DWP’s ‘excruciating PIP assessment torture’ helped cause my son’s suicide, says disabled mum
A young disabled man took his own life, just weeks after the Department for Work and Pensions slashed his benefits, despite being warned he was severely depressed, malnourished, could not face leaving his flat, and had made several suicide attempts.
The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) had been told by his parents in January 2019 that Ker Featherstone had barely left his flat in two years, that he would often pass out when he stood up because of malnutrition, and even that his teeth had started to crumble.
The department was also told that his anxiety and depression were so severe that he could not cope with visits from his own brothers and sisters, and that he had not washed in nearly 18 months.
His disabled mother, Helen, spoke out publicly about her son’s death for the first time this week, inspired in part by the “amazing” efforts of Joy Dove.
Dove was in the high court last week to fight for a second inquest into the death of her disabled daughter, Jodey Whiting, who took her own life in 2017 after her benefits were removed.
Helen said she believed her son’s suicide, like that of Jodey Whiting, showed there were serious and “systemic” problems in DWP’s assessment system.
She told Disability News Service (DNS) this week how she and her husband had written to DWP in January 2019, after hearing how the department was reassessing their son for his personal independence payment (PIP).
In a detailed letter, they said their son rarely ate, that he had “lost so much weight that his clothes are falling off him”, and that he was “unable to prepare food for himself because he has no desire to eat and just can’t face cooking”.
They told DWP: “The anxiety and associated physical symptoms Ker suffers are so bad that he just isn’t able to go out or engage with anybody.
“He won’t even let his brothers and sisters visit him because it’s too difficult a prospect to face.”
Despite the letter, and the evidence from his previous benefit assessments, DWP forced Ker to undergo a PIP face-to-face assessment in April 2019, carried out by a healthcare professional from outsourcing company Atos.
The assessment in his flat in Salford left Ker “very distressed” and had a “significant impact” on his mental health.
Helen, who would deliver hot meals to her son’s flat every day, said: “The assessment was torture for Ker, who was so unwell that he’d barely left his flat in over two years.”
He told her that the assessment had made him feel worthless.
The subsequent assessor’s report, which the family have never seen, led to DWP cutting his PIP payments by about £90 a week.
The decision to reduce his daily living PIP payment from enhanced to standard, and to remove his mobility payment completely – even though he had been found eligible to be in the support group for out-of-work disability benefits – had left him “distraught”, said his mother.
She told DNS: “He felt that the PIP was a lifeline he relied on, and it was largely being taken from him.”
Just two weeks after the PIP decision, his parents discovered that Ker had been self-harming and had large, severely infected ulcers on his arms, chest and back.
He agreed to ask DWP to carry out a mandatory reconsideration of its decision, but when he was told that he might have to appeal the decision to a tribunal, he said: “Mum, I can’t do it. I can’t face that.”
With his mental health continuing to deteriorate, he agreed to be admitted voluntarily to a mental health ward at Salford Royal Hospital.
Nine days later, he was discharged and returned home. He took his own life the next day, on 29 June 2019. He was 21 years old.
Helen wrote to DWP, telling the department that she needed her concerns to be heard.
She wrote: “I’m angry with the DWP Personal Independence Payment system for not believing Ker, for not believing us, for making the distress he was experiencing all the more excruciating.”
She said: “How many more lives have to end before this government stops the torture of vulnerable individuals, punishing them for being unwell?
“I have no doubt whatsoever that Ker’s mental health and wellbeing suffered as a direct result of that visit from the healthcare assessor and the subsequent DWP decision.
“I have no doubt that this was a contributory factor in my son’s death.”
She added: “I need to know that the DWP acknowledge the impact these assessments and decisions have on individuals like my son Ker.”
In its reply, a DWP complaints manager told her: “I understand that both you and Ker were disappointed and distressed with the outcome of the recent award review.
“Unfortunately, as a Complaints Resolution Manager it is not open to me to comment on or interfere with decisions or the evidence that is used to make them.”
Helen described the letter as “lacking in any compassion”.
Just a few days later, DWP reversed its decision to cut Ker’s PIP payments, with an adviser telling his mother: “If we had known and realised how vulnerable he was, we would have been more careful.”
Helen said the adviser’s response had left her “upset and angry”.
DWP, she said, had been given all the information it needed to reach a proper conclusion in the January 2019 letter.
The family also say Ker was “badly let down” by the adult mental health team, which had turned down repeated referrals from his GP before he was admitted to hospital in the weeks before his death.
In January 2020, Helen’s statement to the inquest into her son’s death spoke of the impact of DWP’s actions on her son, but the coroner made no comment about those concerns, before ruling that Ker had taken his own life.
