Bedroom tax will waste £234MILLION of taxpayers' money if disabled tenants forced to move house

Taxpayers will see an estimated £234million wasted if the Bedroom Tax forces disabled tenants to move from special homes.

That is nearly HALF the £500million the Government hoped to save this year with the hated rules, the Sunday People reports.

Minister for Disabled People Esther McVey admitted: "We ­estimate around 35,000 claimants affected by removal of spare room subsidy live in significantly adapted accommodation."

An average of £6,700 has already been spent on making their homes suitable .

If they have to move to smaller properties even more cash will have to be spent adapting those.

Shadow Treasury ­minister Shabana Mahmood said: "This is more evidence of the cruelty and stupidity of the hated Bedroom Tax.

"First taxpayers pay to support disabled people to stay in their homes, then the Government tries to force them to move.

"People are seeing their lives ruined."

Households with a disabled person can apply for a disabled facilities grant - up to £30,000 in England and £36,000 in Wales - to widen doors, install ramps and stairlifts or improve access to bathrooms.

Ex-Welfare Reform minister Frank Field asked how many Bed Tax victims are in wheelchairs but Ms McVey did not know.

Mr Field said: "The Government is clueless about the impact of its Bedroom Tax on vulnerable people.

"It needs to wake up to the severe hardship and distress this is creating."

The Sunday People is fighting for the tax's abolition, which Labour has pledged to do if they win power next year.