‘Devastating’ dossier shows DWP is in ‘state of crisis’
The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) is a failing organisation in a “state of crisis” and faces a “near collapse” of its benefits systems, according to a “devastating” dossier of evidence from its own staff.
The Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) this week accused DWP of “deliberate neglect”, after its members said they believed benefit claimants in vulnerable situations were “falling through the gaps” in the system.
The union’s dossier details multiple concerns about universal credit (UC), with one manager describing staff facing “completely overwhelming” workloads.
In one of the most concerning warnings, a DWP staff member who works in counter-fraud, compliance and debt, said: “We are also experiencing more threats of suicide by claimants, in some cases already attempted, sometimes successfully.”
A universal credit case manager told their union: “The absolute bare minimum is getting done and vulnerable customers are falling through the gaps.”
Another PCS member warned: “Dealing with the move to Universal Credit on top of an already unsustainable workload will end in vulnerable claimants falling through the cracks.
“Who knows what will happen to them.”
The union pointed to serious understaffing across the department, a failure to recruit and retain staff, poor working conditions, and low pay.
The dossier was delivered to DWP as Disability News Service (DNS) published its latest report highlighting serious safeguarding concerns around universal credit (see separate story).
That story describes how senior mental health figures told an inquest last month that DWP’s actions were having a significant “debilitating” impact on service-users, while this impact of DWP’s actions on people with mental distress was a “national issue”.
Only last month, DNS reported how conditions at the Oxford jobcentre became so stressful that 15 members of a team of 23 work coaches quit within 12 months, with at least eight experiencing a significant collapse in their mental health, due to a huge, sudden increase in workload in late 2021.
Also last month, DNS reported on a “deeply troubling” government report that ministers kept hidden for four years and which revealed significant flaws at the heart of the universal credit system, and how its design was “inadequate for vulnerable groups”.
The PCS dossier contains multiple warnings that the staffing problems within DWP, and the way the department is being run, could drastically affect disabled claimants, and in fact already have.
Many of those who gave evidence to the union spoke of huge backlogs in dealing with messages on claimants’ universal credit online journals.
A universal credit case manager told the union: “The absolute bare minimum is getting done and vulnerable customers are falling through the gaps.”
One work coach added: “We are dealing with more and more people with serious mental health conditions, and have only very basic of training for this.”
A newly-qualified work coach said: “We are hugely understaffed. I am shocked at how we are being pressurised into sanctioning our customers instead of offering a whole load of assistances available to help them get out of Universal Credit and back into work.
“We are expected to sanction people for ridiculous reasons.”
One PCS member said employment and support allowance (ESA) was “a ticking time bomb due to the lack of experienced staff” and warned that “millions of ESA claims are incorrect and these vulnerable customers could be owed thousands”.
Within the PCS dossier is evidence from an autistic staff member who said his reasonable adjustment of working two days a week from home had been “stolen away” due to staffing issues.
Many PCS members spoke of their “unsustainable” workload and the stress and depression they now experienced because of these staffing issues.
One said: ‘I have worked for DWP for over 40 years and to be honest I am totally worn out physically and mentally.
“My health has suffered enormously, having to struggle with always being understaffed.
“This is because of constant pressure, poor pay and staff leaving to go [to] better jobs with better pay and less stress. So I have resigned… I felt I had no other option.”
Another said: “The level of staffing for service delivery in my office is astonishingly low, stressful and unsustainable.
“The levels of staff leaving, sickness etc are by far the worst I’ve ever seen. I feel unsafe at times and under considerable pressure.”
On Tuesday, the PCS dossier was handed to Peter Schofield, DWP permanent secretary, and it contains a sample of more than 250 pieces of evidence collected from members who work within the department.
The union warned that DWP was currently running at 30,000 below required staffing levels, and it called for an urgent meeting with Schofield and work and pensions secretary Mel Stride.
The evidence compiled by PCS came after an email was sent out in early October following concerns raised on the union’s website about “staffing chaos”, and which asked members how this was affecting them.
The union’s DWP group president, Martin Cavanagh, said the union had been “overwhelmed by the power and volume of the responses”.
He said: “The responses contained in this document demonstrate that DWP is a failing organisation in a state of crisis.
“This crisis has been created by a government whose policies are vindictive towards claimants that need support and not the punishment that our members are expected to dish out.
“The members’ testimonies demonstrate that the staffing crisis in DWP is creating an epidemic of mental ill health amongst staff and failing to protect the most vulnerable citizens in society.”
He added: “Many of society’s most marginalised are becoming desperate.
“We call on ministers to read as much of this dossier as they can stomach, take responsibility, and provide our members with the tools to do the job and the standard of living they have earned.”
DWP yesterday (Wednesday) declined to provide a response from Mel Stride to the dossier, or to say if the department accepted that there were problems with staffing levels, safeguarding flaws and unsafe conditions for both staff and claimants, including with universal credit and ESA.
It also declined to provide a response from Stride to the concerns in the dossier about universal credit and the risk of “vulnerable” claimants “falling through the gaps”.
DWP also refused to say if Stride would meet with the union, and how he responded to the union’s claim that DWP was a failing organisation in a state of crisis and that this crisis had been created by a government whose policies were “vindictive” towards claimants who need support.
Instead, the department insisted that its priority was ensuring a supportive and compassionate service for claimants, while it had safeguards in place to protect “vulnerable” customers.
It claimed it prioritised lower-paid employees in its 2023-24 pay award, and that its recruitment campaigns remained ongoing, while it provided a range of support to help staff with their physical health and mental, social and financial wellbeing.
A DWP spokesperson said in a statement: “We are committed to supporting the wellbeing of our staff, and provide access to a comprehensive range of assistance for their physical and mental health.
“We have recruitment plans in place to maintain key services – providing excellent opportunities for existing staff and new recruits who are playing a vital role in our next generation welfare reforms to help thousands back into jobs, grow the economy and drive down inflation.”
7 December 2023
DWP failings that helped trigger suicide ‘are a national issue’, NHS manager tells coroner
The actions of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) are having a significant “debilitating” impact on service-users, particularly those trying to claim universal credit, senior mental health figures have told an inquest.
