Contents
Anger and frustration after unions refuse to back disabled people’s manifesto 3
MPs forced to abandon DWP safeguarding inquiry after Sunak’s election call 6
Disabled union activists warn Labour: If you break your promises, we will come for you 8
Accessible housing crisis poses ‘clear and direct risk’ to disabled people, say MPs 10
Progress continues on key parts of Conservative disability benefit reforms, despite election 12
Union activists attack government’s ‘dehumanising’ rhetoric 14
Foxcroft promises a Labour government would ‘break down the barriers to work’ 18
Other disability-related stories covered by mainstream media this week 20
DWP staff tell MPs after years of deaths: We don’t have time to deal with safeguarding ‘carefully’ and ‘correctly’
Two-thirds of Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) staff still do not have enough time to deal with safeguarding concerns “carefully” and “correctly”, despite years of deaths of benefit claimants linked with DWP’s failings.
Results from a survey* carried out by the Commons work and pensions committee reveal serious concerns about safeguarding shared by a majority of DWP staff who took part, including hundreds who work in jobcentres.
DWP has continued to insist that it takes safeguarding seriously and has repeatedly challenged concerns raised by Disability News Service and others over the last decade, despite hundreds, and probably thousands, of deaths linked to its actions.
John McArdle, co-founder of the disabled people’s grassroots group Black Triangle, described the survey results as “truly shocking” after the years of activism by disabled people aimed at pleading with the department to act on safeguarding.
Mims Davies, the minister for disabled people, insisted to the committee (PDF) in March that the “narrative around DWP’s treatment of vulnerable people has been incredibly unhelpful” and was “not roundly correct”.
But the survey results, published quietly by the committee last week (24 May) after the date for the general election was announced, appear to show that these comments were misleading.
They show that 67 per cent of DWP staff who had direct contact with claimants either disagreed or strongly disagreed with the statement: “I have enough time in my day to deal with safeguarding concerns carefully, correctly and in a timely manner.”
They also show that more than two-fifths (42 per cent) of staff with direct contact with claimants did not believe they received adequate safeguarding training.
And even more (44 per cent) said the safeguarding guidance for frontline staff was not clear, comprehensive and easy to access, while more than a third (36 per cent) did not feel confident about how to handle a safeguarding concern.
The survey was completed by more than 1,700 DWP staff, of whom nearly 1,400 have direct contact with claimants.
It was carried out as part of an inquiry launched by the committee last July into DWP safeguarding.
For the last 10 months, the committee has investigated whether DWP has a duty to safeguard “vulnerable people”, and if it does not, whether it should.
Only last month, DWP admitted missing multiple opportunities to record the “vulnerability” of a disabled woman whose death had been linked by a coroner to failings at the heart of its universal credit working-age benefits system.
The survey results were published on the parliamentary website after the committee’s chair, Labour’s Sir Stephen Timms, wrote to ministers to tell them the inquiry had been abandoned because the committee had not had time to finalise its findings after prime minister Rishi Sunak called a general election and parliament was dissolved (see separate story).
Less than half of those who took part in the committee’s survey (44 per cent) and had direct contact with claimants said safeguarding was seen as a priority within jobcentres, and less than half (48 per cent) said they knew which agencies they could refer claimants to if there was a safeguarding concern.
Just one in four (25 per cent) of those with direct contact with claimants believed there was enough support from management and DWP’s “advanced customer support senior leaders” to ensure effective safeguarding.
In March, Mims Davies had told the committee: “We provide training and guidance for all our customer-facing staff so that they are adaptable to all the different scenarios they may face.”
She also said then that the department had “layers of support for those with complex needs”.
And she claimed it was “a core theme for us as a department to get the core of what we do right but always make sure vulnerability, an individualised, tailored approach and time is given to the people with the needs, and that we create a trusted relationship to then signpost them on to those with the expertise and ability to help with the wider complex needs”.
The Conservative party refused to comment on the survey results this week and said it was “one for the DWP to respond to given that it’s about their internal workings”.
But DWP declined to provide a statement on the survey results, although the department said mental health training was provided to all staff with direct contact with claimants, and that it had co-operated with the committee’s inquiry and had set out the improvements it had brought in to support “vulnerable claimants and those with complex needs”.
John McArdle said the survey results showed that disabled people in vulnerable situations were “taking their life in their hands” when entering a jobcentre.
He said: “You’re literally taking your life in your hands going in there when you’re a vulnerable person, and nobody seems to care enough to do anything about it.
“How on earth can they sleep at night? We are just statistics to them.
“They have been playing fast and loose with disabled people’s lives.”
