DWP secretly abandons work on £100m plan to prevent suicides and learn from errors
The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has secretly abandoned work on a £106 million plan that was supposed to prevent suicides and other deaths of benefit claimants, learn from its mistakes, and deliver reform “for the most vulnerable in society”.
Former work and pensions secretary Amber Rudd secured the funding for the “DWP Excellence Plan” from the Treasury just days before she was replaced by Therese Coffey in September 2019.
One-third of the money – £36 million – was allocated to improving safety, support for “customers with complex needs” and decision-making, and to learning from its mistakes.
In all, £66 million was allocated to “support vulnerable people”.
Disability News Service (DNS) has previously reported how Coffey’s DWP watered down key parts of the plan that were focused on preventing suicides and learning lessons from claimant deaths.
But a response to a new freedom of information (FoI) request from DNS shows the department has abandoned all work on the DWP Excellence Plan, blaming the pandemic for the decision.
It confirms that, in the nearly three years since February 2020, DWP has not produced a single report on progress made in delivering the plan.
It has also failed to adopt any “critical success factors” (CSFs) that would have been used to measure progress, and it has failed to report to the Treasury on how the £66 million on supporting “vulnerable people” was spent in a way that maximised value for money, a “specific caveat” that was applied to the use of the funding.
Asked in the FoI request to provide this information and copies of these reports, DWP said: “We confirm that we do not hold the information you have requested.”
It added: “It is worth highlighting, the reason we do not hold the information you are requesting, is because the Department’s activities and processes during this period were heavily impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic.”
DNS previously reported how an internal DWP document, dated February 2020 – obtained by a campaigner under the Freedom of Information Act – appeared to show how the department’s service delivery group had intended to deliver the plan.
One of the aims was to measure DWP’s success in reducing the number of “serious cases”, including suicides of benefit claimants.
It also laid out a series of potential CSFs, which would have determined whether the department had achieved its goal to make its services less harmful and less likely to lead to claimant suicides and other deaths.
The latest FoI response confirms that none of that has taken place in the last three years.
Throughout Coffey’s period in charge of DWP, from September 2019 to September 2022, disabled people continued to die due to her department’s decisions, policies and procedures.
Among them was Sophia Yuferev, a talented artist who lived with significant mental distress and had been living on a sandwich a day for the last few months of her life, after both her employment and support allowance and her personal independence payment had been stopped by Coffey’s department. She is believed to have died in October 2021.
Another was Philip Pakree, who died on Boxing Day 2020, and whose partner had warned that he was too ill to undergo an upcoming benefit assessment that had left him “distraught” and “devastated”.
DWP has also recently been forced to admit repeatedly breaching the Equality Act after a disabled man was left needing hospital treatment three times for suicidal thoughts caused by months of failures by DWP advisers and jobcentres, following a new claim for universal credit claim he registered in February 2020.
And last month, DNS reported how a disabled woman left traumatised by the daily demands of universal credit took her own life earlier this year, just four days after being told she would need to attend a face-to-face meeting with a work coach.
A DWP spokesperson refused to comment on the FoI response this week or to say if the Excellence Plan had been abandoned and how the department justified that decision, other than referring to a statement given seven weeks ago for the report of Coffey watering down the plan.
In October, a DWP spokesperson had said: “We support millions of people each year and we are constantly reviewing our processes to deliver a supportive and compassionate service.
“COVID-19 impacted how we intended to implement the DWP Excellence Plan as we had to address the immediate needs of customers impacted by the pandemic.
“Since February 2020 we have delivered improvements to our service, including broadening the range of circumstances where an [internal process review] is carried out and expanding the IPR team.
“We also continue to learn from serious cases, working to ensure our most vulnerable customers are receiving the best possible service.”
The department also highlighted the £3 million a year it was spending to grow its team of advanced customer support senior leaders, who build relationships with organisations that support claimants in the most vulnerable situations; its introduction of a mental health training package for all customer-facing staff; and its work to improve relevant guidance and training for staff on dealing with claimants who declare their intention to self-harm.
8 December 2022
Disability minister fails to express support on disabled people’s international day
The new minister for disabled people failed to send a message of support on the UN’s international day of disabled people… although he did find time to publish a post about Small Business Saturday.
The two events took place on the same day, Saturday 3 December, but Tom Pursglove chose to post about recognising the “enormous contribution made to local life” by small businesses in his Corby constituency, while staying silent about the importance of disability rights.
Although he retweeted posts about the international day of disabled people by the Department for Work and Pensions, the Disability Unit and the UK parliament, he chose not to publish a post of his own about disability rights or the UN disability convention, either on Twitter or Facebook.
It is not the first time a minister for disabled people has neglected to send a message of support to disabled people on their international day.
Three years ago, Disability News Service reported how not one of the seven ministers for disabled people who had served in the post since the Conservatives came to power in 2010 issued a message of support on social media on 3 December.