One witness said service-users at a mental health trust are often “living on pennies” and “can’t afford to feed themselves properly” because their benefit claims have been rejected, while their mental health is “often made worse by the DWP’s inefficiency”.
Another witness from the trust told the inquest into the death of Kevin Gale – who took his own life on 4 March 2022 – that the “debilitating” impact of DWP’s actions on people with mental distress was a “national issue”.
Disability News Service (DNS) reported last month that coroner Kirsty Gomersal had sent a prevention of future deaths (PFD) letter to work and pensions secretary Mel Stride, warning him that he needed to act to prevent flaws in the universal credit system leading to further deaths.
She had been told how Gale, a self-employed window-cleaner who was only able to work sporadically in the months before his death, took his own life after becoming overwhelmed by the universal credit application process.
But DNS has now secured a recording of the inquest from the coroner’s office, and it details the depth of concerns within Cumbria, Northumberland, Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation Trust about the failing service provided by DWP.
It is just the latest evidence of serious safeguarding flaws at the heart of the department, particularly around universal credit and the department’s over-stretched workforce.
This week, DNS is also reporting how a “devastating” dossier of evidence compiled by the PCS union – based on evidence from its DWP members – shows how the department is a failing organisation in a “state of crisis” which faces a “near collapse” of its benefits systems.
Only last month, DNS reported how conditions at the Oxford jobcentre became so stressful that 15 members of a team of 23 work coaches quit within a year, with at least eight experiencing a significant collapse in their mental health due to a sudden, huge increase in workload in late 2021.
Also last month, DNS reported on a “deeply troubling” government report that ministers kept hidden for four years and which revealed significant flaws at the heart of the universal credit system, and how its design was “inadequate for vulnerable groups”.
The coroner who heard the inquest into Gale’s death decided to send a PFD to Stride after hearing evidence from several witnesses from Cumbria, Northumberland, Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation Trust.
They each described how Gale’s long-term anxiety had been repeatedly triggered by the problems he faced applying for universal credit.
The inquest heard that he had a history of anxiety and depression stretching back several decades, as well as obsessive compulsive disorder, and had been sectioned for six weeks in November 2021.
The inquest heard how Gale – who was well-liked and was supported by family and friends – had repeatedly told mental health professionals from the trust about the anxiety being caused by his universal credit claim, in the weeks leading up to his suicide.
Although other factors – such as a recent diabetes diagnosis and other physical health problems – were also heightening his anxiety, the inquest heard that universal credit was his key concern.
One witness from the trust said, in a written statement: “Kevin’s anxiety had been unfortunately exacerbated by the process of having to apply for universal credit. He couldn’t cope with the paperwork.”
She said he had received a text from DWP the day before he died, asking him to contact the department, which “appeared to have escalated his anxiety”.
A mental health duty worker who spoke to Gale on the phone the day before he died said his main concern had been universal credit “and his worry that he was being fraudulent in trying to claim benefits”.
Dr Judith Whiteley, an associate specialist psychiatrist with the trust, said Gale had told her during a face-to-face appointment on 2 March – two days before his death – that he had been due to receive a call from DWP the following day so he could “at last secure some social welfare benefits”.
She said he had been advised several times to contact Citizen’s Advice or The Lighthouse community mental health hub, while she had waited with him “in a very long queue”, trying to get through to DWP on the phone, but eventually had to abandon the attempt because his appointment had ended.
The coroner was only able to hear from the trust about Gale’s universal credit claim – and not DWP – because the concerns were raised for the first time during the inquest and so no-one from the department had been asked to attend the hearing.
As Dr Whiteley ended her evidence, the coroner asked her if there was anything she would like to add.
She told her: “The DWP. The hurdles that our service-users have to go through to get any financial support.
“Kevin struggled with this for several weeks, they bombarded him with forms to complete.
“They weren’t accessible on the telephone that day… It’s a recurring theme within our service with our patients.”
She added: “The amount of paperwork they subject our patients to, and you can imagine if you’re severely depressed, if you can’t concentrate, if your memory is poor, being asked to complete a 20-page document is essentially impossible.
“Most of my service-users fortunately have the support of a family member to get that completed, so there’s the paperwork, there’s the endless queues on the telephone to get through, to speak to somebody.”
She said one of her service-users with a “major mental disorder” had been forced to drive across the Pennines to Darlington to be assessed, while she was “regularly hearing about service-users that have been declined benefits”.
Dr Whiteley said service-users’ mental health was “often made worse by the DWP’s inefficiency”.
She said: “It perpetuates their illnesses, their depressions continue, their anxieties continue, and they don’t respond to medication as well as they should, the ability to function from day-to-day.
“Often, they’re living on pennies. They can’t afford to feed themselves properly.”
Her colleague, Anna Williams, the trust’s group nurse director for north Cumbria, told the inquest that the concerns raised by Dr Whiteley were “increasingly” a “common factor” and were “a national issue”.
She said the trust’s crisis teams had been forced to start their own foodbanks three years ago.
And she said she had asked for a DWP representative to join meetings of the director of public health’s north Cumbria suicide prevention group.
Asked by the coroner if a PFD report sent to DWP would be useful in helping prevent suicides, she said: “I think it’s really important that we address this issue. It’s just so debilitating for people.”
DWP continues to claim that it provides a supportive and compassionate service, and a strong financial safety net, while funding support for universal credit applications through its Help to Claim service, provided by Citizens Advice and funded by DWP.
It says it has appointed more than 30 advanced customer support senior leaders (ACSSLs) across Britain since 2020, and that their role is to develop relationships with other organisations that provide support to claimants in local communities.
And it says that the ACSSL who covers Cumbria has established links with the Cumbria and Lancashire suicide prevention groups.
A DWP spokesperson said: “Our condolences are with Mr Gale’s family.
“We will review the coroner’s report and respond in due course.”
7 December 2023
MPs say government’s disability strategy is ‘a strategy in name only’
Cross-party MPs have delivered a powerful attack on the government’s discredited National Disability Strategy (NDS), describing it as “a disability strategy in name only”.