He said the figures showed the department was in meltdown, and confirmed the picture shown by the dossier of evidence submitted by the PCS union to the department last December.
Evidence from PCS members in that dossier showed DWP to be a failing organisation in a “state of crisis” and facing a “near collapse” of its benefits systems, with staff accusing the department of “deliberate neglect” and revealing that claimants in vulnerable situations were “falling through the gaps” in the system.
McArdle also pointed to the failure of the Equality and Human Rights Commission to act on concerns about DWP and the safety of claimants for at least five years.
The commission finally launched an investigation into unlawful treatment of disabled benefit claimants last week, five years after it was first asked to act by Labour’s Debbie Abrahams (see separate story).
He said: “The EHRC should have been all over this like a cheap suit, but they have not lifted a finger.”
*The survey was distributed through the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) to DWP staff who were PCS members, so the majority of respondents are likely to have been PCS staff, although PCS members were able to share the survey link with other colleagues
30 May 2024
Anger and frustration after unions refuse to back disabled people’s manifesto
Disabled union delegates have been accused of failing to support the disability movement after refusing to back a motion at their annual conference that called on political parties, and the TUC, to support a manifesto drawn up by disabled people’s organisations.
Opposition to the Disabled People’s Manifesto appears to have started with the refusal of the influential National Education Union (NEU) and the NASUWT teachers’ union to support its demands on inclusive education.
The manifesto, put together by DPO Forum England and supported by 40 disabled people’s organisations (DPOs), calls for a “right for every Disabled and Deaf student to get appropriate support to attend and remain in a fully inclusive mainstream education setting”.
It also lays out a “radical reform programme” across the areas of representation and voice, rights, independence, and inclusion, which is aimed at tackling “disablist policy making and systemic oppression and injustice”.
Despite DPOs expecting a motion supporting the manifesto to be approved, it was opposed by NEU, NASUWT and even the TUC disabled workers’ committee, the body elected annually by disabled delegates to the conference, and which advises the TUC on disability policy.
The committee told the conference in a statement that it supported the “vast majority” of the manifesto, but that the document “does not call out the resourcing and funding crisis facing schools when it comes to the delivery of SEND*”.
It also said it was concerned that the manifesto’s wording was “still subject to change” and that it did not want to commit the TUC and its affiliated unions to “a manifesto that could be altered”.
There was frustration and anger from disabled activists this week at the actions of union delegates at the conference in Liverpool.
Simone Aspis, a lifelong campaigner for inclusive education, and a former policy and campaigns coordinator for The Alliance for Inclusive Education, but speaking on behalf of her consultancy Changing Perspectives, said she was “angry” and “very disappointed” by the unions’ actions and their failure to support the manifesto.
She said: “Ever since I have been involved with the disabled people’s movement, I have never really felt that unions have really supported disabled people in terms of advocating for their rights.”
But Aspis, who attended a segregated special school herself, said she would not have expected the unions that represent school teaching staff to vote any other way “because they are worried about their workers losing their jobs in segregated provision” and have a “vested interest” which should be examined.
She added: “It will take some very brave union to actually say, ‘This is where we want to go and some workers will lose their jobs, but we really want an inclusive society.’”
Bob Ellard, a member of the national steering group of Disabled People Against Cuts, said: “Solidarity of the left with disabled people only seems to apply when organisations want something from us, but not when we ask them to do something for us.
“Again and again over years, disabled people have been let down by people who style themselves fighters for social justice.
“Are we surprised by this? No, we’re used to it.”
And Professor Peter Beresford, co-chair of Shaping Our Lives, said: “There isn’t a public service which hasn’t been damaged and subverted by the privatising and small state politics of at least the last 15 years.
“We know that well-thought-through and well-resourced inclusive education is in the best interest of all school students, properly implemented.
“We know that successive Conservative administrations have shown no commitment to the diversity of children’s educational needs and have done little to support truly inclusive education, more often the opposite.
“But knowing this does not mean that we lose sight of the principles of inclusive education or our long-term commitment to them.
“There is now real hope for ideological change in the UK; now is the time to recommit ourselves to disabled people-led inclusive education, not to weaken our support for it.”
Jonathan Bellshaw, a member of the disabled workers’ committee and a Communication Workers Union delegate, had spoken against the manifesto at the conference.
He told the conference that “we have to be very careful when we say let’s use mainstream for SEND”, and he told delegates that when he had been a school governor there was a disabled pupil “who was not suitable for mainstream school”.
Among his other concerns was that the manifesto’s two-week timeframe for dealing with requests for reasonable adjustments was not realistic because, he said, Brexit meant it now takes more than two weeks to obtain specialist chairs from Europe.