Her son, she said this week, had been a happy child, and was a “lovely, caring individual”, who began to experience significant anxiety and depression as a teenager, which worsened at 17 after the death of his sister, who drowned in the bath after an epileptic seizure, and, on the same day, the accidental death of a school friend.
Ker had been studying A-levels and wanted to be a doctor, and he volunteered with the British Heart Foundation.
But there were problems with his transfer from child and adolescent mental health services to adult services at the age of 18, and he was repeatedly refused further assessment, despite referrals from his GP.
He turned to alcohol at 19, and eventually became unable to leave the house on his own.
He would become breathless just moving around his flat, and would not allow anyone to clean his home, which quickly left the bathroom and kitchen unusable and dangerously unhygienic.
“He had such severe anxiety that he was even uncomfortable hearing his own voice,” said his mother.
A DWP spokesperson refused to say if the department would apologise to the family; if the department finally accepted that there were systemic problems with the disability benefits assessment system; if DWP accepted it needed to do more to safeguard claimants who are seen as vulnerable; and if it accepted that the cases of people like Ker showed DWP was not fit for purpose.
He also refused to say what safeguarding measures were taken in Ker’s case; and whether the department had carried out an internal process review into his death, as it should in all cases in which DWP is informed of the suicide of a benefit claimant.
But he said in a statement: “Our condolences are with Mr Featherstone’s family.
“We support millions of people a year and our priority is they get the support they are entitled to and receive a supportive and compassionate service.”
Atos was not able to respond to questions about Ker’s death as it said it had not received an email sent late on Monday by DNS.
Helen said this week that she believed there was a “systemic” problem within DWP – despite DWP’s claims to the contrary last week in the high court – and that the department and its assessment system needed dramatic reform.
She told DNS: “It’s not just individual errors being made. There has to be something more to it when there are so many deaths.”
She said she was inspired to speak out by the campaigning of Joy Dove, who she met through the Justice for Jodey Facebook page, and who last week was in the high court to seek a second inquest into her daughter’s death.
Helen said: “Although I wasn’t able to speak out earlier on, I feel the need to be able to express how it has affected us.
“I think Joy speaking out and everything she has done over the last two years has been amazing.”
She said she had reached the conclusion that DWP “just don’t care about people” and treat claimants “like numbers”.
She said: “They never seem to believe what people say.
“They can’t take people at face value, there’s always like an atmosphere of suspicion about it as if they just don’t believe that people need the kind of help that they say that they need.
“I want them to review how they assess people and to start treating people as human beings so that this kind of thing doesn’t happen to other families in the future.
“To the DWP, claimants are just a code on a computer but they are human beings and deserve to be treated with dignity and compassion.”
*The following organisations are among those that could be able to offer support if you have been affected by the issues raised in this article: Samaritans, Papyrus, Mind, SOS Silence of Suicide and Rethink
1 July 2021
Disabled women decide ‘enough is enough’ and launch protest over pandemic deaths
Disabled women have begun a three-week protest to highlight “appalling” research findings that showed they were almost twice as likely to die from COVID-19 during the pandemic as non-disabled women.
They said the research showed that disabled women have been treated as “collateral damage” by the government during the pandemic.
About 20 disabled members of the Women’s Equality Party (WEP) and allies – including the party’s co-founder, Sandi Toksvig – were outside the Houses of Parliament yesterday (Wednesday) to begin their #91Percent campaign.
The party wants to ensure that the official inquiry into the handling of the pandemic crisis examines its impact on disabled people, including the disproportionate loss of life faced by disabled women.
They believe these deaths were avoidable.
Disabled women and allies will be protesting in shifts for a total of 91 hours outside parliament over the next three weeks, with the action split into 90-minute chunks*.
Their campaign will run for three weeks, and it will end with a larger protest on 20 July.
They aim to highlight research, first reported by Disability News Service (DNS), that showed how disabled women with higher support needs in England, aged between 30 and 69, have been 91 per cent more likely to have died from COVID-19 than non-disabled women in the same age group, after allowing for factors such as underlying health conditions, and whether they lived in poverty, in a less affluent part of the country, or in a care home.
Disabled men with higher support needs, and aged between 30 and 69, were 74 per cent more likely to have died than non-disabled men in the same age group.
The research, despite being conducted by the Office for National Statistics and researchers at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), has been almost completely ignored by the mainstream media since its publication.
The LSHTM researchers later told DNS that discrimination by the government as it responded to the pandemic, and within the NHS, could be to blame for the sharply-increased risk of dying from COVID-19.