A DWP spokesperson declined to say this week how Pursglove explained failing to send a message on the international day of disabled people, or if he would apologise.
The day before the international day, on Friday (2 December), Pursglove had announced the government would publish a new disability action plan in the new year, which will “set out the practical action ministers across government will take over the next two years to improve disabled people’s lives”.
As part of this announcement, he gave interviews to the BBC, Channel 5 and ITV, but he provided no detail about what would be in the action plan.
There was also no mention in the press release issued by the Disability Unit of whether the action plan would replace the government’s National Disability Strategy.
The high court ruled earlier this year that the strategy was unlawful, after a botched consultation had made it “impossible” for disabled people to “shape” its content.
The government has been granted permission to appeal that ruling.
The DWP spokesperson said the disability action plan was “separate from the National Disability Strategy” and would “set out how we will go further in 2023 and 2024 to improve disabled people’s lives, whilst the National Disability Strategy, which set out our long-term vision, is subject to ongoing litigation”.
Only last week, Pursglove was ridiculed for claiming his government had a record of providing “global leadership on disability inclusion”, six years after it was found guilty of “grave” and “systematic” violations of the UN disability convention, and five years after it was told by the UN’s disability rights committee that its cuts to social security and other support for disabled people had caused “a human catastrophe”.
Pursglove told MPs this week that the action plan would “identify priority areas where we can deliver meaningful change and progress for disabled people to improve their lives”, and that the government would be “drawing up ideas, consulting on them, and then getting on delivering them”.
He had announced the intention to publish an action plan on Friday as he opened a new University College London research laboratory, part of the university’s Global Disability Innovation Hub, which aims to “accelerate innovation in disability science, and technology”.
DWP said Pursglove also “met with GB Paralympians, as well as disabled people on the day”.
The laboratory is part of a new university campus on Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford, east London.
8 December 2022
Court hears universal credit £20 uplift appeal, as activists vow to fight back
Disabled campaigners were outside the Royal Courts of Justice yesterday (Wednesday) to highlight the “appalling discrimination” experienced by an estimated two million claimants who were denied a £20-a-week rise in their benefits during the pandemic.
They spoke of the “heinous” failure of ministers to provide the same £20 uplift given to recipients of universal credit to those on “legacy benefits” such as employment and support allowance (ESA).
Yesterday, lawyers for four claimants of legacy benefits were at the Court of Appeal in London to attempt to overturn a ruling that found that the government’s decision was not unlawful.
The uplift was only ever received by those on universal credit, and never made available to those on legacy benefits.
Paula Peters, a member of the national steering group of Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC), who took part in a vigil outside the court, said the “heinous” failure to provide the £20 uplift to those on legacy benefits showed the government “don’t give a damn about us”.
Martha Foulds, another DPAC steering group member, who travelled from Sheffield to take part in the vigil, said she had wanted to be outside the Royal Courts of Justice to help provide “a united front against this government”.
She said: “The government is united in attacking us, so we have to be united in fighting back.
“We have to stand together whatever our impairment, whatever our claimant status.”
And disabled activist Andy Mitchell, who travelled from Somerset for the vigil, said the £20 “would have helped to alleviate the financial strain” that disabled people experienced during the pandemic “and psychologically it would have made us feel included and that we matter”.
The high court ruled in February that work and pensions ministers behaved lawfully when refusing to offer the £20 increase to about two million claimants of ESA, jobseeker’s allowance (JSA) and income support.
While the high court accepted in February that there was discrimination towards disabled people on legacy benefits, the judge ruled the difference in treatment had been justified.
Lawyers for the four claimants argue that the difference in treatment was “unjustified and disproportionate” – and a breach of the European Convention on Human Rights – particularly as disabled people were already disproportionately affected by poverty, even before a pandemic that led to a significant rise in their cost of living.
A decision by the three Court of Appeal judges who heard the appeal this week is expected in the next few months.
Paula Peters told Disability News Service (DNS) yesterday why she and others had taken part in the vigil outside the hearing.
She said: “As a legacy benefit claimant, it is important to be here to highlight the appalling discrimination we face with being completely, deliberately overlooked and ignored with the £20 uplift.”
She said a victory in the case “would mean justice has prevailed and the wrong has been righted, and legacy benefit claimants would get the support they are entitled to – they would be able to keep their homes heated during the winter, keep food on the tables and pay social care support that is so desperately needed.”
She warned the government that it could “expect more resistance” because “DPAC are not going away”.
Martha Foulds told DNS the failure to provide the £20 to legacy benefit claimants was “just a continuation of the government’s attack on disabled people, a continuation of them treating us with disdain, like dirt on the bottom of their shoe”.
She said a victory in the case would show the government “that you mess with disabled people at your own risk.