Kat Downs, from NASUWT, questioned the demand for accessible housing in the manifesto, because she said it wasn’t clear who would decide whether housing was accessible, and she did not trust “the government and the planning laws”.
She said that, as an autistic teacher, she supported “the right for anybody to choose where they want to be educated”.
She said: “Class sizes right now, in some schools, are way in excess of 30, 34, 35.
“If I was an autistic person sat in one of those classrooms right now, I would not be maintaining mainstream education.”
Kevin Daws, from the University and College Union, had led support for the motion, and told delegates that the document “reaffirms our commitment to the social model of disability” and is “a manifesto for change, a manifesto which provides a new deal for Deaf and disabled people”.
He said: “The manifesto is a call to arms, it’s saying that we as disabled people are proud.
“We’ve had enough of the warm words. We demand a change. And the manifesto is a tool with which to engage with us.”
Austin Harney, a delegate from the PCS union, seconded the motion, and told the conference that it was important to “build alliances” with disabled people’s organisations by supporting the manifesto.
In response to concerns raised by NEU and NASUWT, Daws told delegates: “We should remember that having segregated schools for people with special educational needs is actually based on a medical model of disability and is designed to isolate those people, exclude them from mainstream education.”
And he pointed to government evidence that found that greater inclusion in mainstream settings “can improve the academic achievement for children and young people with special educational needs”.
He said the manifesto “actually includes a demand to commit an extra three billion pounds per year for education support to fund SEND; in other words, properly-funded special educational needs within mainstream schools”.
And he reminded Bellshaw that the demand for a response to reasonable adjustment requests within two weeks was current TUC policy, and had been approved by the disabled workers’ conference in 2022.
The manifesto has been put together by the country’s leading disabled people’s organisations, and disabled activists had hoped that backing from the TUC Disabled Workers’ Conference would help pressure the Labour party ahead of July’s general election.
But opposition from NEU – whose delegates wore “disability pride” tee-shirts to the conference – NASUWT and other unions, meant a motion supporting the manifesto was defeated by 67 votes to 52, with 20 abstentions.
A spokesperson for DPO Forum England said: “We are disappointed the motion in support of our manifesto did not go through.
“However, we are grateful and proud that 52 representatives voted for it.
“We will build on this support, recognising a huge need for DPOs and the unions to work together to create spaces for solidarity among disabled people.
“We know there are fundamental disagreements and we urge the unions to work with us to create opportunities where campaigners for inclusion can be at the table, explain their vision and be heard.”
*Special educational needs and disabilities
30 May 2024
MPs forced to abandon DWP safeguarding inquiry after Sunak’s election call
MPs have been forced to abandon a 10-month inquiry into safeguarding arrangements at the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), just weeks before they were due to report its findings, because of the prime minister’s decision to call a general election.
Last week’s surprise decision by Rishi Sunak meant the Commons work and pensions committee did not have time to finalise its report.
The inquiry was launched last July and followed countless deaths of disabled benefit claimants linked to DWP’s actions and failings over more than a decade.
For the last 10 months, the committee has investigated whether DWP has a duty to safeguard “vulnerable people”, and if it does not, whether it should.
It was the first serious public investigation into safeguarding at DWP since reports of deaths first began to emerge in the early years of the 2010 Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government.
But Sir Stephen Timms, the committee’s chair, told DWP ministers Mims Davies and Viscount Younger in a letter that it had not been possible for the committee to agree a report before parliament was dissolved.
He wrote: “We hope that the evidence we have gathered will be of interest to our successor Committee, the next Government and to the individuals and organisations outside of Parliament and Government who are interested in the matters covered by this inquiry.”
He told Disability News Service (DNS) yesterday (Wednesday) that the committee had not reached the stage of having a draft report to consider by the time the election was called.
He said: “It is very disappointing that we haven’t been able to complete the work.”
Another committee member, the SNP’s David Linden, told DNS that he was “incredibly hopeful” that the committee “could pick up where we left off” with the inquiry’s evidence once it has been set up with new membership as part of the next parliament.
The committee has also published some evidence it gathered during the inquiry, including the results of a survey of DWP staff, which found that two-thirds of them still do not have enough time to deal with safeguarding concerns “carefully” and “correctly” (see separate story).
The survey results also show that more than two-fifths of DWP staff do not believe they receive adequate safeguarding training, while a similar number said DWP’s safeguarding guidance for frontline staff was not clear, comprehensive and easily accessed.