Freya Papworth, co-chair of WEP’s disability caucus, told DNS yesterday that she believed the disproportionate deaths were due to discrimination and oppression, including the impact of a decade of government-imposed austerity.
She said: “It’s so much more than just the pandemic.
“A group of people that were just so vulnerable to begin with to attack, to instability, because the safety net has just been completely destroyed over the last decade so there was nothing to kick in when we had an emergency.”
She said the DNS article on the research had led her and her colleagues to decide that “enough is enough”.
She said: “Everyone in the caucus had been saying that disability needs our ‘me too’ moment.
“It’s been just one awful bit of news after another for 18 months and most of us have been stuck at home shielding, being very nervous about going out.”
She said they did not understand why the impact of the pandemic on disabled people had not been “front page news”.
She said: “We are just fed up because we know the statistics, we know the facts, we knew what was going to happen.
“Our community is dying and hurting and has been hurting for so long and it’s not front-page news.”
She added: “We have been shouting and no-one has been listening.”
The campaign has already secured the backing of disabled crossbench peer Baroness [Jane] Campbell, who told DNS: “I think the ONS statistics have shocked all of us, in terms of the disproportionate effects of the pandemic on the lives of disabled people, and the evidence seems to suggest that disabled women suffered consequences even worse.”
Asked to respond to WEP’s call for an inquiry to examine the impact of the pandemic on disabled people, and its concerns about the impact of austerity, a government spokesperson said: “We recognise this pandemic has been incredibly difficult for disabled people and our deepest sympathies go out to those who have lost loved ones.
“Disabled people deserve the best possible care, and throughout the COVID-19 pandemic we have taken action to protect people using emerging evidence to inform our response.
“This includes £3.6 million to help charities offer vital projects to improve disabled people’s physical and mental wellbeing – and through our forthcoming National Disability Strategy we are going to go even further in addressing issues that disabled people say affect them the most.”
But Dr Hannah Barham-Brown, WEP’s deputy leader and a disabled doctor, said the “devastating” study had shown how COVID-19 disproportionately affected disabled women.
She said: “What makes it worse is that this was a preventable crisis, caused by a total lack of planning and awareness of the reality of being disabled.
“The government should hang its head in shame, and be prepared to listen and learn from this failure.
“This is why an independent inquiry will be the first step in acknowledging and addressing the serious inequalities faced by the disabled community.”
Toksvig said more disabled women would die if the government failed to act.
She said: “The government’s failure to keep disabled people safe during this pandemic is unforgivable.
“I will not stand by and watch more disabled women die simply because the government doesn’t appear to believe their lives are worth saving.”
*The party is looking for disabled women and allies to cover 90-minute sections of the Westminster protest, and also for disabled women and allies to conduct 91-minute protests in their own local areas
1 July 2021
Pressure builds on Labour after free social care ‘betrayal’
Labour has been accused of betraying disabled people after a senior shadow minister told a meeting that calling for free social care would just “give the Tories a stick to beat Labour with”.
There has been widespread anger among disabled people this week after Disability News Service (DNS) revealed the comments made by Thangam Debbonaire, the shadow leader of the House of Commons.
There was particular anger because the new party leader, Keir Starmer, told DNS last year, during his successful leadership campaign, that he supported a motion – passed by Labour’s party conference in 2019 – that called for all social care to be provided free through a new National Independent Living Support Service (NILSS), and for that to be funded by national progressive taxation.
Debbonaire, the MP for Bristol West, made the comments at an online meeting that was drawing up “composite” motions to present to last weekend’s women’s conference.
She apparently claimed that such a policy would cost “£100 billion” and would cost more than the annual budget of the NHS.
Several constituency Labour parties (CLPs) had passed motions calling for free social care, and a draft composite motion included two such references, but the final version of the motion expunged all mentions of free social care.
Ellen Morrison, Labour’s first elected representative of its disabled members on its ruling body, the national executive committee (NEC), told DNS this week that Debbonaire’s comments were “of huge concern for disabled Labour members”.
She said: “The comments reported are not only at odds with what the membership want, but it’s also surprising to hear a policy position against free social care when we’ve been assured that policies will be co-produced with us.”
She added: “Disabled trade unionists have developed a clear vision in NILSS for what we need, so we can move away from a model of social care that sees support for disabled people boiled down to decisions of being washed and fed.
“These proposals are based on independent living so disabled people can have choice and dignity in their lives.”
Morrison said that Starmer told the last NEC meeting that he would give his “100 per cent commitment” to disabled members.