A report published yesterday (Wednesday) by the Commons women and equalities committee said the strategy was merely “a list consisting mainly of pre-existing departmental actions with minimal strategic thinking behind how those actions interact”.
The cross-party committee’s report echoes concerns raised by disabled people after the strategy’s publication in summer 2021, and will be particularly embarrassing for Justin Tomlinson, the much-criticised Conservative MP who was minister for disabled people at the time.
Leading disabled campaigners described the strategy on its publication in 2021 as “all front and nothing behind it”, and “full of tweaks and not much substance”, while analysis showed it provided just 28p of new funding for every disabled person in the UK.
This week’s publication – the first of three reports that will follow the committee’s inquiry into the NDS – describes the strategy as a “list of un-coordinated and largely pre-existing short-term policies”.
And it says that only a strategy that integrated policy areas such as education, health, social care, employment and transport would have a “truly transformational effect on the lives of disabled people”.
In its evidence to the committee, Inclusion London said the actions laid out in the strategy “could not be called strategic or transformative”, while Disability Rights UK said it failed to provide “the kind of systemic challenge that was needed to the inequality that the strategy had set out quite clearly”.
The report calls for the government to collaborate with disabled people to develop a 10-year strategy, with an action plan for the first five years that outlined “clear targets and timescales for delivery”.
Again mirroring previous concerns raised by disabled people’s organisations (DPOs), the report says that the government’s process of engaging with DPOs when developing the strategy was “not as good as ministers claimed”.
It contrasts the fate of the government’s DPO Forum – which was abandoned by Tomlinson after just four meetings in 2020 – with its engagement with non-user-led disability charities.
The government met with the Disability Charities Consortium 10 times in the run-up to the publication of the NDS in July 2021, with the consortium’s co-chairs having access to Disability Unit officials throughout the strategy’s development and charity chief executives able to read an early draft.
The committee said the government “needs to improve its engagement with disabled groups, to listen to and act on what disabled people want, if its policies on improving their lives are to be effective”.
The report says ministers should set up a new national advisory group of the DPO Forum England (whose members are all leading DPOs) and the chairs of the government’s regional stakeholder networks to “review disability policy proposals, advise ministers on key issues, and develop, implement and monitor the NDS”.
And it calls for the government’s Disability Unit to have the final say on all disability policy “to ensure that the whole of government works towards the same long-term strategic objectives”, with the power to challenge ministers in other departments.
The high court ruled the National Disability Strategy was unlawful in January 2022 because its consultation process was unlawful, with the government then pausing 14 policies it said were directly connected to the strategy, while continuing progress on another 100.
The committee’s report is also highly critical of the current minister for disabled people, Tom Pursglove*, for failing to set up a mechanism to monitor progress on the 100 actions, and allowing the government to remain “unaccountable to the very groups who relied on the implementation of those policies – disabled people”.
It says that this “failure to update disabled people on those actions that remained ongoing only served to exacerbate confusion and anxiety”, while the government’s decision to appeal the high court judgment “created many months of uncertainty and frustration for disabled people and their representative organisations”.
The Court of Appeal eventually overturned the high court’s judgment earlier this year.
The report also criticises the government’s failure to send a representative to the UN in Geneva in August for a public examination of its progress since being found guilty of grave and systematic violations of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD).
The UN committee found in November 2016 that the UK government had discriminated against disabled people on the right to an adequate standard of living and social protection, work and employment, and independent living.
The new report says the government has made “little to no progress” against the committee’s recommendations.
It says the government’s refusal to attend the meeting in Geneva was “disrespectful to both the UN committee and disabled people” and “sends the wrong message, both nationally and internationally,” about the UK’s commitment to upholding the rights of disabled people.
It adds: “The Government should set out why it refused to attend the meeting, how and by when it will implement the UN Committee’s recommendations, and what specifically it is doing to ensure that the whole of Government follows the principles of the treaty.”
Svetlana Kotova, director of campaigns and justice at Inclusion London, welcomed the committee’s report.
She said: “We knew from the start the so-called National Disability Strategy was a shambolic PR exercise with no real intent to address the fundamental injustice and inequality we as disabled people face.
“The government chose not to talk to us and then defended this position in court.
“We are pleased to see the committee saw NDS for what it is.
“This report is the first report I have seen that talks about disabled people’s organisations and the need to engage with DPOs in such an extensive way.
“And we welcome the strong criticism from the committee of the failure to make progress towards implementing the recommendations from the UN inquiry, which found welfare and austerity policies leading to grave and systematic violations of disabled people’s rights.”
She said some of the government’s latest policies – such as reforms to the work capability assessment, increased conditionality for benefit claimants, and changes announced in the disability benefits white paper in March – would cause “further harms”.
Kotova said: “We urgently need the government to listen to disabled people and align its policies with its obligations under UNCRPD.”
Caroline Nokes, the Conservative MP who chairs the committee, said: “It is clear disabled people want more influence over the strategies, action plans, and policies affecting them.
“Ministers need to work much more proactively with disabled groups and develop the National Disability Strategy beyond short-term actions that were already in progress.
“The government needs to listen to the concerns that disabled people and their representative organisations had with the strategy and work closely with them to deliver meaningful, long-lasting improvements to the lives of disabled people.”
The government will now be expected to respond to the committee’s report in the coming months.
*Pursglove left his post today (Thursday) to be an immigration minister in the Home Office
7 December 2023
Disabled people ‘will feel the sharp end’ of Cleverly’s immigration ‘crackdown’
Disabled people who rely on care workers are likely to “feel the sharp end” of the government’s planned changes to the immigration system, campaigners have warned.
The new home secretary, James Cleverly, announced the government’s latest “crackdown” on Monday, with plans to reduce immigration numbers through a new five-point plan.
This will include new rules to stop overseas care workers bringing family dependants* with them to the UK, and ensuring that only care firms in England that are regulated by the Care Quality Commission will be able to sponsor visas.
About 120,000 dependants accompanied 100,000 care workers and senior care workers in the year to September 2023, he said.
