Contents

Disabled man dies in poverty and squalor after DWP removes his benefits, just as Labour cuts PIP by £4.5bn 1

Labour’s cuts to PIP will drag a quarter of a million people into absolute poverty, DWP figures show 4

DPAC says ‘this is just the start’, after protest over ‘vile and cruel’ benefit cuts outside Downing Street 7

Forgotten and abandoned, young disabled people are fighting back against cuts through a new collective 9

Disabled people ‘plead for our lives’ in front of MPs and peers, as assisted suicide bill ends key stage 12

Online provider charges disabled students thousands more for same qualification in ‘blatant discrimination’ 16

DWP make tens of thousands of life-threatening errors, while planning more interaction with disabled claimants 18

DWP cannot say how many disabled people it is sanctioning, despite plans for conditions on many more claimants 20

Other disability-related stories covered by mainstream media this week 22

Disabled man dies in poverty and squalor after DWP removes his benefits, just as Labour cuts PIP by £4.5bn

The body of a disabled man was found in his flat in distressing, squalid conditions, just weeks after the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) wrongly removed his disability benefits because he had failed to return a claim form.

His sister, his only surviving close relative, believes he may have been left without enough credit on his phone to call for help, while he had not had enough money to fix his broken mobility scooter.

David*, who was 59, had run out of pads for his incontinence, so his flat in Salisbury was covered in blood and faeces when his body was discovered by the emergency services, after his sister Susan* had grown increasingly concerned at his failure to answer her messages.

Susan believes the wrongful removal of his personal independence payment (PIP) played a significant part in his death.

She told Disability News Service (DNS): “He was already on the breadline, so I think it would have been devastating for him.”

She also believes DWP failed to make the necessary safeguarding checks before removing his PIP.

She has now warned that the death of her much-loved brother must act as a warning of the horrors to come if the government goes ahead with its planned £4.5 billion cuts to PIP.

David, who lived on the ground floor of a two-storey council house, had left a handwritten note describing his deteriorating health and state of desperation, and how he had fallen over eight times since the start of the year.

He is believed to have died on 19 February, after 25 years of ill-health which had grown considerably worse over the last year.

David had ME, fibromyalgia and diverticulitis, which left him with severe fatigue, “mental fog”, reoccurring flu and incontinence, and only able to walk a few steps.

The handwritten note described his continual incontinence and how he was losing a cup of blood a day because of the diverticulitis. 

But his PIP had been removed just weeks earlier, on 4 January, after he failed to return the lengthy form that he needed to fill out as part of a review of his claim ordered by DWP.

His sister says he would not have been well enough to walk to the post-box to post it, even if he had been able to fill it in, because he could “barely make it to his gate without falling over”.

Although DWP later wrote to him to say his PIP would be reinstated on 20 February, the notification of this decision did not arrive until two weeks after his death, and his family believe the decision was only made after the department were told of his death on 21 February.

Because he had been recovering from an eye infection, Susan believes he may not have realised his PIP had been removed until shortly before his death, as he had not mentioned it in any of his text messages in January or during their last conversation on 1 February.

She said: “It was an absolutely brutal thing to do to a vulnerable person, and I can only imagine the psychological distress that he must have felt when he actually did read the letter.”

By the time he read it, she believes, he was too ill to act and may not have been able to call for help because his phone had run out of credit.

His death has disturbing echoes of other deaths linked to DWP over the last decade – including those of Philippa Day, Jodey Whiting and Errol Graham** – and offers yet more evidence that the department is not fit for purpose.

It will also add to calls for a public inquiry into the years of deaths and other harm caused by DWP.

DWP has so far refused to comment, or answer questions about his death.

Susan, who lives in another part of the country but kept in regular contact with her brother, said this week that his death was an example of the “immense distress” and deaths that will result from Labour’s plans to cut more than £4.5 billion from PIP, which “verge on the point of barbaric”.  

Susan believes David would not have been able to cope with the 24-page form, which she believes arrived without a self-addressed envelope to return the completed form to DWP.