“We will fight back, whether with legal action or direct action.”
Andy Mitchell said he was there as a campaigner and legacy benefit claimant who himself missed out on the £20 uplift.
He said the government’s failure was “an absolute injustice” and the way it had treated disabled people was “appalling”, while a victory in the case would be “a huge result to us”.
He said: “Some people are still in debt after lockdown and are struggling to pay their way out of it.
“For many of us on older benefits, we do not look at this case in isolation.
“Since 2010, we have lost out through austerity, benefit freezes, increased conditionality, and benefit sanctions.
“We’ve had our public services taken away and we’ve been demonised by politicians through the media. Not getting the £20 added insult to all those injuries.”
Anna Thompson, from the disabled women’s organisation WinVisible, called for the £20 to be reinstated for all those on universal credit – as well as being awarded to those on legacy benefits – which she said would make “a massive difference” and address the 200,000 children “left in poverty and destitution” by the removal of the £20 payment last year.
Marc Francis, director of policy and campaigns at the poverty charity Z2K, which played a key role in bringing the case, told those at the vigil that February’s judgement had been “absolutely wrong” and that disability discrimination was “never justified”, and he expressed support for the four claimants who were fighting the case.
He said the government should “change its approach” that had led to a two-tier benefits system, which meant some claimants were “left behind” and received less money.
Politicians who attended the vigil to support the appeal included Labour’s Debbie Abrahams, a member of the Commons work and pensions committee, who said it was “so discriminatory” of DWP not to provide the £20-a-week payment to legacy claimants.
She said: “There’s a lot of evidence to show, particularly over the last 10 or 12 years, that disabled people have absolutely been hammered by this government.”
Marion Fellows, the SNP’s spokesperson on disability, praised those who had spent years fighting the government’s reforms, and she said that February’s ruling had been “absolutely ridiculous” and that “justice must prevail”.
DWP refused to comment on an ongoing court case, and would not even provide an on-the-record comment confirming that it believed it would not be appropriate to comment on the case.
Meanwhile, DWP has also refused to say what caused many recipients of personal independence payment (PIP) to fail to receive their monthly payments this week.
The failure of the DWP payment system appears to have affected thousands of disabled people on Friday (2 December) and Monday (5 December).
The problem led to DWP declaring a “major incident” on Monday, according to Buckinghamshire Disability Service.
A DWP spokesperson said on Tuesday: “The issue was rapidly identified and resolved yesterday and we’ve now made the payments.
“It impacted a small proportion of PIP claimants who were due to be paid yesterday.”
But he refused to say what caused the problem or to confirm that claimants with payments that should have been made on Friday had also been affected.
8 December 2022
Lords committee ignores charging in high-profile social care report
A cross-party committee of peers has defended its decision to ignore the crucial issue of care charges in a major “spotlight” report on adult social care in England.
The report by the Lords adult social care committee focuses heavily on the needs of unpaid carers and says little about the funding of social care, other than calling for “realistic, long-term and protected funding for the sector”.
Of the 30 recommendations in the report, A Gloriously Ordinary Life, more than 10 explicitly call for action to improve support or funding for carers, while there is not one recommendation on care charging.
In July, the committee failed to ask the minister for social care a single question about care charges, the social care funding crisis, or the unmet support needs of working-age disabled people, in a two-hour evidence session.
This is reflected in today’s (Thursday) 150-page report, in which there are just 13 mentions of charging for care, with nine of those appearing in an appendix to the main report that describes the committee’s visit to the disabled people’s organisation (DPO) Real.
One disabled person who took part in the Real evidence session told the committee that “almost all” councils charge disabled people for social care, describing this as “not ethical” and a “tax on being disabled”.
She asked: “Authorities don’t charge householders for collecting their rubbish, they don’t charge parents for sending their children to school, they don’t charge for NHS treatment so why is it considered acceptable for them to charge disabled people for their care?”
Despite the concerns raised on charging during the visit to Real, the issue was ignored in the main report, and in its recommendations.
Earlier this year, Disability News Service reported how tens of thousands of disabled people across the country were having debt collection action taken against them every year by their local authorities over unpaid care charges.
But the report’s only mention of “debt” is when the report speaks of “the debt which we owe unpaid carers”.
In all, there are 766 mentions of the word “carer” in the report, compared with 196 mentions of the word “disabled”.
The committee’s investigation took more than 10 months, and it heard oral evidence from nearly 50 witnesses.
The committee claims that its report focuses “on the voices of lived experience”, despite ignoring the concerns raised about care charging in the Real visit.
There are fleeting mentions of evidence provided by disabled people and DPOs during the committee’s inquiry.
Ian Loynes, chief executive of Spectrum Centre for Independent Living, told the committee earlier this year: “There is a notion that, once you become disabled, you are automatically dependent and you need somebody else; you are just looked after and you are wasting your life until you die.