The government will also increase the annual immigration health surcharge from £624 to £1,035.
Although Cleverly also announced an increase of a third in the minimum salary a skilled worker needs to earn to secure a visa – so it will be £38,700 from next spring – this will not apply to those arriving on health and social care visas.
Care workers are currently on the “shortage occupation list”, which means they must earn at least £20,960 a year.
Svetlana Kotova, director of campaigns and justice at Inclusion London, said: “Disabled people will feel the sharp end of the changes to migration rules.
“We already hear from many who stay without support because of staff shortages.
“Changes to migration rules show how the contribution of those who come to work in health and social care is not valued.
“We want those who provide support to disabled people to be paid a good wage, to be able to bring and live with their families.
“Instead of imposing more restrictions on migrant workers, the government should invest in social care so care workers are paid the wage that reflects the huge value of their work.”
John Evans, a pioneer of the independent living movement, said he was concerned that the changes could make it harder for disabled people who employ personal assistants (PAs) from other countries.
He said there was an “already dwindling PA market following Brexit, the pandemic and now the rise in the cost of living”.
He said: “It has never been more difficult finding new staff in my experience of 40 years of employing my own PAs.
“This puts an enormous burden on us as well as an increase in stress because of the worries about remaining living independently that could result in the loss of our freedom.
“Now we are in a position of limbo until this situation gains some clarity.”
Donald O’Neal, an adult social care user for more than 35 years, and author of The Lack of Care Act 2014, accused the government of “electioneering with disabled people’s wellbeing”.
He said the home secretary was acting with “little regard to the current context of a large worker shortage in the social care industry”.
He said: “At this point, with such a large shortage of care workers, the UK government needs to make it easier, and more attractive, for foreign workers to want to come and work in the social care industry, not harder.
“The Care Act 2014 has a significant focus on preventing people’s needs from becoming worse.
“If we see a large decrease in foreign workers coming to the UK to work in the social care industry because of these new immigration rule changes, then that will have the opposite effect.
“Many people will continue to go without the care they need, and their health needs will become worse.
“This could see some people needing more nursing intervention and even being admitted to hospital.
“With about 150,000 job vacancies in the social care industry, now is not the time to place restrictions on foreign workers wanting to come to the UK and work in the industry.”
Christina McAnea, general secretary of the public service union Unison, said the government’s announcement delivered “the final hammer blow to our crumbling social care system”, and would “sacrifice migrant care workers and risk a total collapse of the UK’s care system, just to appease extremist Tory backbenchers”.
She said that “any plans to curb the migrant care workforce will cause utter disaster” and that not allowing migrant care workers to bring dependants with them to the UK “will do exactly that”.
She predicted that staff vacancies would “soar” from the current number of 152,000.
Cleverly said in the Commons that he was “determined to crack down on those who try to jump the queue and exploit our immigration system” and that his five-point plan would “deliver the biggest ever reduction in net migration”.
He said he was taking “decisive action to reduce legal migration”.
When asked about the potential damage to the care sector, he said: “Although an individual with a family might be dissuaded because of the restrictions on family members, someone who does not have those family commitments will almost certainly be willing to put themselves forward, so we do not envisage a significant reduction in demand because of the changes.”
But Labour’s shadow home secretary, Yvette Cooper, told him: “Social care visas have gone up from 3,500 a year to more than 100,000 a year because the government have failed for years to heed warnings about recruitment and retention in social care.
“They halved the budget for social care workforce recruitment and support back in the spring, and they are still not listening and still refusing to adopt Labour’s plan for a proper workforce strategy for social care, including professional standards and a fair pay agreement.”
Meanwhile, legal firm Leigh Day has published a new guide (PDF) to help disabled people know their rights to support during lengthy stays in hospital or respite care.
The guide, commissioned by Inclusion London, followed the case of Cameron Mitchell, a disabled man who challenged cuts to his benefits which threatened to leave him without the care he needed while in hospital.
Thanks to Leigh Day, his claim was resolved.
*The government says a dependant can be “a spouse, partner, child, grandchild, parent, or someone who depends on you for care”
7 December 2023
State of accessible transport is ‘unjust and unacceptable’, says report
The current state of accessible transport is “unjust and unacceptable”, and the government’s efforts to offer “equal access for disabled people” by 2030 have “stalled”, according to a major new report.
Are We There Yet?, released yesterday (Wednesday) by the disabled people’s organisation (DPO) Transport for All, shows that access barriers are “rife” across every form of transport, and at every stage of a journey.
The report details the findings of a survey carried out during 2022 and 2023, with more than 500 disabled people in England asked about journeys they had made between September 2021 and September 2022.
It covers public transport (bus, train, tram, metro and light rail), private transport (cars, taxis and private hire vehicles), and active travel (walking, wheeling and cycling).
Among its findings, Transport for All (TfA) says in the report that disabled people make far fewer journeys than non-disabled people, with an average of just 5.84 journeys per week, a third of the national average of 17 trips a week.
But those disabled people who wanted to make more journeys said they would make an average of 10.84 journeys a week if transport was fully accessible.
Nearly half of respondents (44 per cent) said they thought that the accessibility of transport and streets would worsen in the next 10 years, while only 28 per cent felt it would improve.
With buses, 51 per cent of respondents experienced issues with priority seating and spaces, such as seats being occupied or not clearly defined, or there being too few of them.
On trains, the most frequent barrier to travel was cost, with 65 per cent of respondents saying this had been a barrier in the last 12 months, while 49 per cent reported overcrowding of trains and stations and 43 per cent highlighted the lack of step-free access or level boarding.
With taxis and private hire vehicles, the most frequent barrier was again cost (with 64 per cent of respondents), while more than a third (34 per cent) said there were not enough wheelchair-accessible vehicles and 29 per cent highlighted the negative attitude of drivers.
One wheelchair-user said: “Taxi turned up with broken ramp despite the booking having been specifically for a wheelchair user.
“I was unable to get to my appointment on time and I had to re-book. This meant that I waited an extra five months for urgent medical treatment. It made me feel angry and upset.”
