Well done to Reform UK for proposing to make chunky, £50 billion cuts to the welfare budget, more than twice the £23 billion cuts the Conservative have pledged to make. The left will scream about kicking away the crutches of the poor and sick, but the benefits system has become a voracious beast that is rapidly consuming the country. The bill has risen by 27 per cent in real terms since 2014/15.

Try to reform welfare without touching the state pension and you are tying one arm behind your back

Try to reform welfare without touching the state pension and you are tying one arm behind your back

We have opportunists claiming Personal Independence Payments for anxiety and food intolerances, and people hoodwinking officials who carry out online Work Capability Assessments into allowing them a public-funded life of leisure. Robert Jenrick is quite right to force long-term benefit claimants to turn up and do some work in return for their benefits. When John Major tried the same in a pilot scheme in the 1990s nearly half the claimants........

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