“That is not the reality for any age or for any disabled people.”
Wiltshire Centre for Independent Living told the committee in its written evidence: “When being assessed for care services people are told what they need to live a basic existence in terms of personal care.”
And Inclusion London said in its written evidence that social care support was “largely regarded as support to meet basic personal care needs of older people as opposed to support to ensure people can live a normal life with equal choices and rights”.
Among its recommendations, the report suggests: the appointment of a new commissioner for care and support; that the government should work with local authorities to ensure the Care Act 2014 is “fully implemented”; work should be carried out to embed the principles of co-production in social care; and there should be an independent review of the pay and working conditions of personal assistants.
It also calls for funding for peer-led organisations to provide advice and information on care and support; government funding to develop “innovative models” to make direct payments and personal assistance easier to access and manage and to simplify the recruitment of personal assistants; and increased funding for supported housing.
Baroness [Kay] Andrews, the committee’s Labour chair, defended the report and its recommendations.
She stressed that the report made “the urgent case for realistic and sustainable funding, which… is what we heard disabled people need above everything else from adult social care”.
She said the report also “made the case for greater choice and control for people with disabilities, and took a huge amount of evidence, reflected in our recommendations, as to what would make the difference to them”.
She said the committee had wanted to focus on the “invisibility” of the adult social care sector “because it was important to expand the debate and shine a light on those issues and on people who are often left on the margins – disabled adults and older people of course, but also many unpaid carers.
“We always looked at the lives of unpaid carers in relationship to the people that they support. The two are interdependent.
“The relationship between unpaid carers and people who draw on care is, however, rarely the focus of any interest or inquiry, despite the huge role it plays in enabling choice and control for everyone involved.
“Putting that right was part – but not entirely the whole by any means – of what we aimed to do.
“In our report we cover many aspects and aspirations which have not been brought together before.”
She claimed the committee had not examined charging because it has “been covered in many other ways and our task was to add value where it has not been given”.
She also said the committee had written to the chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, after his autumn statement “because we were outraged at the failure once again to keep the promise of the cap on care costs, while diverting that funding across a vague set of alternatives which we have challenged in detail”.
Meanwhile, a new report (PDF) has highlighted the impact that social care has on the wellbeing of disabled people and family carers.
The Impact of Social Care project brought together the disabled people’s organisation Being the Boss and Bringing Us Together – which brings together disabled children and young people and their families – with funding from The Scurrah Wainwright Charity.
They ran six online workshops, with most of those taking part disabled people, family members and carers.
One of those who took part in a workshop said afterwards: “I am appalled at how badly so many people are treated.”
Another said: “I recognise how out of our depth we often are, when we are up against professionals who are prepared to flout the law or misinterpret it.”
More than 200 people were involved in the project, which – the report concludes – demonstrated the “increasing and significant impact of social care charging and cost of living pressures” and the need to develop an understanding of the support people need to exercise “real choice and control” over their own support “in order to live good lives and participate in their communities as active citizens”.
8 December 2022
Disabled duo take battle for post-Grenfell evacuation justice to high court
Two disabled campaigners were at the high court this week to challenge the government’s refusal to ensure that all disabled people can safely evacuate from high-rise blocks of flats in emergencies.
Following the two-day hearing, Georgie Hulme and Sarah Rennie said they remained “resolute” in their fight for “meaningful measures to help everyone move away from fire or evacuate a burning building”.
Their case follows the inquiry into the Grenfell Tower fire, in which those who died were disproportionately disabled people.
The inquiry found that, with every disabled resident who died in the fire, there had been no plan in place to help them evacuate, or to ensure their information was available for the fire and rescue service to help them evacuate.
The Grenfell fire led to 72 people losing their lives, including 15 of Grenfell’s 37 disabled residents, on the night of 14 June 2017.
But the government later rejected the Grenfell Tower Inquiry’s recommendation that all owners and managers of high-rise residential buildings should be forced to prepare a personal emergency evacuation plan (PEEP) for all residents who might find it difficult to “self-evacuate”.
That rejection – on the grounds of “practicality”, “proportionality” and “safety” – came despite a promise from prime minister Boris Johnson that he would implement all the recommendations from the inquiry’s first phase.
The government’s rejection of the PEEPs recommendation came even though those who responded to a consultation on the proposal overwhelmingly supported their introduction.
The Home Office consulted instead on its own “alternative package” of measures, which it calls Emergency Evacuation Information Sharing Plus, which does not go as far as PEEPs and will only apply to the minority of buildings that have been assessed as being “at higher risk”.
Georgie Hulme and Sarah Rennie, co-founders of the disabled-led leaseholder action group Claddag and both of them wheelchair-users who live in high-rise buildings, were this week asking the court to rule that the government’s rejection of PEEPs was unlawful.