She said: “He could demonstrate this commitment by clarifying if these comments were made on behalf of the party, or whether we can take the assurances given to us that Labour has not yet set its policy on social care in good faith.”
In an article published by the Labour Hub website, Linda Burnip, co-founder of Disabled People Against Cuts, said the “apparent betrayal by Labour has led to mass outrage throughout the disabled people’s movement”.
She said: “Thangam has certainly stabbed us in the back, but may also have done the same to Labour, as we make up around 20 per cent of voters, and whatever Labour may want to think, we don’t have to vote for them in the next election.”
In Bristol, disabled constituents of Debbonaire were among members of grassroots disabled people’s organisation Bristol Reclaiming Independent Living (BRIL) who wrote to her about her remarks.
In their letter, they told her that they were “extremely disappointed and frustrated” with her reported comments.
They added: “As a group of Disabled people in Bristol we have signed up to the national campaign, led by Inclusion London, to scrap social care charging.
“We had believed that Labour would be allies of the 13 million Disabled people and five million carers this campaign is fighting for.”
They said they had hoped that their local MP “would be more aware of and sympathetic to the need to listen to, consult with and above all respect the human rights of Disabled people both locally and across the UK.
“Hence our concern and disappointment about the way in which you dismissed our rights and wiped them off your Party’s agenda last week.”
One disabled party member, Gemma Corker, who was at the composite meeting and then spoke about the social care motion at the women’s conference, told DNS: “I strongly object to Thangam’s insistence that we can’t even hope for better under the Labour party, and I thoroughly disagree with the party rolling backwards from Starmer’s pledge to support the introduction of NILSS.”
Corker, who is chair of Tatton CLP and secretary of Cheshire Disabled People Against Cuts, added: “The Labour party should be proud of the scale of our ambition, and should be eager to share that with the rest of the nation.”
Rachel O’Brien, a disabled activist and chair of London Young Labour, said: “The Labour leadership backtracking on Keir Starmer’s election pledge to support free social care and the National Independent Living Support Service is yet another affront to Labour party democracy, especially considering it passed at the 2019 Labour party conference before being abandoned [in its 2019 general election manifesto] for the National Care Service.
“It does a massive disservice to disabled people, who fought for this policy to be adopted by the Labour party following years of erosion to their right to independent living.”
Kathy Bole, co-chair of Disability Labour, said: “I would expect a comment like those made by Thangam Debbonaire from the government, not a frontbench Labour MP.
“Maybe if she talked to us, she might not be making casual remarks like this.”
She warned that the comments may have “alienated disabled Labour members and their supporters” and could just reinforce the idea that disabled people “are expendable/second class citizens with targets on our back”.
A week on, Labour had still not commented by noon today (Thursday) on Debbonaire’s remarks; why the party appeared to have gone back on Starmer’s support for free social care; and what its message was to disabled people and allies who were fighting for free social care.
1 July 2021
Disabled woman asks high court to declare DWP’s ‘immoral’ deductions scheme unlawful
A disabled woman left in “great distress” by an “immoral” Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) scheme – which allows it to take money from her benefits to pay off utility debts – is asking the high court to declare the practice unlawful.
Helen Timson even had to cancel a cancer scan because she could not afford the taxi fare, thanks to the deductions.
On other occasions, she has not been able to pay her rent.
The long-standing scheme allows DWP to take up to five per cent of someone’s means-tested benefits to pay off a utility bill.
But the scheme does not have to seek the claimant’s permission to make the deductions, and it seems they are often not told about the payments before they begin.
This means claimants are typically not given the opportunity to challenge the payments or discuss the financial problems they might cause with DWP before they begin.
Critics say the scheme lacks the necessary checks and balances.
Timson, from Leicester, believes the DWP deductions scheme means she is treated worse than those with utility debts who are not benefit claimants.
If she was not a benefit claimant, a court would have to decide whether she was liable for the debt and how much she should repay.
But the deductions scheme provides her and many other claimants with less legal protection and often results in them paying higher deductions than an “economically identically situated non benefit claimant”.
Timson first had to ask DWP to stop making deductions for her water, electricity and gas debts in December 2014, because they were making it difficult for her to pay her rent.
But the department said the only way it would do so was if she secured permission from her creditors to stop the deductions.
On this occasion, she said, she had been charged too much because of a faulty electric meter.
Even when the electricity company knew the meter was faulty, it continued to take the same amount through the deductions scheme, even after she had changed supplier and no longer owed them anything.
She said: “It was a substantial amount of money: £80.80 a month. I made repeated phone calls about this, but it carried on for about two years.”
Now she is again being faced with deductions from her employment and support allowance, this time amounting to more than £20 a week, to pay off fuel and water debts.