Seven in 10 survey respondents (71 per cent) said they would like to use environmentally-friendly forms of transport more often – such as walking, wheeling, cycling or taking the bus – but were prevented from doing so by a lack of accessibility and availability.
TfA said transport has the highest greenhouse emissions of any UK sector of the economy, so investing in accessible public infrastructure “is crucial in tackling the climate crisis, and removing barriers would allow millions more journeys to be made sustainable each year”.
Nearly two-thirds of respondents (62 per cent) said they had to plan every journey to make sure it was safe, but the information they needed to do this was often unavailable, inaccurate, or inaccessible.
And 77 per cent of respondents said poor pavement surfaces had caused a barrier to them while they walked or wheeled in the previous 12 months, including problems with bumps, potholes, tree roots, broken tiles, and narrow width.
This was the most frequently-cited barrier of any form of transport.
One respondent said: “The road to my nearest bus stop is in awful repair. I have damaged my wheelchair and nearly fallen out of it due to bad paving.
“I have to go on an alternative route which takes twice as long to get me to the bus stop. And my chair is now damaged.”
Among its many recommendations, the report calls for the government to investigate why progress towards its 2030 target of “equal access for disabled people” – laid out in its 2018 Inclusive Transport Strategy – has stalled.
It also calls for “meaningful” engagement with disabled people and DPOs by government and transport bodies; a new regulator to enforce the right to accessible transport under equality laws, and gather data on compliance; and ring-fenced investment in “accessible and reliable public transport options”.
And the report calls for a “significant and swift change to the approach to concessions for travel for disabled people, overhauling the eligibility criteria, and standardising concessions across modes to ensure equity and fairness”.
Caroline Stickland, TfA’s chief executive, said: “It is unacceptable that millions of us are still prevented from going out, seeing loved ones, accessing work, education, and medical care because of inaccessible transport.
“It is now the responsibility of decision makers to listen to our experiences and remove the discriminatory barriers that are holding our community back.”
7 December 2023
Report exposes lack of adjustments for neurodivergent prisoners
A new report has exposed how often neurodivergent people in the criminal justice system fail to receive the reasonable adjustments they need.
The report by User Voice, a charity led by ex-offenders, describes the “unedited” experiences of neurodivergent people in prisons, the probation service, the courts and the police system.
For the study (PDF)*, commissioned by NHS England, User Voice interviewed 104 service-users – all of them diagnosed or self-diagnosed as neurodivergent – across 11 prisons in England, as well as surveying 250 neurodivergent service-users.
Those who took part in the study included prisoners who were autistic, had ADHD, Tourette’s, dyslexia or acquired brain injuries.
Only 15 of the 104 service-users said they been offered adjustments around their neurodiversity while in prison.
These adjustments included being given single cells, being let out for a walk when they felt overwhelmed or frustrated, having access to the gym to burn energy, being provided with noise-cancelling headphones, or being given plates that allowed different foods to be kept separate.
Many interviewees spoke of the lack of access to health care and mental health services, and those with ADHD particularly felt the whole criminal justice system was dismissive about their condition “and treated them accordingly”.
Interviewees said adjustments and support were not delivered systematically by all staff, and some staff deliberately ignored adjustments.
One said: “I cut my stomach. And they literally… they just called me pathetic.”
Some of those who were interviewed shared experiences of “provocation and abuse” from prison staff, and officers not always believing them when they disclosed their neurodiversity.
One 63-year-old, who was autistic and had ADHD, said: “Out of all the staff I’ve known in all the prisons I’ve been in, so thousands of staff… there’s only, I would say, five members of staff in all these years that I actually got a lot of time for.
“They actually went out of their way to try and help, and then they’re ridiculed by staff for helping me… ‘Are you going to help the spastic today Mel?’”
Three interviewees spoke positively about a “neurodiverse wing” at Pentonville prison in north London, where it is less crowded, there is more freedom, and staff have a better understanding of neurodivergent prisoners.
But interviewees said there were not enough staff in prisons who were qualified to understand neurodiversity, or enough opportunities to be assessed or screened for neurodiversity.
One said: “I need help. I need specialist help. I should not just be slammed in here all the time.
“If someone was to speak to me and give me some medication to chill me out I’d be fucking right.”
Another interviewee, who is autistic, with ADHD and other conditions, said he had been “coming to prison from the young age until now” and “every time they send me to prison I always come out worse”.
Most of those interviewed spoke of the “ignorance, lack of information and misinformation” they encountered, and said that those working in the criminal justice system needed to learn more about neurodiversity and the needs of neurodivergent people.
One autistic man described how one officer who had an autistic sister “knew how to deal with me” after he mentioned that he was autistic and that he was then “a lot better and I’ve got on with him ever since”.
Most of those questioned said courts had made no adjustments for them.
Some said they had wrongly pleaded guilty in court without understanding what it meant because their solicitor had asked them to.
A service-user with learning difficulties had been asked by his solicitor not to speak at a court hearing because of his stammer, while a dyslexic interviewee was told by his solicitor that he did not need to read all the court papers because he was taking longer than usual to read them.
“This resulted in incorrect information being put across to the judge which affected his sentence,” the report says.
Many of those interviewed described how they had been over-medicated throughout their lives, with no other support offered, while many said they were “easily manipulated, coerced, groomed, or susceptible to peer pressure”, which had led them into trouble and contact with the criminal justice system.
More than half of those questioned for the study had experienced abuse in their early life (47 per cent of the men and 76 per cent of the women), and one third had spent time in care before entering the criminal justice system.
More than seven in 10 of the men (71 per cent) and nearly half of the women (47 per cent) said they had been labelled “bad”, “naughty” or “thick” at school.
A third of the women had an acquired brain injury, mostly caused by domestic abuse.
Many of those interviewed said they had lived their entire lives “in crisis” due to neglect, isolation and a lack of understanding or support from their families and education, healthcare, and social care institutions.
Many of the men had turned to drugs and alcohol to cope, and eventually committed crimes such as theft, robbery and assault, while many of the women had been victims of domestic abuse, lost their children to social services, or suffered bereavement, which had led to drug use and crime.