She knew he had been short of money even before his PIP was removed – she and her partner sent him money for a new mattress at Christmas because the old one was filthy, following months of persistent diarrhoea – and Susan believes that losing his PIP plunged him into destitution.

In an email to his sister last summer, he told her: “I get PIP, it is to give disabled people extra money to pay for a cleaner, or the cost of taxis because they are too sick to drive etc.

“I get the lowest amount possible when I am entitled to the full amount possible.

“The bloody gov is being so unfair and cruel to the disabled. I got an application form to fill in to show them the reality of my life.

“Like some bad days when I can’t even get to the kitchen to make a cup of tea.

“I simply now did not have the energy to appeal and go to a tribunal in person where three doctors question you.”

She became increasingly alarmed about her brother during February when he failed to reply to text messages and emails.

She said: “For the last few years, it can be a week, sometimes two weeks, before he replies to me, although I always become very anxious, but he does get back to me eventually.

“But this time he hadn’t got back to me several times and then when I phoned him, his phone was dead – whether that was because the phone was not charged or because he ran out of money to top it up, I don’t know.”

She added: “I believe that the reduction in his PIP directly contributed to his inability to maintain his essential mobility aid and, most tragically, to access essential communication.

“This tragic sequence of events suggests a systemic failure in the support provided to vulnerable individuals.

“My brother’s death is not just a personal tragedy; it raises serious questions about the inadequacy and lack of humanity in the current social security system, as well as within local support systems in Salisbury.”

And she said his death should act as a warning call to the government not to plough ahead with its £4.5 billion in cuts to PIP.

She said: “My concern is how many people will be affected by cuts if people are already on the breadline and already struggling, like my brother, and already feeling suicidal.

“To have what little they have taken from them, I think it would cause widespread deaths.”

Susan originally raised her concerns about her brother with members of the Disability Benefits Consortium, including Caroline Collier, from Inclusion Barnet, who passed the email – with Susan’s permission – to DNS.

Collier, speaking on behalf of Inclusion Barnet’s Campaign for Disability Justice, said: “Susan’s initial email was heartbreaking, and I’m so pleased she felt able to speak to DNS so that David’s story can be told.

“I can hardly begin to imagine the difficulty and desperation of David’s final weeks, and believe that we have a duty to reflect as a society as to why we allow such tragedies to keep happening.

“Firstly, I think it’s important that there is an inquest, so that the role of the DWP and other agencies in this case can be properly scrutinised.

“Secondly, we need to urgently reframe the conversation around the current proposed cuts to recognise that, far from the narratives peddled by certain sections of the press, there are two million disabled people in the UK who are destitute, many of whom will be facing similar challenges to David.

“This has to be addressed: literally the last thing we need is more cuts.

“At the Campaign for Disability Justice, we want the government to commit to working towards a decent life for all, and to ending these appalling outcomes for disabled people.”

DNS asked DWP on Tuesday morning to answer a series of questions about David’s death but it had not responded by noon today (Thursday), other than to finally acknowledge the request last night.

DNS had asked if the department would be apologising to Susan; if it would be investigating the circumstances of David’s death; whether David had been flagged on DWP’s systems as a “vulnerable” claimant; if DWP accepted there had been a critical safeguarding failure when it appeared to have removed David’s PIP without checking he could survive without it; whether DWP only reinstated his PIP after learning of his death; and whether it would now put reforms and cuts to PIP on hold until his death has been investigated.

*Not their real names

**All three feature in The Department: How a Violent Government Bureaucracy Killed Hundreds and Hid the Evidence, John Pring’s book on the years of deaths linked to DWP, which is published by Pluto Press

27 March 2025

Labour’s cuts to PIP will drag a quarter of a million people into absolute poverty, DWP figures show

The government’s decision to tighten eligibility for personal independence payment (PIP) will drag a quarter of a million working-age people into absolute poverty* by 2030, official documents have revealed.

Although the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has for some reason failed to calculate the increase in disability poverty caused by the various cuts and reforms announced in last week’s disability benefits green paper, it has carried out calculations showing how many working-age people will be affected.