Rennie and Hulme believe the Home Office decision to reject the PEEPs proposal breaches its duty to protect life, and its duty not to discriminate against disabled people, under the European Convention on Human Rights, as well as the government’s public sector equality duty under the Equality Act.
They also believe the consultation process on the PEEPs proposal was unfair because the Home Office later held follow-up meetings with representatives of local authorities and housing associations, allowing them to raise concerns to which Claddag and others had no chance to respond.
And they believe that the Home Office failed to understand the inquiry’s reasons for recommending the PEEPs proposal.
Rennie and Hulme told Disability News Service this morning (Thursday): “We are resolute in our position.
“We didn’t hear anything at the hearing that gives us reason to believe that the Home Office are ‘open’ to consultation on any meaningful measures to help everyone move away from fire or evacuate a burning building.
“We would like to thank our legal team and everyone who has shown us support in this legal challenge.
“This includes contributions to our crowdfund from the disabled community, allies and the Law for Change fund.”
The Home Office said yesterday that it would be inappropriate to comment on an ongoing court case.
But a Home Office spokesperson said: “We are committed to delivering proposals that enhance the safety of residents whose ability to self-evacuate in an emergency may be compromised.
“Our public consultation on Emergency Evacuation Information Sharing Plus sought views on the scope of evacuation plans and we are currently analysing the responses.
“Working closely with the National Fire Chiefs Council and London Fire Brigade, we commissioned research to test evacuation strategies, for which live testing took place this year.
“A research team is now completing the evaluation of the evacuation strategy tests.”
8 December 2022
Covid inquiry ‘has shut out’ grassroots disabled people’s organisations
Grassroots disabled people’s organisations (DPOs) have expressed their frustration at being “shut out” of the Covid public inquiry.
The UK Covid-19 Inquiry has decided that 14 DPOs will not be allocated status as “core participants” in two crucial parts of the inquiry, a decision that is likely to be replicated across the whole inquiry.
Instead, just four of the UK’s larger, national DPOs have been given core participant status for one of the two modules for which arrangements have already been decided by the inquiry.
Disability Rights UK, Inclusion Scotland, Disability Action Northern Ireland and Disability Wales will be treated as core participants for the second module, on key UK decision-making and “political and administrative governance”.
Oral evidence hearings for this module are scheduled to take place next summer.
But another 14 DPOs – including The Alliance for Inclusive Education, Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC), Inclusion London, Disability Positive, WinVisible, and Greater Manchester Coalition of Disabled People (GMCDP) – had their applications to be treated as core participants for the inquiry’s second module rejected.
If they want to provide evidence for this module, they will have to feed it through one of the four national DPOs, which some disabled activists view as being closer to the establishment.
The grassroots DPOs will also not be allowed access to confidential documents that will be shared by the inquiry with the four national DPOs.
None of the DPOs – including the four national organisations – have been granted core participant status for the first module, which will examine the UK’s state of preparedness for the pandemic.
Individuals or organisations with a “significant role or interest” in the inquiry’s work can apply for core participant status (PDF) for a particular module, which allows them to access evidence, make opening and closing statements at inquiry hearings, and suggest lines of questioning to the inquiry’s barristers.
Bob Ellard, a member of DPAC’s national steering group, said: “The inquiry can remain in its comfort zone by only admitting establishment-linked bodies into core participant status – bodies that can be relied on not to ask too difficult questions or rock the boat too much.
“Grassroots organisations that work for the interests of disabled people at the sharp end have been firmly shut out.”
A GMCDP spokesperson added: “As disabled people were the majority of deaths from Covid we think the inquiry is failing to appreciate the severity of the impact on our community and accord us the proper respect.”
Lynne Turnbull, chief executive of Disability Positive, in Cheshire, said: “Whilst I was disappointed that we were not granted core participant status for module two of the inquiry, I welcome that four DPOs have been, which will ensure that the voice of disabled people and our organisations is heard.
“Disability Positive is a member of DR UK, who are one of the organisations named as a core participant. We would therefore ideally be able to feed in our experiences through them.
“However, without agreement to a confidentiality circle for inquiry documents, this will prove difficult.
“As an organisation, we took on various vital new roles during the pandemic, including distributing PPE [personal protective equipment] for use by personal assistants, making wellbeing calls to disabled people, supporting people to understand vaccine and face-covering information and providing advice during a time of great confusion.
“Taking on these new roles had a substantial impact on us and was a direct result of government policy creating a vacuum into which we had to step to protect the wellbeing and lives of disabled people.
“These experiences are important and without the confidential information from the inquiry being shared with us, it is difficult for us to contribute as much as we otherwise could.”
WinVisible is another grassroots DPO that has expressed frustration at the inquiry’s decision.