Even without the deductions, her total income is below the level which the benefit system says is an appropriate minimum level for someone in her circumstances.
Instead of the automatic DWP deductions, she wants to obtain professional money advice, and be allowed to make her own decisions about what spending to prioritise.
She also hopes to seek support from charities that help people repay utility debts.
She said: “I feel extremely upset about the behaviour of the DWP and how this scheme allows utility companies to treat me like a second-class citizen.
“I have been extremely stressed and upset, especially when I have phoned begging for these payments to be stopped, and I have just been dismissed.
“This scheme has made me feel like I have no voice and am powerless.”
She said the deductions scheme was “immoral”.
She said: “It is sold as helping benefit claimants, but in fact it helps the utility companies to get their pound of flesh.
“This scheme allows utility companies to prioritise and help themselves to money for their arrears before we can use our own money to pay rent or buy food.
“Can you imagine the uproar if banks allowed utility companies to help themselves from people’s accounts? Or if employers allowed utility companies to help themselves from people’s wages? So why is it OK for it to happen to benefit claimants?”
She believes there will be thousands of disabled and non-disabled claimants who are being put under financial pressure due to the scheme.
She is receiving support from law firm Bindmans and social security barrister Tom Royston for the high court case against work and pensions secretary Therese Coffey.
In papers submitted to the court, they say that Timson “feels very strongly that she should be allowed to manage her own resources, and has been caused great distress by [Coffey’s] unilateral control of those resources”.
They say that she “strongly considers that her approach is likely to be significantly psychologically preferable for her, is likely to give her greater economic flexibility to manage critical spending, and is likely to be better value in the sense that it will probably lead to her paying less of her modest income to service debt”.
They are arguing that the DWP deductions scheme is a breach of three articles of the European Convention on Human Rights: on discrimination, the right to a fair trial, and the right to “peaceful enjoyment of possessions”.
Timson has told the court that, even if she successfully appealed a deduction at a benefits tribunal, it would not be able to “eradicate the experience of having had to live month to month on that inadequate income”.
They believe the case raises important points of principle and is likely to be relevant to many other claimants.
Timson’s solicitor, Emma Varley, from Bindmans, said: “Our client has demonstrated incredible bravery in challenging the DWP’s third party deductions scheme, under which payments are made from her benefit to private utility companies without her consent, and as a result of which she has sometimes been left unable to pay her rent.
“We hope that her judicial review challenge will lead to a changed system, whereby our client, and many others, will be afforded more autonomy to decide how their money is spent.”
But it is not the first time that Timson has had to complain about unfair treatment by DWP.
Two years ago, the Independent Case Examiner upheld five complaints she had made against DWP after it incorrectly calculated an ESA overpayment three times, provided conflicting information about the overpayment, delayed providing her with information she had requested about her case, and failed to respond properly to her complaints.
A DWP spokesperson said: “Customers can contact the DWP if they believe a deduction from their benefit should not be made, while safeguards are in place to ensure deductions are manageable and to prevent hardship.
“It is not appropriate for us to comment on current legal proceedings.”
1 July 2021
Campaigner set for legal action over ‘fundamentally broken’ rail assistance app
A disabled campaigner has taken the first steps towards launching legal action over the rail industry’s use of a long-delayed and “fundamentally broken” passenger assistance mobile phone app.
The industry hoped its Passenger Assist app would make it easier for disabled passengers to book assistance with train journeys, but Doug Paulley says it is a “massive disappointment” and will even prevent many disabled passengers from travelling.
The Rail Industry Group (RDG), which represents the companies that run Britain’s railways, had already been warned that the app was not fit for purpose.
But this week, Paulley published a detailed account of the app’s flaws, and has told RDG, South Western Railway and TransReport – the technology firm responsible for designing the app – that they should consider his blog a “letter before action”, the last step before he takes legal action.
He is now seeking an admission that they have discriminated against disabled people by failing to make the wheelchair space and assistance booking processes “easy and reliable”; a promise to fix the problems with the system; and suitable financial compensation.
Early versions of the app that were trialled secured support from disabled people, many of whom worked to improve its accessibility.
It was finally launched in May, nearly three years after originally planned, with TransReport securing £2.3 million in venture capital funding for the project earlier this year.
But Paulley said the Passenger Assist app does not have many of the “revolutionary features” that had been promised.
He says it provides no way for staff and passengers to contact each other; no way for disabled passengers and staff to get in touch with each other when there is rail disruption or if mistakes occur; and no GPS tracking of the passenger to let staff know their location.
