breaking news - govt drop removal of mobility allowance for care home residents

11/29/2011 09:49:00 am BenefitScroungingScum 2 Comments

disability news roundup by john pring - week ending nov 25th

11/29/2011 09:30:00 am BenefitScroungingScum 0 Comments

• The government appears to have left out any mention of the brutal cuts to disabled people’s benefits and services in a crucial report about how it is implementing the United Nations disability convention.
• Disability organisations have welcomed the second annual review of the government’s much-criticised “fitness for work” test, but have warned that progress on improving the assessment has been too slow.
• A disabled activist with one of the country’s leading self-advocacy organisations has spoken of her pride in taking her council to court over its decision to remove their funding.
• At least three disabled people’s organisations plan to submit evidence to a major inquiry to draw its attention to how some newspapers are stirring up hostility towards disabled people.
• The radical disabled people’s network DAN has warned the government to expect an imminent return to the kind of high-profile, non-violent, direct action protests last seen in the 1990s.
• Disabled activists have linked the conviction of a man who called his disabled neighbour a “benefit scrounger” to hostile stories and comments that have come from the media and the government.
• Organisers of a conference aimed at addressing disability poverty made it too difficult for disabled people experiencing poverty themselves to attend the event, it has been claimed.
• A government minister and executives from the company that carries out “fitness for work” tests on disabled people have faced angry criticism from campaigners at a national conference on disability poverty.
• A government-backed report is set to make it harder for disabled people to claim out-of-work disability benefits, while potentially delivering another lucrative assessment contract to the private sector. 
• A legal loophole is depriving hundreds of thousands of older people who receive care in their own homes of protection under the Human Rights Act, according to the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
• Campaigners have criticised the government for launching a new housing strategy without including any measures aimed at easing the shortage of accessible housing for disabled people.

The Benefits Scandal - Soundings

11/25/2011 08:10:00 am BenefitScroungingScum 3 Comments

50 years post Beveridge much work remains to tackle the giant of ignorance

11/22/2011 12:19:00 pm BenefitScroungingScum 3 Comments

The Hardest Hit Christmas Card Campaign

11/22/2011 11:34:00 am BenefitScroungingScum 3 Comments

Dear All

The Welfare Reform Bill is making its way through the final stages in
Parliament. The next month provides us with our last real opportunity as
a sector to influence the bill and we need to make our next action BIG
and LOUD. 

 

A giant Christmas card has been organised by the Hardest Hit campaign
group (DBC (Disability Benefits Consortium). The famous cartoonist and
illustrator, Gerald Scarfe, is illustrating the card. We have 2 weeks
(deadline 6 December) to gather 10,000 signatures before the card is
presented to the Government in early December. Please cascade this
action out to all volunteer campaigners, members forum representatives
and local societies. We are asking each contact we have to gather 10
signatures each to help us reach our target of 10,000 signatures by the
beginning of December.

The action is timed for WRB reaching Report Stage in the House of Lords
and aims to increase political pressure on the Government by
demonstrating mass concern over how disabled people will be affected by
proposals within the Welfare Reform Bill, particularly the time-limit on
ESA and PIP proposals. 

We look forward to seeing the signatures flooding in and will stay in
touch to report on progress. Text of the action follows:

"Dear David Cameron and Nick Clegg,

While we don't expect gifts this Christmas, we do want our basic rights
protected and the support to enable us to live independently and with
dignity.
Please make the New Year something disabled people can look forward to
by:
*Not bringing in an arbitrary time-limit on Employment and Support
Allowance for those who've paid into the system and still need support.
*Making sure that those who rely on Disability Living Allowance continue
to receive the financial support they need through Personal Independence
Payment"

This is the link to the online action:
http://www.e-activist.com/ea-action/widget?widgetId=752 

 

Please do ask each of your contacts to promote this action to ten of
their friends/ contacts each. Those signing the card can also leave a
short comment if they wish in the card. 

Disability News Round Up By John Pring - Week Beginning 21/11/2011

11/22/2011 08:34:00 am BenefitScroungingScum 0 Comments

• New evidence suggests that an insurance giant that could make huge financial gains from government reform of incapacity benefit played a much larger part in influencing those reforms than it previously admitted.
• A cabinet minister has been heavily criticised after again appearing to encourage national newspapers to run stories attacking disabled benefit claimants.
• The government has finally admitted that large numbers of confidential medical questionnaires – submitted by disabled people as part of their benefit claims – are being opened by Royal Mail staff.
• The government has agreed to reconsider a key aspect of its disability living allowance reforms, after disabled peers said the measure could cause serious financial hardship to people who have just become disabled.
• A disabled peer has failed to persuade the government to postpone the re-assessment of existing disability living allowance claimants until it has piloted the new testing regime.
• Government plans to reform disability living allowance and cut spending by 20 per cent will deny help to many disabled people least able to access alternative support, a disabled peer has told the House of Lords.
• The government has agreed to reconsider plans to completely change the name of a key disability benefit, after it heard the new name would be confusing, misleading and could add to hostility towards disabled people.
• The decision by the government to give the go-ahead for the first three special schools to be set up under its “free schools” programme has caused anger and dismay among campaigners for inclusive education.
• The latest of a series of horrific murders of disabled people has shown the urgent need for research into what motivates the men and women who commit such hate crimes, campaigners believe.
• A new report has highlighted the missed opportunities and failures of local agencies in the lead-up to the “truly abhorrent” hate crime murder of a young disabled woman.
• A disabled people’s organisation has failed in its first attempt to challenge the government in the high court over its sweeping cuts to legal aid.
• Two disabled men have won a high court case that challenged a local authority’s cuts to their support.