They show that 250,000 working-age people will be drawn into absolute poverty due to the PIP cuts, and it is certain that almost all of these will be disabled people.

The figure is just one crucial detail in several documents published yesterday (Wednesday) by DWP, the Treasury, and the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), alongside the spring statement delivered by the chancellor, Rachel Reeves.

An equality analysis by DWP estimates that 3.1 million households with at least one disabled member will lose out through the overall package of cuts and reforms by 2029-30, with an average loss of £1,730 a year.

Another 1.8 million households with at least one disabled member will gain, but only by an average of £560 a year.

Reeves told MPs yesterday that the government will be cutting £4.8 billion a year from spending on social security by 2029-30 – although it is not clear from the Treasury figures how she has calculated that figure.

This is because spending on PIP being cut by more than £4.5 billion, while there will also be £3 billion in cuts to the health element of universal credit**, and the impact of other measures has yet to be calculated.

The impact of the cuts on disabled people were revealed as more than 1,000 disabled people and allies protested outside Downing Street and parliament yesterday as part of a protest organised by Disabled People Against Cuts, Inclusion London and Stop the War Coalition, and supported by many other grassroots groups and unions.

Other protests took place across England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales under the same #WelfareNotWarfare banner.

The actions came as Disability News Service (DNS) reports today how the body of a disabled man was found in his flat last month in distressing, squalid conditions, just weeks after DWP wrongly removed his PIP because he had failed to return a review form he was too ill to complete (see separate story).

His death highlights yet again the major concerns about DWP’s ability to cut safely billions of pounds from disabled people’s support, without risking the lives of countless claimants.

Of the cuts laid out in last week’s Pathways to Work green paper, the new documents published yesterday show the greatest impact will be caused by DWP’s decision that, from next year, PIP claimants must score a minimum of four points in at least one daily living activity to be eligible for the daily living part of the benefit.

This will see, by 2029-30, 370,000 current PIP recipients losing their daily living entitlement when their award is reviewed, and 430,000 future recipients not receiving the PIP they would otherwise have received, at an average loss of £4,500 a year.

Another measure that will have a significant impact on disabled people is the government’s decision to cut the health element of universal credit for new claimants from £97 per week currently to £50 per week in 2026-27, while freezing it for existing claimants until 2029-30.

This could see 2.25 million current recipients of the health element losing an average of £500 per year in 2029-30, and 730,000 future recipients losing an average of £3,000 per year, although they will all benefit from a small increase in the standard universal credit allowance of £5 per week above inflation by 2029-30.

There remain several important unanswered questions about the government’s reforms.

A key issue is whether OBR is correct in its estimate that 800,000 disabled people will lose the daily living element of PIP through the tightened eligibility, as opposed to the 1.5 million suggested by what it calls the “static costing” of the policy.

OBR seems to suggest the lower number is more likely because of the “strong financial incentive” to qualify for PIP, and the increased number of appeals it expects, but fears will remain that the number losing out could be even higher than 800,000.

Another key question is how many disabled people who receive universal credit and have “the most severe, life-long health conditions”, no prospect of an improvement in their health, and who “will never be able to work”, will no longer be reassessed and will receive an additional premium.

Ministers have yet to decide the size of this premium, and which groups of disabled people will be protected in this way.

OBR also says it is too early to calculate the impact of scrapping the work capability assessment and deciding eligibility for the universal credit (UC) health element through the PIP assessment instead.

Other question-marks remain over the impact of the government’s decision to review the PIP assessment, and to increase the number of face-to-face PIP assessments.

OBR also confirms in its report that the various government cuts amount to the “largest package of welfare savings since the July 2015 Budget”.

And it confirms that – before the cuts – total social security spending was stable as a proportion of GDP, as reported by DNS earlier this month, and that it is now on a “slightly downward trajectory”.

The documents also fail to assess the financial impact of preventing young disabled people claiming the health element of universal credit until they are 22, from 2027 onwards, and of plans to raise the age at which young people transition from disability living allowance to PIP from 16 to 18, a move which will also cut spending.