*The Department, DNS editor John Pring’s book on DWP and how its actions led to countless deaths of disabled people in the post-2010 era, will be published by Pluto Press in August. Visit the DNS website for a 50 per cent discount
30 May 2024
Disabled union activists warn Labour: If you break your promises, we will come for you
Disabled trade unionists have warned that they will hold Labour to account on the promises it makes to improve the rights of disabled workers, if the party wins power at July’s general election.
They have also called for activists to exert pressure on Labour during the election campaign to persuade it to expand its existing pledges on disability employment.
And they called on the party to include in its general election manifesto all the measures in the Disability Employment Charter, which aims to address the widespread disadvantage disabled people face in their working lives.
The charter was founded by organisations including Disability Rights UK, the public services union UNISON and the Disability@Work group of academics, who have played a significant role in raising evidenced concerns about the Conservative government’s policies on disability employment.
Lola Oyewusi, a UNISON delegate, told the TUC Disabled Workers’ Conference in Liverpool: “To win for disabled workers is very paramount to the success of a Labour government.
“If Labour does not deliver for disabled workers, we will definitely hold them to account.”
And she warned Vicky Foxcroft, Labour’s shadow minister for disabled people, who had spoken at the conference the previous day, that – if she becomes minister for disabled people – “we will surely make sure she delivers”.
Anong the policies described by Foxcroft in her speech – many of which are in the charter – was a pledge to force larger employers to report on their disability pay gaps; reform of the Access to Work scheme; action to make it easier for disabled workers to secure reasonable adjustments; and reform of the government’s much-criticised Disability Confident scheme.
Lee Starr-Elliott, a delegate from the Communication Workers Union, told the conference: “It is now imperative that we rid ourselves of the Tories.
“However, it’s just as important that the Labour party is held to account and do not repeat or continue the mistakes that the current government are making.”
He added: “Attacks on Deaf and disabled people and workers must be stopped, and we need a Labour party that embraces and works with disabled people and groups to make the change for the better.
“Access to Work, disability benefits and many other programmes must be fixed, and the rights of disabled people and workers must be strengthened, especially in employment, where we are seeing the biggest number of attacks from both the employer and the DWP.
“Labour must also be held to account and commit to being a leading figure in disability issues, both nationally and internally.”
Philip Blundell, a Unite delegate, called on the Labour party to stand with the union movement.
But he added: “Don’t do it and you’re part of the enemy and we will come for you.”
He told delegates: “Go back to your workplaces, ask people to vote Labour, then we’ll hold them to account.
“And if they don’t bring in, within the first 100 days, what they said they were going to do, we will hold them to account. We will march.”
Alison Gaughan, from the University and College Union, told fellow delegates: “I want to see the back of the Tories as much as anybody.
“However, I’m sceptical about how much will change when Labour come to power.
“I welcome the promises that we’ve heard from Labour. I hope they will come to pass, but I’m not holding my breath.”
She added: “We know that we live in a system where if the needs of disabled people come up against the interests of capital, capital will win.
“We shouldn’t forget that the Labour party has committed to the same economic rules as the Tories adhere to.
“Shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves has repeatedly emphasised her commitment to so-called fiscal responsibility, and she cosies up to business leaders.
“The TUC must hold Labour to all their promises on disability, and more.
“We want full equality for disabled people and a full commitment to the Disability Employment Charter and the UNCRPD*.”
Ian Thomas, from the PCS union, pointed out that only two of the unions represented at the conference had signed up to the charter themselves, despite 187 organisations backing it.
He said: “If we all… go back to our own unions and say, ‘Why haven’t you signed it yet?’ that action alone would really boost the visible sign that we as trade unions are signed up to the Disability Employment Charter, that we want to see a workplace where disability employment rights are recognised by the employers that we are negotiating with.”
Dougie Johnstone, a delegate from the bakers’ union BFAWU, told the conference that although he was looking forward to “getting rid” of the Conservatives, he also had “some concerns” about the Labour party.
He pleaded with Labour to ignore the “nice headlines you’ll get in the Tory rags” and “be the party that says, ‘I will stand up for everyone.’”
The motion was passed with only a handful of abstentions.
*UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
30 May 2024
Accessible housing crisis poses ‘clear and direct risk’ to disabled people, say MPs
The shortage of accessible housing in England poses a “clear and direct risk” to disabled people across the country, with many of them living in unsuitable accommodation for years “without hope”, a report by a committee of MPs has concluded.
Members of the cross-party levelling up, housing and communities committee said in their report that too many disabled people had been failed by the government’s housing policy, with the resulting shortage of accessible housing posing a direct risk to their “dignity, health, and wellbeing”.
Hundreds of disabled people submitted accounts to the committee of their experiences, with many describing the “horrendous impact that living in inaccessible housing can have on a disabled person’s life”.