There is also no way to use the app to buy a ticket at the same time as booking assistance.
Most importantly, says Paulley, it does not allow a disabled passenger to book a wheelchair space, and in fact “makes no mention of booking wheelchair spaces at all”.
Instead, he says, it simply provides “a one-stop place to book passenger assistance… with a comparatively accessible interface (thanks to the input of some excellent disabled rights activists) and with the passenger’s assistance needs and biographical details pre-filled in without having to redo them for each booking”.
He adds: “This is a benefit, but nothing like that promised all those years ago, and sadly those benefits are offset by some significant problems.”
Paulley says in the letter before action that TransReport also took over responsibility last autumn for the database of the 1.25 million assistance bookings made on the rail network every year*.
Since then, he has experienced “repeated and significant problems booking wheelchair spaces”, and he says that TransReport’s system is wrongly telling rail staff that spaces are not available, even though older systems show that the spaces are available and allow staff to book the same spaces on the same trains.
But he says there are also other flaws with the app.
If rail companies do not mark a disabled person’s journey as “completed”, which he says they never do, the journey “hangs around forever” in the “Current Journeys” section of the app.
The app also allows users to book assistance onto and off London Underground journeys, which cannot be booked; allows train ramps to be booked to help board rail replacement coaches; and allows ramps to be booked for stations that are only accessible by several flights of stairs.
Paulley says the app also allows passengers to make booking requests at “impossible short notice”, for example for a train that is leaving in five minutes.
Paulley has included South Western Railway in his legal warning after a marathon wheelchair space booking “nightmare” that lasted more than an hour and still did not result in a usable booking.
All of this, he said, “to attempt to do what a non-disabled person can do in seconds on their website: make the bookings and practical arrangements to secure their accommodation and travel”.
RDG had declined to say by noon today (Thursday) if it recognised the concerns Paulley was raising and if it was trying to fix them.
But Robert Nisbet, RDG’s director of nations and regions, said in a statement: “The Passenger Assistance app is just one element in improving disabled passengers’ experiences.
“This app is the first of its kind on British public transport, so getting it right took time.
“We also wanted to ensure the functionality so the app went through several rigorous trials and was pre-released to an ‘early access’ group for feedback.
“The app was rolled out with functionality that is already improving requests for assistance such as providing an alternative to having to call in order to reserve assistance.
“We are adding functionality, and welcome feedback.
“We are balancing rolling out improvements as quickly as possible with ensuring we get them absolutely right for customers, to give them confidence on their journeys.”
A South Western Railway spokesperson said the company was “aware” of the problems Paulley had highlighted and said that its staff “provide feedback to industry partners on a regular basis”.
He added: “We’re sorry for the unsatisfactory experience that Mr Paulley had when booking his assistance with us.
“We’re investigating the matter further, so that we can ensure this does not happen again.
“We regularly provide feedback on TransReport as part of the industry-wide effort to improve the passenger assistance system and simplify the assistance booking process.”
TransReport has refused to comment.
*The last available pre-pandemic figures
1 July 2021
Disabled activists persuade council to think again on ‘discriminatory’ Peterloo memorial
Disabled campaigners have persuaded a council to reconsider its decision that nothing can be done to ensure that a high-profile memorial to the victims of the Peterloo massacre is fully accessible.
Manchester City Council caused outrage among disabled people two years ago when it tried to push ahead with “discriminatory” plans for a memorial that would be completely inaccessible to many disabled people.
It was eventually quietly unveiled without a civil ceremony in August 2019, but disabled campaigners have continued to lobby the council to seek a solution that would ensure the memorial was accessible to all disabled people.
Last month, Manchester City Council appeared to admit defeat, announcing that “in the absence of any prospect of a workable and satisfactory permanent remodel solution for full accessibility the memorial will remain as it is”.
But just days later, the council agreed to set up a new working group of councillors that will enter discussions with disabled campaigners and allies who have come up with new proposals that would open up the monument to those with mobility impairments.
Disabled activists had previously described the memorial* as “a folly which shamed Manchester and opened the city up to derision and mockery”, a “physical manifestation of inequality, exclusion and prejudice” and “a million pound embarrassment”.
The memorial was designed to be used as a platform for speakers and demonstrators, mirroring those who spoke during the protest in 1819 that led to the massacre**, but it was completely inaccessible to many disabled people.
Now disabled campaigners and allies from The Campaign for an Accessible Peterloo Memorial believe they have come up with a solution.
A tentative design was sketched out by Mark Todd, a disabled access expert who started a Facebook page to protest at the design of the memorial in 2019, and retired planner Joan Rutherford, with input from other campaigners.