Meanwhile, the Equality and Human Rights Commission has confirmed to DNS that it is considering whether the measures in last week’s green paper have breached DWP’s public sector equality duty to have “due regard” to how its policies and decisions affect disabled people and other groups protected under the Equality Act.

*The number of people earning below 60 per cent of the average (median) income in 2010-11, adjusted for inflation

**It is also unclear what the final impact of changes to universal credit will be, as the standard allowance will be increased slightly in real terms and some changes to the health element are yet to be finalised

27 March 2025

DPAC says ‘this is just the start’, after protest over ‘vile and cruel’ benefit cuts outside Downing Street

Disabled people have spoken of their anger, frustration and fear – and sense of betrayal by the Labour government – over plans to cut billions of pounds from disability benefits, as they protested outside Downing Street yesterday (Wednesday).

Estimates suggest more than 1,000 disabled people and allies chanted outside the Downing Street gates or listened to speeches across the road, on the other side of Whitehall.

They later marched down Whitehall and past the Houses of Parliament, just as chancellor Rachel Reeves was delivering a spring statement that confirmed more than £4.5 billion in cuts to personal independence payment (PIP) and £3 billion in cuts to the health element of universal credit (see separate story).

The protest was organised by Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC), Inclusion London and Stop the War Coalition, and supported by many other grassroots groups and unions, while other protests took place across England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, with reports of 100 protesters in Newcastle, a similar number in Cardiff, and more than 100 in Norfolk.

DPAC said it may have been its largest and most successful protest ever.

But it was, DPAC said last night, “just the start of our fightback” against the “deadly and disgusting cuts”.

Among those protesting, Clare Williams, a lecturer at Kent Law School, told Disability News Service (DNS) that she felt “anger and frustration that we are seeing this under a Labour government”, and she called on ministers to work with disabled people’s organisations, “think again”, and halt the cuts.

She said: “Tens of thousands of people are scared about how they are going to survive.”

Abi Palmer, from south London, said she was “terrified” about the cuts.

She said: “I rely on PIP to survive. PIP is the only thing that allows me to stay in work.

“When Labour came in, it was not a Labour government I would have voted for, but I thought, ‘Thank god I will not be a target anymore, there will not be this vitriol and hatred against people like me,’ but lo and behold it is worse than ever.”

She said PIP was “the bare fucking minimum” disabled people need to cope with the barriers they face.

She said she was surprised at how many disabled people had attended the protest.

“I know how much it is costing people’s bodies to be here. I have talked to people who will be knocked out for a week or a month, but this is important.”

Alimamy Bangura, a disabled refugee and a member of the Manchester-based human rights organisation RAPAR, said he was “so worried” about the planned cuts.

He told DNS: “I want to work, but I am not able to work because of my health restrictions.

“We should not be treated like this.”

He was one of the disabled activists who travelled to Geneva last March to hold the last Conservative government to account over its failure to make progress after being found guilty of “grave and systematic violations” of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in 2016, mostly around its own cuts and reforms to disability benefits.

Bangura said: “There was nothing about benefits in the Labour manifesto.

“I campaigned for Labour, but I will never vote for them again.”

Joel, another PIP recipient, said the government would create more barriers to work – not less – by cutting disability benefits.

He said: “I am worried about how it might affect my ability to get into work.

“They are treating disabled people as if they are lazy. It’s a bizarre accusation but that is what is implied by the words of the government.”

Susie Bannister, a wheelchair-user from Surrey, said her concern about the cuts to disability benefits “keeps me up at night”.

She said: “It’s not just the person being impacted, wider society will be impacted.

“Some of us can’t physically work but are able to volunteer. There are a lot of disabled people who volunteer.”

Chris, a wheelchair-user, said he had looked at the government’s planned reforms and believed he would lose the daily living part of his PIP when the cuts come in and his PIP is reviewed, although he said “it will hurt a lot of people worse than it will me”.

Zeek, who receives PIP, and is a member of London Renters Union, told DNS: “I don’t know what I would do if I didn’t have PIP.”