Among the report’s recommendations is for more adjustments to be made for neurodivergent prisoners, such as providing single cells, one-to-one learning, more physical activities, peer support, as well as more thorough and consistent assessments and screening for neurodiversity.
Simon Boddis, chief executive of User Voice, said: “It is hard to look at our report and not to conclude that we as a society are locking up people who are in desperate need of help.”
He added: “Whilst the numbers of neurodiverse individuals in the community stands at one in 20, in prison and on probation it is closer to half.
“This report tells the unedited experience of neurodiverse people in the criminal justice system.
“It is often uncomfortable reading, as people tell us about their lives before prison, which often featured addiction or neglect.
“Once in the system, police and prison staff rarely have the knowledge to help and we see people being punished repeatedly.
“We hope that through this report, the criminal justice system will sit up and listen and make reasonable amendments for a significant proportion of the prison population.”
*‘Not Naughty, Stupid, or Bad’: The Voices of Neurodiverse Service Users in the Criminal Justice System
7 December 2023
Anger over ‘incompetence’ and delays within DWP’s Access to Work scheme
An autistic woman has been left without the workplace support she needs for more than 15 months because of repeated delays and incompetence by the government’s Access to Work scheme.
Laura’s* employer, the autism support charity Autistic Nottingham, says it is “genuinely flabbergasted” at the “incompetence” displayed by Access to Work (AtW).
Her ordeal has emerged as a “devastating” dossier of evidence from DWP union members this week reveals that DWP is a failing organisation in a “state of crisis” (see separate story).
Laura started her new job with Autistic Nottingham in September 2022, and her application for support from AtW was submitted the following month, but she had to work from home while she waited for an assessment.
When she was finally given an appointment for an assessment at the charity’s offices, on 27 March 2023 – five months after she had submitted her application – the assessor failed to turn up, with no explanation provided.
It was only when Laura’s manager called AtW for an explanation that they were told the assessor had been off sick.
A follow-up assessment took place online two days later, and Laura received a letter in April which described the services and equipment AtW would fund.
Autistic Nottingham, which is a disabled people’s organisation, put all of this in place within a month, apart from a specialist chair the assessor had recommended.
This was because the AtW assessor had put the wrong cost on the award, and there was a substantial difference between that figure and the actual cost of buying the chair from the supplier.
For the last six months, Autistic Nottingham’s chief executive, Claire Whyte, has been asking AtW to update this quote so she can go ahead and order the chair.
Every time she contacted AtW to check on progress, she was told the “task” had been “assigned to someone”.
But when she followed up later, she was told: “It was assigned, and they didn’t action it; I will reassign it.”
After two months of repeatedly being told the task had been assigned – and then not actioned – Whyte lodged a formal complaint.
But AtW was not even able to deal with its own complaints process correctly, with Whyte being told again, when she asked why there had been no response: “It was assigned but never actioned.”
She complained a second time, and had the same response, so she has now been forced to lodge a third complaint.
Eventually, AtW decided to carry out a new assessment, which took place last week.
Meanwhile, Laura has still not had all the support she was assessed as needing, and is still working from home, nearly 15 months after starting her new post with Autistic Nottingham.
Whyte told Disability News Service: “I am genuinely flabbergasted at this level of incompetence from a government organisation whose sole purpose is to support disabled people to stay in work.
“It is December now. This has been half a year of a disabled person not being able to engage in their employment fully when all that was required was one updated quote.”
DWP claims it has made several attempts to establish the details of the additional cost of the chair.
It did not address the concerns about the complaints process.
A DWP spokesperson said: “Our priority is to ensure everyone who applies for support through Access to Work has their claim progressed as quickly as possible.
“We have recruited additional staff to meet customer demand, which has already improved processing times, and a new digital claims process is being tested to help customers better track progress of their claims going forward.”
*Not her real name
7 December 2023
Protesters say ‘obscene’ profits from ‘inhuman’ asylum housing conditions must end
Disabled refugees and allies have protested outside the Home Office at the “inhuman” treatment that disabled people seeking asylum receive from private sector companies paid to provide their accommodation.
The protest called for an end to the “obscene profits” made by the companies, and for the contracts to be handed to local authorities, so the services can be run on a non-profit basis.
Disabled allies who helped organise the protest warned that one of the companies – the outsourcing giant Serco – will soon be carrying out disability benefit assessments in the south-west of England on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions.
Aida, a member of the Manchester-based human rights organisation RAPAR, told the protest that her Serco housing is “miserable” and plagued by rats and insects.
She said: “[Serco] are being paid a lot of money and get to ride around in their fancy cars, while we are being treated terribly.”
She said the way she had been treated by the Home Office since arriving in the UK had caused her impairment, and she added: “The way Serco treats us lacks so much respect. It’s inhuman.”
One Serco staff member barged into a female friend’s room without knocking when she had just come out of the shower, she said.
Another protester, Mariatu, who also lives in Serco housing, said: “Asylum-seekers have no dignity, they have no choice because we are not [seen as] human.
“They treat us like we are inhuman, especially when you are disabled.”
Sami, who has lived in Home Office accommodation provided and managed by another Home Office contractor, Clearsprings Ready Homes, spoke of how residents have to plead for toilet paper and toothbrushes, and how staff sometimes do not arrive to help when an emergency button is pressed.
He said disabled people living in Clearsprings properties stay silent about their treatment because they are “afraid” that speaking out will harm their asylum cases.
DNS has previously reported how more than 50 disabled people seeking asylum have been living in “cramped, unsafe conditions, without adequate food or care” in Clearsprings accommodation in Essex.
Nanou Thassinda, a volunteer at Migrants Organise, said: “Clearsprings has been profiting from our misery, providing unsafe, undignified and inadequate accommodation for people seeking asylum.
“These places aren’t a home or a hotel. These places are detention hotels and an open-door prison.
“It’s time for the government to return the contract to the local authorities to provide asylum accommodation on a non-profit basis.”