The Commons committee – which had a Conservative majority – said it had been told of “decades-long” waiting-lists for accessible social housing; significantly higher asking prices for accessible homes; and some landlords denying permission for home adaptations.
And it concluded: “We have found little evidence that the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities is treating disabled people’s needs as a priority in housing policy.”
The committee was highly critical of the government for failing to implement its “headline” policy to address the shortage of accessible housing: increasing the minimum accessibility level of all new-build homes to the M4(2) standard*.
It is now almost two years since the policy was first announced, and almost four years since it was first consulted on, the committee said.
The report also calls on all local authorities in England to include a minimum percentage of M4(3) standard* homes in their local plans.
And it highlights “many shortcomings” in the disabled facilities grant (DFG) system, and calls on the government to raise the current £30,000 upper limit on individual DFG grants.
The committee said it was “deeply disappointing” that the government had still not acted on the main findings of a review it commissioned, which reported in 2018, that made “several appropriate and valuable recommendations on DFG funding, eligibility, and the delivery process”.
The report also points out that none of the actions in the government’s much-criticised Disability Action Plan “specifically address housing for disabled people”.
In fact, the only “substantive reassurance” that housing and homelessness minister Felicity Buchan could provide to the committee was that she had “heard from lots of people on the ground” in her capacity as her department’s ministerial disability champion.
Among those who gave evidence to the committee, one wheelchair-user had been on a waiting-list for accessible accommodation for 16 years, and had been living in temporary accommodation for 13 years, “with no indication as to when an accessible home might become available”.
Another disabled person told the committee they felt “trapped in their own home” because they could only leave with assistance from someone to “bump them down the steps in a wheelchair”.
A third disabled person said they had been told by a London council that there would be a 40-year waiting-time for accessible social housing.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities said it was unable to comment on the report because the government was now in the pre-election period.
But Mikey Erhardt, policy and campaigns officer at Disability Rights UK, said: “Almost 30 years after the Disability Discrimination Act and with the UK population including over 14 million disabled citizens, we still have public and private housing that totally fails to meet the needs of disabled people.
“We should all have the right to affordable, accessible housing that keeps us warm and safe.
“As I told the committee, no one is more at fault for this dangerous mess than successive UK governments.
“They have failed to fund the building of social housing, leaving us in 2023 with six times more newly homeless families than new social houses.
“They have left us stranded, nowhere near the 100,000-a-year target that we need, with record numbers of disabled people in inaccessible, unsafe, and incredibly costly temporary accommodation.
“The committee’s recommendations are welcome, and we urge the next government to use them to make major changes to our housing system.
“The way out of this mess is clear – freeze rents, build more affordable, accessible social rented homes, improve the avenues through which disabled people can get our homes adapted, and create a minimum accessibility standard reflective of the needs of the local population.”
*Homes built to the M4(2) standard have 16 accessible or adaptable features, similar to the Lifetime Homes standard developed in the early 1990s, to make homes more easily adaptable for lifetime use, while M4(3) homes are those that are supposed to be fully wheelchair-accessible
30 May 2024
Progress continues on key parts of Conservative disability benefit reforms, despite election
Progress on key parts of the government’s disability benefit reform agenda is unlikely to be significantly disrupted by July’s surprise general election, Disability News Service (DNS) has established.
Rishi Sunak’s decision to hold a general election on 4 July means parliament has been dissolved and a series of government bills have had to be scrapped.
But the dissolution of parliament also came in the middle of a crucial DWP consultation and a call for evidence.
The Modernising Support for Independent Living green paper and consultation – which includes options for making it harder to claim personal independence payment and even replacing cash payments with vouchers or one-off grants – is due to close on 22 July.
And the call for evidence on fit note reform – which could see responsibility for issuing fit notes shifted away from GPs and towards “specialist work and health professionals” – is due to close on 8 July.
Although there have been suggestions that the consultation and call for evidence would now have to be abandoned, because of the election, that is not correct.
Civil Service guidance states clearly that ongoing consultations “should continue as normal” and adds: “During the election period, departments may continue to receive and analyse responses with a view to putting proposals to the incoming government but they should not make any statement or generate publicity during this period.”
When asked about the consultation and the call for evidence, DWP would only confirm when they were launched and when they were due to end.
DWP also provided little certainty on other key policies this week.
Policies announced in recent months by the Conservative government appear to be ongoing and there is no suggestion that they have been put on hold by DWP civil servants during the election campaign.
These include plans to accelerate the migration of claimants of employment and support allowance onto universal credit, which is now due to begin in September; plans to tighten the work capability assessment (WCA) from next year; and medium-term proposals to scrap the WCA.
