A cancer victim is "frightened" funding, which allows him to live an independent life, will not be ring-fenced when it is transferred to local authority control. 

The Independent Living Fund (IFL), sponsored by the Department for Work and Pensions, delivers financial support to disabled people so they can choose to live in the communities, rather than in residential care. 

A Freedom of Information request submitted on website What Do They Know has revealed Waltham Forest council will not ring-fence the ILF as of June 30.    

Under welfare reforms, spearheaded by secretary of state for work and pensions, Iian Duncan Smith, the fund has been closed to new recipients since 2010.

The council has been allocated a budget of £1.148m from the total ILF budget of £330m.

There are currently 87 residents who receive the ILF in Waltham Forest, including Gabriel Pepper, 43, of Boundary Road, Walthamstow. 

Mr Pepper, who suffers from Astrocytomas - a type of brain tumour, has been a wheelchair user since 1996 and recipient of the ILF since 1999.

He said: "Other councils have managed to ring-fence the ILF, so why not Waltham Forest?

"The ILF gives me a life, it guarantees access to society. It is an integral part of living a dignified life.

"A lot of people in my position are worried about their future.

"I am concerned and frightened, but I will do what I have always done and fight for the ILF." 

Cabinet member for adult services, councillor Angie Bean said the council is "committed" to ensuring vulnerable residents live independent lives, but refused to answer why the fund is not being protected in future budgets. 

She said: "The government made the decision to stop the ILF scheme, and on 30 June 2015, the funding will be transferred to local authorities across the country and the ILF will cease.

"However, this does not change the fact that local authorities continue to have a duty of care to vulnerable residents in need of support.

"Waltham Forest Council is committed to ensuring its residents have access to the support services they require to live as healthy, happy and independent lives as possible.

"While no local authority has been directed by government to ring-fence ILF funding, everyone who received the ILF in Waltham Forest is being assessed to make sure they have an appropriate, council-funded care plan to meet their assessed needs in place when the scheme stops this month."

Disability rights campaigner Mary Laver, 67, a former RAF servicewoman, travelled down from her Newcastle home to Mr Duncan Smith's constituency office in Chingford in April to warn against the abolition of the ILF. 

Campaigners told the Guardian changes to the ILF will only result in more people ending up in residential care.