Claire Glasman, co-ordinator at WinVisible, said it was unacceptable that the inquiry had shut out all DPOs from the first module, on the country’s state of preparedness, even though “emergency planning is the first stage, where our survival is at stake and where our survival was dismissed”, and that only the four national DPOs had been granted core status for the second module.
She said the 14 grassroots DPOs had joined together “as a way of holding the government, former health secretary Matt Hancock and others accountable for the thousands of deaths which could have been prevented”, and their experiences would now need to be represented by the four national DPOs and outside the inquiry.
She said: “Many thousands of people, disproportionately women and people of colour, died from Covid being seeded into care homes, when the government already knew about transmission.
“Many thousands more died from neglect under cover of Covid: at home and in care homes and hospitals.”
WinVisible member Micheleine Kane, from Scotland, said: “As a bereaved daughter whose disabled mother with multiple sclerosis was left to starve in a care home and was frightened into not going to hospital, I am one of many let down and robbed of our family members due to the measures enforced by UK and devolved governments.
“I wanted my mother to come and live with me, but the care home said no, she couldn’t leave because of lockdown. I was only allowed window visits.
“As a result, my mother died a slow, painful, inhumane, lonely death at their hands.”
Glasman said DPOs including WinVisible had helped to widen the terms of the inquiry to include the disproportionate impact of Covid measures on disabled people, women, people of colour and others covered by equality law.
She said they would carry on pressing for the government to be held to account in the inquiry for deprioritising social care, and for the discriminatory treatment decisions made within the NHS using critical care guidelines and the issuing of “do not attempt resuscitation” notices without the consent of disabled patients or their families.
She said: “We are with the bereaved families who fear the inquiry will be another cover-up, after they were barred from testifying directly to it and were relegated to a ‘Listening Project’.”
A spokesperson for the inquiry said: “The inquiry will be looking at the impact of the pandemic on inequalities, including disabilities, throughout its work.
“The inquiry has not announced all of its investigations yet. It will invite further applications for core participant status as it does so.
“Core participant status is only one way to take part in the inquiry.
“Others include providing evidence and participating in the inquiry’s listening exercise.”
The inquiry says that decisions on core participant status are made by its chair, Baroness [Heather] Hallett, following criteria set out in the Inquiry Rules 2006.
The inquiry said it does not comment on individual applications for core participant status.
8 December 2022
Cabinet Office silent on blackout reports because of ‘national security’
The government is refusing to release documents which could show what measures it is taking – if any – to protect disabled people who rely on medical equipment in their own homes, in the event of power blackouts this winter.
Disability News Service (DNS) has been trying since October to secure details of any government plans to protect disabled people who need electricity to run lifesaving medical equipment such as ventilators and dialysis machines in the event of three-hour blackouts this winter.
But three government departments – the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities – have already refused to say if they have drawn up plans.
Now the Cabinet Office has joined them, refusing to release any details of ministerial meetings on preparing for possible winter blackouts, which are likely to have included any plans for how to protect disabled people with a critical need for electricity.
The government’s response to the energy security emergency is being coordinated by Oliver Dowden, chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, who was appointed to that role on 25 October and, says the Cabinet Office, “has been kept closely informed of energy security work since then”.
In response to a DNS freedom of information request, the Cabinet Office said that it did hold information about ministerial meetings (and supporting material) held to prepare for winter blackouts.
But it said it was refusing to release the information under section 24 of the Freedom of Information Act, which relates to “safeguarding national security”.
The Cabinet Office said in its response: “Whilst there is a definite public interest in matters related to national security, it is important that this sensitive information is protected so as not to unduly enhance the level of risk posed to energy security this winter.
“We remain firmly of the opinion that sufficient information has already been communicated to the public on this winter’s energy outlook by the Electricity System Operation, the Gas System Operation, BEIS, and others.
“Therefore, taking into account all the circumstances of this case, we have determined that the balance of the public interest favours withholding this information.”
DNS is appealing this decision, as it has heard from numerous organisations concerned that “sufficient information” has not been shared with disabled people who rely on lifesaving equipment in their homes.
The Association of Directors of Public Health is among organisations that have raised concerns, and told DNS last month that it was not aware of any “national contingency plans” that have been put in place by the government to protect those who rely on power for critical medical equipment in their homes.
An NHS integrated care board has told DNS that no national guidance or support around the issue has been sent to the NHS in England by DHSC.
And disabled people and charities that represent people with long-term health conditions have also told DNS they are concerned about the lack of information coming from the government and other organisations.
Government departments have repeatedly referred to priority services registers, which are maintained by individual power companies, but the energy industry has itself been unable to explain what protection the registers will offer those who sign up, other than the usual “extra help, including advance notice of planned power cuts and priority support”.
The industry has made clear that customers on the register will not be exempt from any blackouts, and that those who need a continuous supply of electricity for medical reasons “should seek advice from their local health service provider”.