The scrounging immigrant drug addict also known as Pete.

11/18/2011 09:42:00 am BenefitScroungingScum 5 Comments

Pictured, a bottle of oramorph solution with the oral syringe adaptor removed from the neck in the foreground of the photo. With pincers up (they were down when the adaptor was in the bottle) in a 'died happy' posture there is a very obviously dead earwig/unidentifiable pincery insect.

Charley Says 'Why We Need A Welfare State' - Charley's March Of Time 1948

11/17/2011 03:10:00 pm BenefitScroungingScum 2 Comments

Disability News Round Up By John Pring - Week Beginning 14/11/2011

11/15/2011 10:14:00 am BenefitScroungingScum 2 Comments

Disability News Round Up By John Pring - Week Beginning 07/11/2011

11/08/2011 06:26:00 pm BenefitScroungingScum 1 Comments

• A report into one of the most controversial of the government’s planned welfare reforms has been given a cool reception by leading disabled people’s organisations.
• Outraged campaigners have attacked the BBC for screening an “offensive” documentary about the benefits system.
• The life of Helen Keller, disability hate crime and the history of the Disabled People’s Direct Action Network are among the subjects that will be discussed and debated during the second UK Disability History Month.
• A disabled activist is threatening to take legal action against the House of Commons after he and other wheelchair-users were refused entry to a debate on accessible transport.
• A sudden government move to cut the length of time benefit claimants have to fill in a lengthy medical questionnaire will make it harder for them to obtain the support they need, say campaigners.
• The Department for Work and Pensions has rewritten rules that were making it harder for disabled people to use a key employment support scheme to find and keep work.
• A disabled businessman was pulled off a tube carriage in his wheelchair and told the underground network was “not accessible to wheelchair-users”, just minutes after being helped onto the carriage by station staff.
• Disabled activists have welcomed a campaigning breakthrough after the government agreed to correct a major disparity in the sentencing of disability hate crime murders.
• A police force has been criticised by an independent watchdog for ignoring two phone calls expressing serious concerns about the health of a disabled man, who was later found dead.
• Campaigners have called for politicians to show their support for inclusive education, to mark the 30^th anniversary of a key piece of legislation.
• Scores of disabled activists have come together to plan the next stage of the fight against the government’s cuts to disability benefits and services.
• A new book exposes how society’s obsession with the idea of “normality” and “perfection” has led to discrimination, hostility, and the isolation and segregation of disabled people.

Tackling disability poverty: the role of skills, independent living, employment and welfare reform

11/04/2011 09:22:00 am BenefitScroungingScum 1 Comments

Tackling disability poverty: the role of skills, independent living, employment and welfare reform

• Liz Sayce, Chief Executive, Radar and author of the Sayce Review
• Maria Miller MP, Minister for Disabled People
• Neil Crowther, former Director of Disability at the Equality and Human Rights Commission
• Chris Benson, the Equality Act and you (tbc)
• Kaliya Franklin: what it means to me; a disabled person’s perspective

• DWP Work Programme lead
• DWP Head of Communications
• DWP Personal Independence Payment (PIP) lead
• BIS Skills and Disabled People lead (tbc)

1. Is the WCA improving? (Atos and DWP)
2. PIP assessment (Scope, DWP and Disability Alliance)
3. Employment and skills opportunities (Liz Sayce, Andrea Lewis)
4. Work: how to get there; localism, social care and commissioning (NCIL)

More information

• order form
• venue map

Disability News Round Up By John Pring - Week Beginning 31/10/2011

11/01/2011 10:18:00 am BenefitScroungingScum 2 Comments

• Disabled activists have ridiculed a union’s claims that its members have been unfairly criticised for the way they test disabled people’s “fitness for work”.
• Government figures have revealed alarming new evidence of a slump in the number of disabled people granted funds to make their workplaces more accessible.
• Two disabled people have lost their high court challenge over a council’s decision to slash spending on social care services.
• The number of disability benefits claimants found “fit for work” by the government has fallen sharply over the last two years, according to new figures.
• Researchers are seeking volunteers to take part in a project that will trace how the educational experiences of disabled people have changed over the last 100 years.
• A disabled peer has challenged a minister over whether she is taking account of the views of disabled people in developing new policies.
• Trials of the assessment for the benefit that will replace disability living allowance (DLA) show the test is worryingly similar to the government’s discredited “fitness for work” assessment, say campaigners.
• Thousands of disabled people and other campaigners have taken part in a series of anti-cuts protests in more than a dozen towns and cities across the UK.