DWP declined to comment on any of these three policies, and directed DNS only to a written statement made by employment minister Jo Churchill last week, in which she laid out the timetable for the universal credit migration.
Despite that statement, there have been mounting concerns about universal credit and its “potential threat to our safety and well-being”, with two coroners writing to DWP in the last year to raise concerns about safeguarding issues after suicides of disabled claimants, including the death of Nazerine Anderson.
Among other policy ideas likely to be presented to the next set of DWP ministers, whichever party wins the election, are the government’s plans for a new fraud bill.
This would give DWP fraud investigators new powers to make arrests, conduct searches and seize possessions, which it has said would “allow DWP to control the end-to-end investigation in the most serious criminal cases, applying for the warrants, leading the operation and searching and seizing evidence”.
That bill would also introduce a new civil penalty for benefit fraud with a “lower burden of proof”.
And although Conservative plans to give DWP sweeping new powers to carry out financial surveillance on benefit claimants through their bank accounts will now be abandoned, as the data protection and digital information bill was not passed before parliament was dissolved, there is nothing to stop the next government re-introducing those measures.
These proposed new anti-fraud powers have been heavily-criticised by many disabled people’s organisations and allies.
Although these anti-fraud policies – and other DWP proposals brought forward in recent months – have been presented as Conservative policies, the history of DWP and the Department of Social Security (DSS) before it, strongly suggests that departmental policy will continue to be driven by senior civil servants rather than politicians.
The last time there was a changeover from a Conservative to a Labour government, in 1997, policy on disability benefits, assessments, fraud and the use of private sector contractors – as well as the culture within DSS – hardly changed.
Labour has yet to express a clear opinion on whether it would take on or scrap existing Conservative DWP policies.
30 May 2024
Union activists attack government’s ‘dehumanising’ rhetoric
Disabled union activists have attacked the government’s demonisation of disabled people and its “disgraceful discriminatory language”, at a conference that began less than a day after prime minister Rishi Sunak finally announced the date of the general election.
A series of five emergency motions approved by delegates at the TUC Disabled Workers’ Conference in Liverpool condemned the Conservative government’s repeated attacks on disabled people’s rights, particularly through its social security reforms.
There were also calls for the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) to be enshrined into UK law.
One of the motions said Sunak and his government’s actions effectively “declare war on disabled people”.
Austin Harney, a delegate from the PCS union, which represents many Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) staff, attacked DWP for issuing “disgraceful benefit sanctions on disabled claimants”.
He called for unions to pressure a Labour government “to get rid of these sanctions once and for all”, and he accused the government of committing “what you could call corporate manslaughter or political murder” because of the impact of its DWP policies on disabled people.
He said: “It’s also terrible how this war on disabled people is not being taken very, very seriously and it’s time for all of us trade unions to stand together to do something about this.”
Kevin Daws, from the University and College Union, said he was “angry that the government are demonising disabled people and treating them as undeserving citizens”.
Criticising Sunak’s claim that there was a “sick note culture”, he said: “The level of statutory sick pay is so low that people go to work when they are sick because they have no choice, as we witnessed during the Covid pandemic.”
And Falyn Waterman, from USDAW, told fellow delegates: “Rishi talks about a sick note culture, tells us that we as a country can’t afford to have this many people sick, when he and his government are responsible for making us sicker and making us poorer and poorer.”
Moving the “war on disabled people” motion, Unite’s Sadia Mirza told the conference: “We all know that real change comes from the top and will only come once the [UNCRPD] is enshrined into UK law.
“Disabled people are not outcasts. We are an important minority and deserve our basic rights.”
She said the government’s failure to send a minister to Geneva in March to defend its disability rights record in front of the UN’s committee on the rights of disabled people “showed the lack of priority towards the rights of disabled people”.
Lee Starr-Elliott, a delegate from the Communication Workers Union, moved an emergency motion that condemned the government’s “systematic violations of disabled people’s rights”, as demonstrated by the UN committee.
He was one of the union activists who joined the delegation of disabled people who were in Geneva in March to hear a civil servant defend the government’s record.
He told fellow delegates that it was “no surprise” to see the government and mainstream media ignore the UN’s subsequent report or even challenge it, but he added: “What was even more concerning was the lack of trade union support for disabled activists who have fought to highlight the abuses and hold government to account.”
He said: “The election is a golden opportunity for the TUC and its affiliates to lead Labour forward and ensure the UN’s recommendations are carried out and going forward we have a joined up collective approach to making Deaf and disabled people feel a valued part of society… now is not the time to be silent.”