The protesters attempted to deliver a letter about the “cramped, unsafe conditions” at the accommodation provided by Clearsprings in Essex, but Home Office staff refused to accept it.
The letter says that disabled people are experiencing “horrific and unnecessary suffering”, and it pleads with the Home Office “to intervene to provide decent conditions”.
It points out that Clearsprings made £62.5 million profit on its Home Office contracts last year, an increase on the £28 million it made the previous year.
Friday’s protest was organised by disabled people’s and migrant justice organisations including the Disability and Migration Network.
Rebecca Yeo, from Disabled People Against Cuts, an activist and academic on disability and migration, and one of the organisers, told the protest: “The restrictions put on people in the asylum system are actively designed to prevent people from meeting physical and emotional needs.
“The asylum system is deliberately disabling.
“Some people arrive in the UK as disabled people, other people become disabled as a result of the deprivation in the asylum system.”
Bethany Bale, from Disability Rights UK, said the protest had highlighted the “horrific” standards of accommodation and the “disregard for life” and “abhorrent disrespect” faced by disabled people seeking asylum who were staying in Serco and Clearsprings accommodation.
She said this treatment was “completely immoral and unacceptable”.
Rensa Gaunt, from Inclusion London, compared the provision of asylum accommodation to the benefits assessment system.
She told the protest: “It’s the same system that keeps all of us down. We need to keep it out of the hands of private companies.
“Your fight is our fight.”
She told DNS later that both systems were profit-making schemes, and that handing Serco the benefits assessment contract was a “huge safeguarding risk”, because of its track record in delivering Home Office contracts.
Svetlana Kotova, director of campaigns and justice at Inclusion London, had said earlier: “Disabled asylum-seekers must be treated with dignity. This not only includes a safe and accessible place to live, but also appropriate care and support, so people can do basic everyday things.
“We are calling on the Home Office to respect the basic human rights of disabled asylum-seekers.”
A Serco spokesperson said the company did not accept accusations that it was providing inadequate housing and support to disabled people seeking asylum; or that the accommodation was miserable and run down; or that its accommodation was overcrowded, with people treated in an inhuman way.
He said: “Serco provides accommodation for asylum seekers on behalf of the Home Office in two of the six regions of the UK and all the accommodation we provide is regularly inspected and complies with the terms of our contract with the Home Office and with all appropriate housing standards.
“Our teams are committed to supporting the asylum seekers accommodated by Serco with compassion, dignity and respect. Their safety and wellbeing is always our top priority.”
He said he could not comment on the claims that some accommodation was overrun with insects and rats, that people had acquired impairments because of the conditions they experience in the UK, or that a Serco staff member had entered a woman’s room without knocking, because DNS was unable to provide further details.
But he added: “Our housing officers are highly professional individuals.
“An appointment will always be made, and our processes and procedures do not permit entry to a resident’s room without knocking.”
Clearsprings declined to comment on the protest and referred DNS to the Home Office.
The Home Office said that asylum accommodation providers are contractually obliged to ensure that accommodation is accessible and complies with the Human Rights Act and the Equality Act, while asylum-seekers who have problems with their accommodation can contact the charity Migrant Help.
It does not accept hand-delivered letters.
A Home Office spokesperson said: “We are committed to ensuring the safety and wellbeing of those in receipt of asylum support and have extra provisions in place for people with disabilities.
“Asylum accommodation providers are contractually obliged to ensure accommodation is accessible for disabled people and where concerns are raised, we work with providers to ensure they are addressed.”
7 December 2023
Ruth Bashall: Tributes and affection for ‘mighty’ and ‘formidable’ activist
Friends and fellow activists have paid tribute to the “mighty”, “formidable” and much-loved Ruth Bashall, who has died at the age of 71.
She leaves a commitment to the women’s movement stretching back half a century, and to fighting for the rights of lesbians, and later for disability rights, through years of “extensive, ground-breaking and dynamic” work.
Friends within the disabled people’s movement this week spoke of a “fierce activist and advocate” who “never stopped fighting to make a positive difference”, while also forming “enduring friendships and relationships” and inspiring huge affection among her friends.
She had spoken publicly of how her upbringing in France in the 1960s had a significant impact on her later life as a human rights activist.
Asked in 2014 by fellow activist Eleanor Lisney why she called herself an activist, and what had shaped that journey, Bashall spoke of the influence of her feminist, communist mother.
But she also spoke of growing up as a foreigner in xenophobic France in the 1960s – she was once tied to a tree as a punishment “for having burnt Joan of Arc” – when she learned through her family of the mass murder by French police of 200 Algerians who had been marching in Paris for independence in 1961.
The atrocity was “hushed up”, and she said that “for me as a child that was an impression that really… stayed in my memory, and it still does.
“The injustice of the silence around that. The mass murder of a group of people who were simply fighting for their right to self-determination.”
She also described another hugely influential experience, when she “dutifully went off and threw paving stones at police officers” during the student revolt in Paris in 1968, and how they “retaliated by raping a friend”.
She came to Britain in the early 1970s to study at university, at the beginning of the women’s movement, bringing her “internationalist experience”.
She had a daughter in 1972, before breaking up with her husband and coming out as lesbian.
She fought for the right of lesbians to keep their children, she said in 2014, just as today disabled women often have to fight to be allowed to keep their children, and she worked on anti-racism campaigns and in community politics.
She said: “I’ve always been a kind of grassroots activist in my own neighbourhood in east London, and when I became disabled I got kind of ‘dragooned’ into the disability movement by a couple of friends, who basically said, ‘Stop feeling sorry for yourself and get on with it, there’s a demonstration to organise,’ and I was used to organising demonstrations, so I did, and I haven’t looked back.”
Among her jobs and roles, she spent time as a bus conductor; a worker for Centerprise, a community centre and bookshop in Hackney; a researcher at the Centre for Independent Transport Research in London, which included examining the barriers faced by disabled passengers; a London Lesbian Line volunteer; a founder member of the Lesbian Mothers’ Group; and a freelance disability equality trainer and consultant.