Any other support they might be able to secure is not yet clear.
The emergency winter power cuts are said to be unlikely but possible.
8 December 2022
Bus company breached access laws… and then lied about what it had done
A public transport provider breached access laws by refusing to allow a wheelchair-user to board one of its buses, and then lied about its driver’s actions.
Accessible transport campaigner Doug Paulley is taking legal action against Stagecoach after he was refused entry onto one of its buses as he and his brother tried to travel from Inverness in the Highlands of Scotland for a trip to a whisky distillery in the nearby town of Elgin.
Although the Stagecoach Bluebird vehicle was wheelchair-accessible, and the wheelchair space in the bus was available, the driver refused to allow Paulley to travel.
As he has faced repeated discrimination and service failures in his attempts to access public transport, Paulley always records video of his journeys.
Disability News Service has seen the recording of the Inverness incident, which shows the driver initially claiming that Paulley’s wheelchair was too big, before admitting that the reason he could not board was because he was unable to remove the temporary seat that occupied the wheelchair space.
It also shows him having detailed discussions with the company’s control room on his mobile phone about what action he should take.
It is unclear whether he does not know how to remove the temporary seat or whether it is not possible to remove it.
Paulley turned down the driver’s offer of waiting for an accessible taxi because he said he wanted to take advantage of his legal right to access the bus, but also because he finds taxis “dangerous, uncomfortable and unreliable, especially in remote Scotland”, with only about 50 accessible taxis and private hire vehicles available across the entire Highlands.
He said: “The taxi roof is always really low, so I have to travel hunched over with the back of my neck and shoulders pressed against the ceiling.
“I nearly always find that I am incredibly uncomfortable and not strapped in properly.”
He was later forced to wait for another Stagecoach bus, which had a more accessible layout and which he and his brother boarded successfully.
The original bus followed behind and later in the journey had to leave another wheelchair-user at a bus stop because of the same access problem.
Stagecoach has insisted that it did not breach the Equality Act and its duty to make reasonable adjustments for disabled passengers.
In response to a legal letter from Paulley about the incident on 15 October, Stagecoach’s solicitors insisted that he had not been allowed on board because the driver “explained to you that he considered that it was not safe for you to travel on the Vehicle due to the size of your wheelchair”.
Responding to this letter, Paulley said Stagecoach had “quite clearly acted in bad faith, lying about the supposed reason that they refused me transport on that bus”.
He told Stagecoach’s solicitor: “My brother and I were prevented from getting on that bus, causing immense stress and stuffing up our long-held and anticipated plan for our holiday, simply because your client was not set up to accept wheelchair users on your bus, in contrary to moral, civil and criminal law obligations.”
And he said Stagecoach had “responded with hostility and dishonesty” to his legal claim.
Stagecoach claims it took “all reasonable steps to prevent its driver’s alleged failure to make reasonable adjustments by providing significant training to its drivers, having clear policies on how to deal with disabled passengers and then fully investigating the matter upon receipt of a complaint”.
And it told Paulley, through its solicitor, that its driver had “sought to comply with our client’s policies by having concerns for your safety, offering a taxi and waiting with you until the second vehicle arrived”.
Paulley told Disability News Service that he believed Stagecoach was regularly sending out vehicles “that can’t actually be used by wheelchair-users, because they leave a seat installed in the wheelchair space [that cannot be removed].
“This is disgraceful and illegal, and more to the point, highly immoral.
“All local and scheduled bus services have had to be accessible to wheelchair-users, including those travelling spontaneously, for years now; yet Bluebird were quite content to knowingly send a vehicle out in a condition that meant wheelchair-users, myself and another, were prevented from travelling.”
He said this was “blatantly discriminatory” and the company had later “lied about the stated reason that I was prevented from travelling”.
He said: “To attempt to lie one’s way out of the consequences of one’s illegal discriminatory action makes everything so much worse, and makes me even more determined to hold them to justice.”
Paulley has previously shown that a different company was breaching the law by failing to ensure that such spaces can be accessed easily and refusing to allow wheelchair-users to “turn up and go” on its services.
That case led to the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency warning that operators would face “tough action” if they fail to comply with the law on wheelchair spaces.
Any buses that have been adapted to be compliant with Public Service Vehicle Accessibility Regulations must provide a wheelchair space and make that space available to wheelchair-users.
Separate laws state that a driver is committing a criminal offence* if he or she does not allow a wheelchair-user to access that space, if it is not occupied by another disabled passenger and the bus is not full.
But if the seat could not be removed for a physical reason, it is possible that a criminal offence was committed by Stagecoach, the driver and Stagecoach managers under section 175 of the Equality Act.
A spokesperson for Stagecoach Bluebird said: “We want our services to be as accessible as possible for everyone and we have made millions of pounds of investment in our fleet and other areas to assist passengers who have specific requirements.
