Increase of 32k people on disability allowance ‘very disturbing’

An increase of 32,000 people going onto disability allowance over the past five years has been described as “very disturbing” by the Disability Federation of Ireland (DFI), which also says the high number of applications rejected is “very disheartening”.

New Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection figures provided to the Irish Examiner show that, last year, 29,491 disability allowance claims were decided, of which 12,022 applications were disallowed — just over 40%.

However, of the 4,256 disability allowance appeals decided on by the Social Welfare Appeals Office last year, just under 70% were allowed, with just 28% of the original rejections upheld.