIP in 2025. The review's finding that the system itself is faulty shifts the conversation. The growth is not about people lying or being lazy. It is about how the system sorts people.

In July 2025, MPs warned that new benefits claimants could slip into poverty under the proposed changes UK Parliament Committees. More recently, when the government was asked about whether type 1 diabetics should automatically qualify, it pointed to this review as the place where fairness would be sorted out UK Parliament Petitions—in other words, it delayed a specific answer until the bigger review is done.

The Department for Work and Pensions would not comment on the interim findings when contacted by the media. The government will say what it thinks when the full report comes out in autumn.

What happens next

The review faces a real puzzle. It must fix a system it has called broken, but cannot spend more money to do so. The steering group must figure out whether a new or reformed assessment method can satisfy disabled people, stay within budget, and survive in Parliament. Last year's attempt to cut PIP only just failed—it came very close. There is not much room to make changes without MPs rebelling again. The autumn recommendations will show whether any solution is actually possible.