In 2014, she spoke about being one of the founder members of the Campaign for Accessible Transport (CAT) and how the campaign’s development of inclusive ways for disabled people to be involved in direct action “had an impact way beyond” the 100 or so people who were on CAT’s mailing list at the time.
Her friend Kirsten Hearn said this week that she had met Bashall in 1984 while working at Greater London Council, and got to know her better several years later “when she joined a rota of lesbians supporting me when I broke my leg falling off a tandem”.
She said that a “typical habit of Ruth’s was the commitment she gave to those who needed her. If there was an emergency, she’d be right there, supportive, kindly and generous.”
They later worked together at Waltham Forest council, where she was an access officer, and Hearn remembers her friend’s “cavalier attitude to deadlines”, while also being a “brilliant and tenacious worker”.
Hearn said Bashall was a “powerful mentor and encourager of others”, who “liked nothing more than to support and nurture disabled people, who she knew could be amazing advocates for other disabled people”.
As two of the “Oxford Street 16”, who were arrested after a CAT direct action in London, they spent several hours together in a police cell “while the police hunted out a means of getting 16 disabled people to an inaccessible court”.
Bashall would use her experience of direct action – dating back to her youth in Paris – as an active member of the Disabled People’s Direct Action Network (DAN).
She and Hearn attended the second international disabled lesbian and gay conference, in the Netherlands, and from then she worked to challenge violence against disabled women across Europe.
Together with Anne Novis, Bashall formed the Metropolitan police’s Disability Independent Advisory Group (DIAG) in the early 2000s, working to make the force take disability hate crime seriously.
Katharine Quarmby, a disability rights activist and journalist, had known Bashall for more than 15 years, and first met her when she was news editor at Disability Now magazine and covered a transport meeting where she and Novis were advocating for disability rights.
She said: “Ruth was then and later quietly spoken and yet formidable and I warmed to her immediately.”
Bashall and Novis read drafts of Quarmby’s ground-breaking Getting Away with Murder report on disability hate crime “and were as always both generous and knowledgeable”.
She said: “I continued to meet Ruth at meetings – and for occasional convivial lunches afterwards. I learned so much from her and feel privileged to have known her.
“Her work on disability rights and the intersection with feminism was, and remains, groundbreaking.”
Bashall’s work on disability hate crime led to her helping to set up Stay Safe East, a disabled people’s organisation providing advocacy and support to Deaf and disabled victims or survivors of domestic and sexual violence, hate crime and harassment and other crime in London.
She only retired from her role as policy manager a few days before she died, having previously been its chief executive.
Outside her work and activism, Hearn said she also remembers her friend as a “lesbian mother and proud grandmother” who “formed enduring friendships and relationships” and for whom her “lesbian family, made up mainly of disabled lesbians, was hugely important to her.
“She was a big-hearted woman, who was always there in an emergency.
“Ruth was a mighty woman and leaves so many people who are thankful for having her in their lives.”
Novis, another close friend, said they had found “common ground, the same sense of humour, and a determination to make a difference and get justice for Deaf and disabled people” after meeting when setting up DIAG.
They supported each other through “the same barriers, the challenge of exhausting care reviews, benefit assessments, care charges assessments, access to equipment and the services we needed”.
She said: “I recall Ruth being called a ‘formidable woman’ by a government minister. It was so true.
“Yet mostly I think of Ruth as a dear friend who I miss so much.
“Always a phone call away, willing to travel long distances to get to my home, so we could have a natter and change the world with our words.
“A dynamic woman, and best of friends, whose presence empowered my life, and many others. Ruth made a huge difference, with her life and words, for us all.”
Another friend, Savi Hensman, who had known Bashall for more than 30 years, spoke of her “warmth, determination and humour”.
She said the eulogy at her funeral described how she “fought for spaces for people who were marginalised, in particular those at risk of deportation and other forms of state racism, women and children who were under threat of male violence and disabled people denied full access to society”.
Bashall’s daughter, Tamsin, said her “mother and proud grandmother of my two children” died on 11 November following a period of illness, and that “we remain proud of all she stood for and will miss her greatly”.
Angie Airlie, the new chief executive of Stay Safe East, said that she, like many others, was “completely inspired by Ruth”.
She said: “She was a fierce activist and advocate and never stopped fighting to make a positive difference.
“She will be missed by staff and clients alike and I know her death will resonate much more widely.”
*To add to the many tributes already paid to Ruth Bashall, visit the online condolence book set up by Stay Safe East
7 December 2023
Other disability-related stories covered by mainstream media this week
The head of the UK Heath Security Agency is facing a backlash after it emerged she suggested that discharging Covid-infected hospital patients to care homes would be “clinically appropriate” to protect the NHS from collapse. Care home providers and the families of those who died after contracting Covid while in residential care said the revelations confirmed their suspicions at the time, adding that it disproved the claim of ministers to have thrown a “protective ring” around the homes: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/dec/02/she-sacrificed-care-home-residents-health-chief-jenny-harries-under-fire-after-uk-covid-inquiry-revelations
Plans for a footbridge to replace a level crossing over a railway line near York have been dropped after complaints about accessibility. Network Rail has withdrawn its planning application for the bridge across the Copmanthorpe crossing. Objectors called for a bridge with a ramp rather than one with steps. The rail company said it would now take the opportunity to “evaluate solutions” and look again at “the benefits of all options”: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-67618683
Some disabled children have to go home to use the toilet because their schools lack the necessary adaptations, east Yorkshire councillors have heard. The issue affected “a minority of children” across 103 schools, East Riding of Yorkshire Council was told. The authority said it was working to adapt schools where necessary, but was limited by financial constraints: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-humber-67588351
The BBC has apologised and pulled a Christmas episode of University Challenge after two disabled contestants complained about a lack of access provision. The festive spin-off from the BBC Two quiz show, hosted by Amol Rajan, features teams of distinguished alumni who compete on behalf of their former universities. A contestant, who is blind, told BBC News that audio description had been promised but not provided, and a request for subtitles for a neurodivergent contestant is also understood to have been turned down: https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2023/dec/01/university-challenge-special-axed-for-not-supporting-disabled-contestants
7 December 2023
News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com