Natasha Hirst, the first disabled activist to be president of the National Union of Journalists, said the government’s rhetoric on disabled people had been “designed to dehumanise us and to shift public opinion towards the narrative that tells us that our lives are worth less, that we are a drain and a burden and that we are evading playing our part in society”.
Hirst was another of the union activists who joined the Geneva delegation in March.
She was critical of the mainstream media for its lack of coverage of the UN report and the government’s benefit reforms, and she moved an emergency motion that attacked the “inaccurate negative and unethical coverage of disability issues” by the media.
She told the conference: “Policy changes to social security have made it impossible for most people to understand and access the support that they are entitled to unless they have an expert advocate by their side.
“The inequalities and injustices that we experience as disabled people are a direct result of political choices and these are choices that are made by people who have never experienced oppression, who have never experienced the sharp end of our social security system, an incredibly demoralizing experience to go through.”
She added: “The government is not being held to account or shamed for its failures, and it empowers them to continue with their agenda.”
All five of the emergency motions were overwhelmingly passed by the conference.
30 May 2024
Watchdog confirms DWP probe will not take evidence from individual claimants or relatives of those who died
An investigation into unlawful treatment of disabled benefit claimants will not accept evidence from individual disabled people or relatives of those who died through failings of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), the equality watchdog has confirmed.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) was criticised last week when it emerged that its investigation into possible “unlawful acts” by successive work and pensions secretaries would not take evidence from members of the public.
It confirmed this week that it would not seek evidence from individuals because it did not consider this to be “proportionate”.
Instead, disabled people who claim benefits, and relatives of claimants who have died, will be expected to contact a “relevant organisation or representative such as an MP to provide their story”.
Disability News Service (DNS) has already seen one response from EHRC to the relative of a claimant who took their own life due to DWP failings.
The relative attempted to provide evidence to the commission, but has been told by EHRC that it is “not taking information or evidence from individual members of the public, other than employees or former employees of the DWP or their contracted health assessors”.
An EHRC spokesperson told Disability News Service yesterday (Wednesday): “Inviting evidence through third party organisations who represent disabled people is a proportionate way to gather the evidence necessary for the investigation, ensures that we are receiving the most relevant submissions and enables the investigation to conclude within a reasonable time.”
But the commission has confirmed that it will receive evidence from disabled people’s organisations (DPOs).
The inquiry’s terms of reference stated that it wanted to hear from “charities, third sector and advocacy organisations” and some disabled activists questioned whether this could exclude their evidence.
But after being contacted by DNS, an EHRC spokesperson said: “Disabled people’s organisations are welcome to submit evidence to the investigation.
“The list on our website is intended as a guide, but we will update it to make it clear that disabled people’s organisations are included.
“We have already invited a number of disabled people’s organisations, alongside other stakeholders, to attend a session on 4 June so that we can provide more information about our investigation and assessment.”
EHRC has also suggested that it could take evidence relating to some deaths of claimants who died before January 2021.
There were concerns that the inquiry was only focused on events from January 2021 onwards.
The focus on the last three-and-a-half years could have meant the investigation did not consider evidence relating to some of the most high-profile and disturbing deaths linked to DWP’s failures, such as those of Philippa Day (September 2019), Jodey Whiting (February 2017), Michael O’Sullivan (September 2013), Roy Curtis (November 2018) and Errol Graham (spring 2018).
And it could also have meant a focus on the actions of just three work and pensions secretaries: Therese Coffey, Chloe Smith (who was in post for less than two months in 2022) and Mel Stride, who current occupies the position.
But when asked this week about the earlier cases, the spokesperson pointed to the inquiry’s terms of reference, which state that the investigation will look at earlier periods “if relevant, necessary and proportionate”.
He said: “This allows investigators to consider evidence from earlier than 2021 if appropriate and relevant.”
The EHRC investigation will examine concerns that successive secretaries of state may have broken the Equality Act in the way their department has carried out benefit assessments.
It will particularly examine the work capability assessment (WCA) and the assessment for personal independence payment (PIP), and it will include the impact of the WCA on universal credit claimants.
It will focus on failures to make reasonable adjustments for people with mental distress and learning difficulties.
The commission will also be assessing whether DWP breached its obligations under the Equality Act’s public sector equality duty.
DWP could face a potentially unlimited fine if the allegations are found proven, and be required to produce an action plan to correct its failings.
Calls for EHRC to act date back as far as April 2019, when Labour’s Debbie Abrahams wrote to the commission to ask it to investigate deaths linked to the WCA and PIP assessment processes.