He added: “The cuts will make things worse for disabled households. It will push people into homelessness.

“It’s going to kill people.”

Zeek is on an NHS waiting-list, and he said he cannot even consider working until he receives the treatment he needs.

John McDonnell, the former Labour shadow chancellor, who has supported DPAC for nearly 15 years and is currently sitting as a suspended Labour MP, told protesters: “It’s not austerity for the rich, it’s austerity for people living in poverty, for disabled people.”

He said the battle over PIP would “be won on the streets, like this”.

Disabled actor Cherylee Houston told DNS she was “angry and really upset and hurt” by the government’s cuts, which she said would lead to disabled people being left “prisoners in their own homes”.

She had said earlier: “PIP is used by many of us to stay in work and cover the extra costs that disability causes.

“My community is terrified that the government is taking away the most basic support that those most in need rely on.

“It makes no sense to take away the basic supports that enable disabled people to contribute to society.

“These cuts will trap more people in poverty.

“I am already hearing from friends that they fear they will no longer be able to work if these cuts go ahead.”

Natasha Hirst, president of the National Union of Journalists, and herself a disabled activist, told the protest: “These cuts will kill.”

She said: “These proposals will take away vital financial support from disabled people, without addressing the discrimination, abuse and exclusion that we experience in our daily lives.

“These cuts are a political choice, not a necessity. We expected this treatment under a Conservative government, but not from Labour.

“This is a vile and cruel attack on disabled people that will ultimately bring harm to everyone.”

Linda Burnip, co-founder of DPAC, said before the protest: “Labour should be ashamed of their proposed cuts which will push disabled people into even greater poverty and destitution and cause many more to kill themselves.

“Disabled people will not allow themselves to be made scapegoats for Robber Reeves’ cuts while millionaires remain untouched by cuts.”

27 March 2025

Forgotten and abandoned, young disabled people are fighting back against cuts through a new collective

Hundreds of “forgotten” and “abandoned” young disabled people across the country have taken part in peaceful protests against government cuts to disability benefits, as part of a new movement of activists powered by social media.

The Crips Against Cuts (CAC) collective has grown in just a few weeks from a single disabled campaigner who felt abandoned by charities and politicians, to organising actions in more than 20 towns and cities across Britain last Saturday.

Actions were organised across England, Scotland and Wales, including Bristol, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Newcastle, Hull, Darlington, Leeds, Sheffield, London, Brighton, Portsmouth, Truro, Exeter, Bournemouth, Coventry, Cambridge, Thanet, Nottingham, Birmingham, Liverpool and Manchester.

CAC believes there were about 500 disabled people and allies at Saturday’s action in central London, on the South Bank, near London Eye and County Hall, and about 200 in most of the actions in the larger cities.

The new collective is being driven by users of the social media platform Instagram – with younger disabled people making up the bulk of its membership – and to a lesser extent other social media platforms like Bluesky and Threads.

Linsey McFadden, one of the first disabled campaigners to join CAC, told Disability News Service: “I think our success in that sort of mass mobilization really comes down to the fact that we’re tapping into that younger Instagram audience.

“I think millennials and younger generally have less [money] because of the way the prolonged austerity has hit us.”

She added: “There’s a very human health toll to the more than decade of austerity that we’ve had.

“There’s a very human health toll to all the money that’s been taken out of the NHS, the rate of disability from long Covid, and the impact of rising cost-of-living amid stagnating wages.

“If you consider the impact that even one of those things has on mental health, it is no shock at all that we have rising mental health problems.”

McFadden said the loss of PIP would be “life-destroying”.

She said: “My best friend lives in the negative; her bank balance is always minus several hundred even when PIP hits… and she works, but it’s just not enough.

“They keep saying that those of us with ‘severe disabilities’ will still keep our benefits and I’m not happy with that.”

She said she wanted all disabled people to be able to access PIP, a sentiment that “has been very well echoed across the community”.

At the London action, she said, “a lot of the speeches were very raw and emotional because it comes from such a deep place.