“In addition, our drivers receive regular training on helping disabled passengers to travel safely with us.
“In the event that our services are not able to safely carry a customer using a wheelchair or mobility aid, we will always provide a free wheelchair accessible taxi.
“We do take complaints about our services very seriously and will always carry out a full investigation into any claims of this nature.”
A Police Scotland spokesperson said: “We were made aware of a dispute between a man and a bus driver at Falcon Square in Inverness around 10.10 am on Saturday, 15 October.
“Officers attended and provided assistance. The man was able to travel on another bus a short time later and enquiries into the incident are ongoing.”
*This is a breach of the Public Service Vehicles (Conduct of Drivers, Inspectors, Conductors and Passengers) (Amendment) Regulations 2002, and contravention of this regulation is an offence under the Public Passenger Vehicles Act 1981
8 December 2022
Media ‘still use disablist language and blame disabled victims’ when covering crime
News stories about crimes against disabled people in the mainstream media still too often use disablist language, blame the victim, and portray the disabled person as a “burden”, according to a new report.
Inclusion London’s report, Disability, Crime and Hate Crime in the News, examined news coverage of 300 crimes against disabled people over the last 18 years, and was published to mark this year’s international day of disabled people on 3 December.
Although the report found that news coverage of such crimes across the UK had improved since 2005, including a drop in the frequency of disablist language, it still found “many stories contained disablist concepts and portrayals”.
As recently as this year, the research uncovered news articles about crimes against disabled people that contained “disablist language, assumptions, infantilization, and the same attitudes which lead to societal discrimination” against disabled people.
The report says that most of the examples are likely to be due to “unconscious biases and perceptions prevalent within society, resulting from historic and cultural values and beliefs built up over the years”.
It also provides examples of how journalists can write their articles in a less disablist way.
Among its concerns are news stories in which disabled murder victims have been described as a “burden” to the relatives who killed them, often using quotes from living relatives about how “difficult” they were.
It found many articles where “language choices, quotes used from professionals involved in the case, or the general write-up of the case shifted some or most of the blame for the crime onto the victim or downplayed the impact of the crime”.
Disablist language was often used to describe the perpetrators of crimes, such as “deranged”, “psychotic killer” and “unable to deal with their demons”.
And disabled victims are frequently portrayed as “helpless, weak, vulnerable, and unable to do anything to defend themselves”.
The report concludes: “Disabled victims of crime deserve to be written about in respectful and considerate ways that do not perpetuate disablist ideas.
“We hope that this report gives writers of all public facing media, but particularly those within the criminal justice system and reporting on crimes against Disabled people, some material to review their own publications, what stories they decide to place value on, and how they choose to cover them.”
It also suggests ways in which the media can engage with disabled people – including through seeking their services as paid consultants or to provide training – to improve the way they write their stories, as a way of “dismantling unconscious disablism in their work”.
Louise Holden, manager of Inclusion London’s disability hate crime project and the report’s co-author, said: “For any journalist that really wants to stamp out disablism in the media, this report has clear examples of good practice.
“What is written about us matters. Disabled victims deserve better.”
8 December 2022
Other disability-related stories covered by mainstream media this week
Some of England’s major cities have no plans for providing wheelchair-accessible homes, the BBC has found. Three of the 10 largest cities have no requirements beyond the national guidelines, which only say homes should allow wheelchair-users through doors and hallways on the entrance level. Disabled people say they face long housing searches, huge extra costs and poor homes which harm their health: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62638644
Worsening health in Britain has led the number of new disability benefit claims to double in the past year, according to a report. The Institute for Fiscal Studies said claims for personal independence payment (PIP) had doubled to 30,000 a month between the summer of 2021 and July this year, with no sign of slowing. Standing in stark contrast to years of relatively little change in the number of PIP awards made by the Department for Work and Pensions, it said the recent increase in recipients had taken place across medical conditions and ages, with the fastest rise among teenagers, where claim rates have tripled: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/dec/06/cost-of-living-keeps-depression-rates-above-pre-pandemic-levels-says-ons
MPs are to open an inquiry into assisted suicide in the new year, looking in particular at the experience of other countries that have changed their laws. The health and social care committee will hear evidence from medical professionals, campaigners and the public, and will make recommendations to the government: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/dec/05/mps-assisted-dying-inquiry-next-year
A Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) employee was unfairly dismissed after his depression caused him to look at strangers’ records without permission. He was fired after accessing the records for reasons he couldn’t explain. An employment tribunal found his employer had repeatedly ignored his claims he had depression and mental health problems which affected his decisions. He had worked for DWP for 39 years with a perfect record, and was looking forward to partial retirement: https://www.grimsbytelegraph.co.uk/news/local-news/depressed-dwp-employee-unfairly-dismissed-6163278
8 December 2022
News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com
