It’s been five or six weeks since me, my stepmother, P, and my stepbrother, D, started the process of moving him from his old benefits on to universal credit, and I have a lot, and I mean a lot, of thoughts about this system, not all of them bad. D is severely mentally ill and – this is the not-bad bit – everyone at universal credit is incredibly helpful and understanding about who they’re dealing with. They respect his privacy and take the time to make sure P and I are authorised to help, while not erecting needless barriers around talking to us. They’ll sit on the phone listening to all three of us bicker, they’ll put up with P absolutely refusing to be known by her given name, even though that’s the one on all her bank accounts. They are nice.

The online forms are very plainly written, except for odd bits of language. There are stark........

© The Guardian