Suffolk Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC)
10,000 cuts and counting
A day of protest at the Job Centre and ATOS Assessment Centre, St Felix House, Silent Street, Ipswich, IP1 1TF
Tuesday 5th November 2013, 11.30am – 1pm
Suffolk DPAC is demonstrating today to highlight the deaths of 10,000 sick and disabled people who died during and after taking the Work Capability Assessments carried out by ATOS and the Department for Work and Pensions.
The Assessment is degrading and sets up people to fail – even when they have serious illnesses and major disabilities and it results in people having their benefit stopped. Most succeed when they challenge the findings but this can take many months and people’s health is damaged by the experience.
The government is trying to turn the clock back to Victorian times by encouraging inaccurate and offensive attitudes towards disabled people. Labelling us as scroungers while doing nothing to address the real problems like the lack of proper jobs, high housing costs and the reluctance of employers to employ people with a disability.
The Work Capability Assessment is just one of many attacks on people on benefit and which are causing hardship and misery.
We demand the Coalition Government:
· Scraps the Work Capability Assessment
· Scraps the wasteful and punitive Work Programme which also pays millions to private companies.
· Stops unpaid work for benefit claimants – if work needs doing, people should be paid for doing it. Unpaid work takes away work from workers and undermines wages.
· Stops unjustified, deliberate sanctioning of benefit claimants.
· Stops further cuts in benefits.
· Benefit claimants did not cause the financial crisis or the public spending deficit.
“The moral test of government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in the shadows of life, the sick, the needy and the handicapped”.Hubert H Humphrey . Former US Vice President.
Contact : dpacsuffolk@yahoo.com or suffolkpeoplesassembly@runbox.com
