How DLA works for children
Whether or not your child is entitled to DLA is decided on how much more help they need than other children of their age, because of their disability or illness.
This can be help that other children of their age don’t need (for example, if your 14 year old needs help with getting dressed). Or help that children of their age do need but your child needs more help or it takes much longer (for example, if it takes you 30 minutes to get your 5 year old to brush their teeth, or if you have to spend a long time getting a 10 year old to sleep).
Your child must have needed extra help for the past three months and be expected to need extra help for at least the next six months. If your child has only just developed these needs, you can claim but it would not be paid until the three months are over. If your child is terminally ill you can be paid without waiting three months.
Entitlement does not depend on their diagnosis and it doesn’t matter if they don’t yet have a diagnosis.
DLA has two components: the care component and the mobility component. You may get either or both.
Each component is paid at different rates.
What rate you get for mobility depends on their difficulty moving around or going out, compared to the needs of another child of a similar age.
What rate you get for care depends on what additional help a child needs with things like eating, washing, dressing, learning, communicating, doing fun things, or sleeping, and how often.
The DLA mobility component
DLA has a ‘mobility component’ that deals with ability to walk and go places.
To get the higher rate for mobility your child must:
- be at least 3 years of age, and
- be unable to walk or virtually unable to, or the exertion involved in walking would endanger their health, and this must have a physical cause, or
- have no feet, or
- be blind or severely visually impaired, or
- have a severe mental impairment and/or severe behavioural problems and also qualify for the highest rate of the care component. (The rules for this category are very specific. If you are thinking of challenging a decision because you think your child is entitled to higher rate mobility due to behavioural issues, we suggest you look at Contact’s guide Claiming DLA higher rate mobility).
To get the lower rate for mobility you child must:
- be over the age of 5, and
- need substantially more supervision or help to go out than other children their age. For example, your child may need to be prevented from running into the road (when other children their age are aware of road dangers). Or need extra prompting and encouragement to walk and keep walking. If a child can manage familiar journeys without help, they can still get the lower rate of mobility for trouble with unfamiliar journeys that another child their age would be able to manage.
The DLA care component
DLA also has a ‘care component’.
To get the highest rate for care, your child must meet the ‘daytime’ and ‘night-time’ conditions, or be terminally ill.
The daytime condition is that your child needs:
- substantially more practical help, encouragement or prompting with daily living tasks than another child of their age frequently throughout the day, or
- someone to supervise them throughout the day to keep them or other people safe.
The night-time condition is that your child needs:
- substantially more practical help, encouragement or prompting than another child for at least 20 minutes at night, or
- at least twice during the night, or
- someone to watch over them at night to keep them or other people safe.
To get the middle rate for care, they must meet either the daytime condition or the night-time condition.
To get the lowest rate for care, they must need substantially more practical help, encouragement or prompting than other children of their age for at least one hour or more (in one go or spread throughout the day).
To count as needing help at night, your child needs to require a lot more help than another child of their age at a time when the rest of the household would usually be asleep. For example, if you usually go to bed from 11pm-7am (or would usually if you were able to), it would only count as ‘night’ if it happens between 11pm-7am. If you would usually be up, it doesn’t count even though it is after the child’s bedtime. However, if you have to stay up later or get up earlier than you would otherwise because of your child’s needs, this counts as night-time.
What the DWP look at
If the child or young person can do any of the things below on their own but it takes them a very long time, causes them pain, or may put them (or somebody else) in danger, the law sees this as needing help so you should include it on your form.
Mobility
Do they have physical difficulties that affect their ability to walk places?
If they cannot walk even short distances without discomfort, or if they are very slow, explain this carefully as this could entitle them to the mobility component.
If they need help to walk around school for example, please explain what difficulty they have and what help they need.
If they are slower than their friends and need people to wait with or go slow, include that.
Do they need supervision, prompting or encouragement to walk places?
If they need more help than another child their age to go out and about, include that. This might be help to stay safe or encouragement, prompting, or calming.
If they ever need to be held back or restrained to keep them safe, over and above what another child their age needs, explain this. If they have ‘meltdowns’ when out in public, include examples of what happens.
Daily care
Next, look at the help they need in the home or at school or nursery. Do they need more physical help, prompting, encouragement, or supervision than others their age to:
- get up or go to bed?
- eat meals and snacks?
- keep themselves clean (this includes washing hands, brushing teeth, washing face, and having a bath or a shower)?
- go to the toilet?
- move about indoors?
- dress and undress (including selecting appropriate clothing)?
- take their medication or manage any therapy? (Medication is medicine prescribed to help your child. Therapy includes things such as nebulisers, feeding tubes, and breathing equipment as well as speech therapy, physical exercises, counselling, and behavioural therapy. Explain how often do they have to take it/do it and how long it takes to get them to do it properly?
- speak, hear, or read?
- keep themselves and others safe?
- have fun, take part in social activities, or enjoy hobbies? It doesn’t matter if they actually get this help, it is about what help they would need to do something reasonable, like go swimming or go to an after-school club.
- play and learn (including taking part in PE, art or music)?
Add up the amount of time the extra help with these tasks takes. If it adds up to more than an hour extra a day it would entitle you to (at least) the low rate of the care component. If it amounts to frequent help throughout the day (which means more than one hour per day in total) it would entitle you to at least the middle rate of the care component. To see if you are entitled to more than that, look at the help they need during the night.
During the night
Do they need more help than other children their age at night? This might be to stay in bed, go to the toilet, or calm down if they get upset.
Or it might be that they need supervision because of a health need or because there is a risk that they might get up and do something dangerous.
(Night-time is when you would otherwise be in bed. If they sleep in your bed because you cannot get them to stay in their bed for a reason connected to their disability, explain this, and what happens if you try to get them to stay in their bed.)
Do they need this for either at least 20 minutes at night or at least two times? If they do, you meet the night-time condition.
