Grieving daughter hands mother's ashes to benefits inspector to prove she isn't fit to work

A distressed daughter presented her mother’s ashes as evidence to a doctor who was sent round by benefits inspectors to assess if the dead woman was fit to work.

Louise Broxton received benefits for a host of neurological problems and died from lung cancer at the age of 47 in August.

Her daughter Hatti Broxton, said she informed authorities straight away that her mother had died, which meant all her benefits were cancelled.

But seven months later the Department for Work and Pensions sent a doctor to the door of her home in Wolverhampton, West Midlands, to see if she was still able to work.

The 27-year-old prison administrator said she was “upset and angry” about the situation.

“It’s our government that has done this to us,” she said.

"I’m only 27 and my brother has just turned 17. We’ve been through enough already and we don’t need this.

“I told the DWP afterwards I’d love to live in the world that the DWP live in, the one where my mum’s still alive. But she’s been gone for seven months.

"When mum passed away August last year, and everyone was notified.

“I got an acknowledgement from the DWP themselves to say that mum had died.

“They stopped paying her benefits and paid the arrears they owed her into my account because I am her next of kin.

“But on February 28 we got a letter addressed to mum saying they were going to do a home visit on March 13 to assess her disabilities for ESA.

“I was furious about it so I decided not to phone them about the mistake.

“Instead I waited to see if they would actually have the balls to do the home visit.

“I booked the day of work and stayed at home to wait for someone to come. My cousin came round to support me.

“The letter stated they’d be coming between 11am and 2pm band they would contact to book an appointment.

“Obviously they haven’t been able to contact Mum because her phone has been cut off. They had my details as next of kin but they didn’t contact me.”

When the doctor knocked on the door at 1pm, she invited him inside.

Seeing her cousin sat on the sofa, the doctor asked if she was Louise.

Ms Broxton said: “My cousin replied, ‘No, I’m not,’ and I said, ‘Hang on a minute.’

“Then I went behind the sofa to the unit where mum is, picked up her urn, turned around, and said ‘This is Louise Broxton and you’ve come to assess her?’

“He was completely mortified, as you would be. He apologised and offered his condolences.

“I told him, ‘I’m not doing this to embarrass you, but the letter and having you on my door today, that’s twice the DWP have missed something.’”

She said she asked the doctor to leave her house and told his bosses about what had happened.

Ms Broxton believes the DWP missed a number of opportunities to avert the mistake and said she hoped that policies were tightened so no one else had to go through the same situation.

“It’s not the case that my mum died a couple of weeks ago. Then a crossover would be understandable and I would accept their apology," she said.

“After the doctor left, within 10 minutes the DWP rang. The lady apologised and offered her condolences, but after admitting their mistake she tried to leave it at that.

“That’s not good enough. I want policies in place and procedures to be followed. I don’t want anyone else to be in my situation.”

A DWP spokesperson said: “We’ve apologised to Ms Broxton for the distress caused by the administrative error.”

Additional reporting by Caters