Personal Independence Payments from the Department of Work and Pensions still offer cash to people struggling with daily life and the amounts paid out will increase slightly from April to £843 a month, following another percentage increase for inflation.

The DWP has a list of 13 requirements it uses in assessments to work out whether someone with a chronic health condition, either mental or physical, is in need of cash payments to help them meet the needs of daily life. Rather than paying out by default for any one health condition – be it epilepsy, Parkinson’s or Motor Neurone Disease – the DWP uses a list of ‘13 daily tasks’ against which it measures a claimant’s need for Personal Independence Payments (PIP).

The benefit sees those successfully claiming given up to £184 a week from two payment parts, comprising a daily living rate and a mobility rate, either of which can be standard level or enhanced.

The criteria the DWP uses are as follows:

Daily living part

You might get daily living payments from PIP if you need help with:

The criteria the DWP uses are as follows:

You might get daily living payments from PIP if you need help with:

• preparing food
• eating and drinking
• managing your medicines or treatments
• washing and bathing
• using the toilet
• dressing and undressing
• reading
• managing your money
• socialising and being around other people
• talking, listening and understanding

Mobility part
You might get the mobility part of PIP if you need help with:

From April, the standard rate for daily living will be £76.70 per week, up from £73.90 per week, while the enhanced rate will be £114.60 per week, up from £110.40 per week.

The standard rate for mobility will be rasied from £29.20 per week to £30.30.

And the enhanced rate for mobility will be increased from £77.05 per week to £80.00 a week.

That means someone claiming the higher rate of both elements can get £194.60 per week, which is £10,119.20 per year, or £843.26 per month, from April.

Those with less than 12 months to live will automatically be eligible for the daily living part of the benefit.

Those in Scotland will need to apply for Adult Disability Payment (ADP) rather than PIP.

Proposed changes to PIP from the government could change assessments to make it harder to qualify, in a bid to push more people into working or looking for work.