“We were already the poorest demographic in the UK before the cost-of-living crisis hit.

“We’re just kind of sat here, forgotten and suffering, and most of us aren’t receiving the treatment we need, or we don’t have our pain managed, or the barriers to accessing specialists are impossible to navigate.

“It’s a very difficult feeling to describe, but I would also say that in all of that and the rawness of the emotion, there was tremendous support for each other.

“All of us have been talking about how wonderful it’s been for us to connect with each other, because as disabled people, we are often so alone and isolated.

“All of a sudden I’ve got all of these disabled friends, and we all want to listen to each other and we all want to amplify each other.”

The origins of the new movement are in the West Country.

CAC began with Mac, a disabled campaigner from Bristol, who relies on PIP and was frustrated at the lack of response to her concerns about the government’s proposed cuts from her MP and traditional charities.

McFadden said: “After reaching out to lots of spaces that claim they support disabled people, she just felt really abandoned and so figured that lots of us were probably feeling the same… and she was very right.”

CAC was contacted soon after it launched by Paula Peters, from Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC), which McFadden said had “welcomed us into the crip liberation movement” and had been “very supportive”.

Both grassroots groups are now supporting each other’s actions.

McFadden said: “I think for disabled liberation, it’s really important for there to be multiple groups who are all serving different demographics to some extent, and then collaborating together to ensure that everyone’s needs are being met.”

CAC is now discussing how to move forward, developing resources, deciding what contributions members can make, with plans to allow the community to vote on what its next actions should be, and a determination to remain a non-hierarchical organisation.

They also want to work with groups from other marginalised communities, as they hope to address the intersectional nature of the oppression many disabled people face.

And although the focus of their anger is the planned cuts to PIP, they will not ignore the other cuts the government is planning, such as those to the health element of universal credit (see separate story).

McFadden said: “This is very much not going to be a sprint.

“Today we’re talking about PIP, but PIP is not the be-all, end-all of cuts against disabled people.”

CAC’s actions are likely to remain peaceful, but she said: “I really feel like [the government] thought that we would be an easy target, but millennials and younger are very much in the mindset of ‘we’re not going to be quiet’.

“We would really encourage both the government and British society as a whole to consider why they have so quickly jumped to using the most vulnerable population in the country as the scapegoat for our money problems, rather than looking at the very real problems that have led us here.”

The scapegoating and hate crime that disabled people are increasingly reporting was illustrated when last weekend’s action in Exeter was marred by a member of the public who threw a chair at some of the activists.

McFadden said the incident was “quickly diffused”, but she added: “I understand that quite a lot of people in the UK are angry for quite a lot of reasons.

“Everyone is struggling to some extent unless you are wealthy, but really, why are we your scapegoat?”

27 March 2025

Disabled people ‘plead for our lives’ in front of MPs and peers, as assisted suicide bill ends key stage

Disabled people with progressive and terminal conditions have come to parliament to “plead for our lives” in front of MPs and peers, as a bill to legalise assisted suicide in England and Wales finishes a key stage in the Commons.

They told parliamentarians that disabled people were still “missing from the conversation” on assisted suicide, as the terminally ill adults (end of life) bill ended its committee stage.

Monday’s meeting was organised by the disabled people’s organisation Not Dead Yet UK (NDY UK), and it saw a string of disabled people attend a meeting in the House of Lords to tell their stories of how legalisation would put their lives and those of other disabled people at risk.

The disabled crossbench peer Baroness [Jane] Campbell said NDY UK believed disabled people were “a cohort of people who are missing from the conversations” on the bill.

She said: “Most of the people in the room today will be affected by the bill.

“We feel that our lived experience of living with progressive and terminal conditions should be heard but not only heard but we should be at the centre of this conversation.”

But she said it was “very difficult” for disabled people opposed to the bill to get their voices heard by MPs and peers.

She said they “do not hear our voices because they meet far more people just like them.

“The predominant voice… is that people like us should have a right to die.

“They do not consider even for a minute that we are struggling even to have the right to live every day of our lives.