They describe their design as an “elegant, curved, processional ramp which goes around the back of the existing memorial like an arm being put around a friend’s shoulder”, and say it would be built from “very light, even transparent materials”.
As well as providing an access solution, their plans for the memorial – which they call The March to Peterloo! – would also tell the story of the massacre, including details of the main protagonists, and the names of towns and neighbourhoods from which people marched.
There are tentative suggestions that the new version could include lighting, solar-powered projectors and infrared movement detectors.
Todd said: “I think it’s time for the people of Manchester to sort this out and give us a fitting memorial to those who fought and died for equality back in 1819.
“We believe that The March to Peterloo! will make that possible.”
Dennis Queen, from Greater Manchester Coalition of Disabled People (GMCDP), who was at last week’s council meeting with Todd, said: “Commissioning a public memorial that excluded disabled people was wrong and quite rightly the decision drew widespread criticism, locally, nationally and internationally.
“Local disabled people mobilised and harnessed the collective anger caused by our exclusion.
“Nevertheless, GMCDP remains committed to working with Manchester City Council to identify how the Peterloo memorial can be made accessible for all.”
Dr Morag Rose, a disabled artist, activist and lecturer in human geography at the University of Liverpool, who is also part of the campaign, said: “It shames Manchester that an important memorial which should symbolise working class struggles for equality, democracy and participation instead excludes and segregates disabled people.
“I’m excited to see what happens next and I hope it will improve not just the Peterloo memorial but the way we think about the public spaces of our city and who they are for.
“We’ve waited over 200 years, and now is the time to fix this.”
The council insisted this week that it had put its decision to abandon any proposed changes to the memorial on hold, pending discussion of the new proposals, rather than reversing it.
Cllr Luthfur Rahman, deputy leader of Manchester City Council, said: “We have worked with the Peterloo memorial access campaign over many months but have been unable together to find a workable access solution.
“We have committed to meet with them to listen to and consider what they are describing as a brand new proposal.
“We will go into that meeting with an open mind.”
*The memorial is situated outside the Manchester Central conference centre
**On 16 August 1819, paramilitary and military forces attacked more than 60,000 peaceful pro-democracy and anti-poverty protesters in Manchester, which led to 18 deaths and an estimated 700 serious injuries, in what became known as the Peterloo Massacre
1 July 2021
Buckingham Palace refuses to release figures on disabled staff
Buckingham Palace has refused to publish figures showing how many of its employees are disabled people, despite publishing similar figures for minority ethnic staff.
The royal household’s annual report and accounts, published last week, show that 8.5 per cent of its 499 employees were from ethnic minorities, as of 31 December 2020, with a target of 10 per cent for March 2022.
But there are no similar figures for disabled staff, or for staff with other characteristics protected under the Equality Act, such as LGBT people or women.
The figures relate to staff working for the Queen, rather than those employed by other royals, such as the Prince of Wales and the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.
When challenged on the failure to publish the figures this week, a Buckingham Palace spokesperson said data on the number of disabled staff were collected, reviewed and discussed.
He said: “To confirm, we do collect data on disability and it is reviewed and discussed at senior levels as part of our work on diversity and inclusion.”
But he refused to release those figures, or to explain why they were not included in the report.
He also refused to say if Buckingham Palace had set targets for employment of disabled staff, as it had for minority ethnic staff.
In the report, Buckingham Palace claims that “Diversity and Inclusion are valued, all appointments and promotions are on merit, with active consideration given to applicants with disabilities, and support to employees who become disabled to ensure their development and career progression continues”.
The report also says that there had to be a “shift” in its diversity strategy last year to ensure that it “actively emphasises the importance of inclusion”.
And it points to activities that marked International Women’s Day, Pride, Ramadan and Black History Month, and a week of events to mark national inclusion week, but makes no specific mention of activities related to disability or disabled people.
The refusal to publish any figures has raised concerns that Buckingham Palace employs a disproportionately small number of disabled people.
Jumoke Abdullahi, communications and media officer at Inclusion London, said the failure to publish data on disabled staff suggested that the figures were “incredibly small”.
She said: “Regardless of the exact numbers working at the royal palace, the needs of disabled people in the workplace remain the same.
“Disabled people should have fully supportive environments that allow them to flourish at the workplace without coming at the cost of their wellbeing.
“It should not only be a matter of focusing on the number of disabled employees, but also how they are treated.”
A spokesperson for the Equality and Human Rights Commission said: “We believe it is useful for transparency and best practice for any employer to regularly collect and publish data on the diversity of their employees to better understand the barriers that hold some groups back from flourishing.