*The Department, DNS editor John Pring’s book on DWP and how its actions led to countless deaths of disabled people in the post-2010 era, will be published by Pluto Press in August. Visit the DNS website for a 50 per cent discount
30 May 2024
Foxcroft promises a Labour government would ‘break down the barriers to work’
A Labour government would introduce a string of policies to reduce the disability employment gap and strengthen the rights of disabled people in the workplace, Labour’s shadow disability minister has told union activists.
Vicky Foxcroft also told the TUC Disabled Workers’ Conference in Liverpool that her party would “end the politics of division”, although there was no mention in her speech of how a Labour government would address the key issue of disability benefit assessment reform.
Although the audience of disabled workers meant her speech was always likely to focus on employment, the content did suggest that Labour’s manifesto offer to disabled people is likely to focus strongly on jobs and employment support.
Foxcroft told the conference: “We will break down the barriers so that disabled people will have exactly the same rights to get into and get on in work as non-disabled people.”
Among her pledges was that a Labour government would “make it easier to secure reasonable adjustments in a timely manner, including when changing jobs or when circumstances change”.
And she repeated the party’s long-standing commitment to co-produce disability-related policies with disabled people, although there was no detail on how this would be done.
She said she was “working with colleagues across the shadow cabinet to ensure disabled people are at the heart of all of our policy-making”, and she promised that a Labour government would “restore and strengthen disabled people’s rights”.
She said: “Co-production with disabled people is key to delivering this, and I can assure you that this will be at the heart of everything that we do.”
Foxcroft said Labour’s planned New Deal for Working People would “hugely benefit disabled people and those with long-term health conditions”.
Employers would be required to accommodate all “reasonable” requests for flexible working; the “time and facilities” available for trade union representatives to do their work would be improved; and there would be new rights for union equality representatives.
There would also be a review of health and safety guidance to “properly support people with mental health conditions”; improvements to statutory sick pay, so it is available to “all workers, including the low paid”; and action to close the disability pay gap, including forcing firms with more than 250 employees to report on how their disabled and non-disabled employees are paid.
And, she said, Labour would ensure “full rights to equal pay for disabled people alongside Black, Asian and ethnic minority people”.
Foxcroft promised that a Labour government would “reform jobcentres so that they have a new focus on tackling the barriers to good employment” and would force them to work closely with “other agencies including the NHS”.
There was also a promise to “overhaul” the government’s Access to Work disability employment scheme – an area she has focused on in parliament in recent months – so “disabled people know what equipment and adaptations or personal support they will get before they start work, giving them the confidence to take the plunge”.
Her one reference to benefits was to repeat Labour’s promise that those receiving out-of-work disability benefits who are not currently expected to seek work would be able to try employment “without fear of losing their income or having to be reassessed if it doesn’t work out”.
TUC general secretary Paul Nowak told the conference, the day after Foxcroft’s speech, that Labour’s New Deal for Working People would provide the “biggest expansion of workers’ rights and, crucially, trade union rights in a generation”.
He added: “Regardless of what you’ve read in the press, regardless of what the employers’ organisations say, regardless of what the likes of Peter Mandelson say, our unions expect Keir Starmer to deliver that new deal for workers in full in the first 100 days of a Labour government and I’m going to make sure it happens.”
Nowak said the government’s attempts to target disabled people as benefit cheats had been “disgusting” and would be part of how the Conservatives will “go more and more into the gutter” as election day approaches.
He called for “a completely new approach, rooted in a social model of disability, so we build a world of work that is accessible by default, not where there are barriers to begin with.
“The current medical model, which dominates our law and employment practice and our welfare system, simply isn’t fit for purpose.”
He added: “If you’re disabled in Britain today, you’re less likely to be in work.
“If you are in work, you’re more likely to be in low pay; you’re more likely to be on a zero hours contract.”
He said the government had made “zero progress” in tackling the disability pay gap, with “disabled workers still losing £70 a week, the pay gap higher than it was a decade ago, and disabled women faring worst of all with their pay penalty doubling under the Tories”.
Nowak told the conference: “This isn’t about the odd bad employer or the odd bit of bad practice, it’s systematic inequality, discrimination and unfairness in our labour markets, our economy and our society and that’s why we need change.”
30 May 2024
Other disability-related stories covered by mainstream media this week
Rishi Sunak has been ordered to publish secret documents showing the impact of his cut to universal credit. As chancellor, the prime minister ignored pleas from campaigners by scrapping the £20-per-week uplift introduced during the pandemic. The government has refused to release an analysis examining the impact of not extending the support. But in a victory for the Mirror, the Information Commissioner’s Office has now ordered the Treasury to disclose the details: https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/rishi-sunak-ordered-publish-secret-32895976
30 May 2024
News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com