“However, employers are not generally legally required to publish diversity data, aside from the duty on those with over 250 staff to publish gender pay gap data.”
1 July 2021
Council ‘used pandemic as Trojan horse for city centre access changes’
By Chloe Johnson
Campaigners have accused a council of using the pandemic as a “Trojan horse” to make permanent changes to the city centre that are already having a “devastating” impact on disabled people’s ability to access services, after being introduced as temporary measures.
York Disability Rights Forum warned last summer that the short-notice pedestrianisation of several streets in the city centre and the removal of blue badge parking spaces – designed to aid social distancing and encourage cyclists and pedestrians – could discriminate against disabled people.
Nearly a year later, City of York Council has decided to make the changes permanent, as part of its Footstreets scheme, which restricts vehicle access to many streets between certain times of the day, or 24 hours-a-day in some areas.
The forum believes the council has simply used the temporary measures to make changes “they had wanted to make anyway, and in the process disregard the rights of many disabled people to access the city centre”.
It told a council meeting last month that it had been “horrific” to hear of the “devastating impact” the changes have had on many disabled people’s day-to-day lives, particularly their ability to access shopping, support and other amenities.
The forum told the council that it acknowledged that many disabled people had said in response to surveys and other engagement last year that they now felt safer in the city centre, but it also accused the council of using those results to present a “false picture” of disabled people’s views.
It said that the engagement results also showed that 78 per cent of people with blue badges disagreed or strongly disagreed with the statement: “There is parking close enough to allow me access to the city centre.”
The council is now beginning a consultation on making the changes permanent.
Helen Jones, a member of the forum, said the council had already been considering changes to the city centre before the pandemic.
She said: “I think most disabled people always felt it would be permanent.
“When the pandemic hit, it felt like the council took advantage.”
When it introduced the temporary measures, there were some minor mitigation measures, including some new blue badge parking spaces in a car park and a taxi service that could take people to one set place in town.
But Jones said the taxi service “wasn’t well received and wasn’t well used and has been withdrawn”, while the reopening of a small section of a road a “long way” from the main city centre, which lacked anywhere practical to park, had also not helped significantly.
The council is now apparently considering a new shuttle system, but discussions are at an early stage, and Jones said the information so far had been “vague”.
She said: “This could mean that by September 2021, many of York’s disabled residents are unable to visit the city centre they live in. A city centre that has been out of bounds to us since July 2020.”
She said she feared the impact the changes in York could have on disabled people across the country.
She said: “Other local authorities who currently offer better access for blue badge holders could see what York is doing as a positive example and lead to a host of inaccessible cities throughout England.”
Elki Houston, a disabled member of the forum, added: “I feel angry, sad, ignored, forgotten and ultimately treated as if I have no value.
“Over the years I’ve figured out the places I could go in York that are accessible to me… but now those places are inaccessible to me.
“Not because they have changed but because I’m not allowed to get to them anymore.
“As the council returns other people’s freedom after lockdown, mine is set not to come back.”
Fazilet Hadi, head of policy at Disability Rights UK, said: “The past year has seen dramatic changes to streetscapes, often with little or no consultation with disabled people.
“Most changes therefore have failed to address the needs of disabled citizens.
“Restaurant furniture has been placed on pavements, making it difficult for wheelchair-users and people with sight loss or mobility impairments to navigate safely and independently.
“Streets have been fully pedestrianised and disabled parking bays removed, excluding disabled people reliant on cars from accessing town and city centres.
“The Equality Act requires local authorities to take equality considerations into account when making decisions, but the reality is that across the country, the mobility needs of disabled citizens have either been an afterthought or ignored completely.”
A spokesperson for City of York Council said it was “trying to balance the access needs of all York’s residents, protect jobs, support businesses, and keep everyone in our city centre safe”.
They said: “Last year’s temporary extension to the footstreets allowed the city to reopen safely, with space for social distancing in our busiest streets.
“The extra outdoor space protected many jobs, allowing many businesses to keep trading.”
They said that last year’s engagement showed that “most respondents acknowledged the benefits of the footstreets”, with “tangible benefits of vehicle-free streets” felt by “many older residents, those with sight loss and those with mobility aids, who can now use the smoother road surface instead of narrow pavements”.
They added: “The advantages the footstreets bring have led to the decision to consult on making the temporary measures permanent.”
They also said that the council had taken some steps to improve blue badge access and parking spaces after the engagement revealed the impact on blue badge-holders.
And they said the council was working on improving access across the city centre.
1 July 2021
News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com
Nothing will change in till we get rid of the tory government. Just a bunch of murdering ba….