“We do not enjoy coming here today to plead for our lives. It takes away our humanity and it gives us no sense of self-dignity.

“For us, this is almost like the last straw. Now is about our right to breathe and survive and live and have value.”

Among the MPs who attended were Labour’s Neil Coyle, a director of policy and campaigns for Disability Rights UK before he became an MP, and senior Labour MP Dame Meg Hillier, as well as crossbench peer Baroness [Ilora] Finlay and Labour’s Baroness [Kay] Andrews.

Coyle said he would be voting against the bill and that he “shared many of the concerns” that had been outlined in the meeting.

The meeting heard from disabled actor and activist Liz Carr, whose award-winning documentary* about assisted suicide, Better off Dead? – broadcast by BBC1 last May and still available to watch – explained the dangers of legalisation to a mainstream audience.

She said disabled people were often told that the bill “will not touch us, it is not about us, and we are shut up because of that”.

But she said: “Even if the definition stays incredibly tight on this bill at the beginning, we are pretty sure, using the experience of other places, that it will extend, but even as it is now, terminally-ill people are disabled.”

She said: “Even if this bill remains as terminally-ill, our voices can show you and teach you… that there are real concerns about handing this over at this time to an NHS and social care system… that is struggling.”

Nicki Myers, who receives palliative care through NHS continuing healthcare funding, and support from her local hospice, spoke to the meeting through a video recording.

She said: “What I worry about most with this bill is that it will change my relationship with doctors and the medical profession as a whole.

“I would be constantly questioning whether these people really wanted to treat me or not.”

Mike Smith, former disability commissioner of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, who has a progressive neuromuscular condition, said: “In a perfect world, I would actually like the choice if I have just got told, ‘you have six months to live’, but it’s not a perfect world and I really don’t think that my so-called right [to an assisted suicide] is more important than other people’s right to be protected from coercion.

“I don’t see how we can make a decision [on legalising assisted suicide] at this moment in time with the state of palliative care, the NHS… and social care.

“Knowing the challenges that the majority of disabled people face, I would be really scared if they passed this legislation, and knowing that if they do so, state-sponsored death is going to be the solution to those problems.”

Chelsea Roff, a researcher and founder of the US-based charity Eat Breathe Thrive, who had a stroke due to severe anorexia as a teenager, gave evidence to the Commons committee currently debating the bill.

She co-wrote a research paper that found that at least 60 women with eating disorders, many in their teens and twenties, had died by assisted suicide in Belgium, the Netherlands, and the United States.

This included Oregon, the US state where assisted suicide is restricted to those who are terminally-ill, just as with the bill MPs are examining.

She told Monday’s meeting: “I think eating disorders have in some ways been the canary in the coalmine to go, ‘Everything disabled people have been saying about this is true: the definition of terminal illness is very loose in practice.’”

Despite this and other evidence shown to the committee, every amendment put forward by eating disorder charities to try to ensure people with those conditions do not qualify for an assisted suicide under the bill was rejected by the committee, she said.

Roff said: “They chose not to do that, having looked at the evidence.”

She said the committee – which has a strong majority in favour of legalisation – chose to believe instead that no-one with anorexia would ever be called untreatable, even though Roff herself was pronounced untreatable as a young person and “was so close to death I could taste it”.

She said: “If this had been available to me when I was ill, I would 100 per cent have taken it.

“I begged the doctors to let me die, I did not want to live, I thought I didn’t have a life worth living for anymore.

“So I am very worried about this bill. I have huge doubts about the safeguards.

“I am worried that those pushing it through have not looked closely at the evidence and not looked closely at the wording of the bill.”

The meeting also heard about the experiences of Rosy Bremer, from Portsmouth, who has motor neurone disease, and whose story was told by her friend, Rev Wendy May Jacobs.

She had been forced to rely on friends and family on a care rota after her local council only agreed to provide her with 12 hours of support a day, even though she could not move from her chair or eat without assistance.

They later crowdfunded more than £23,000 to pay for £8,000 of extra care a month when the rota could not be sustained.

The “shock and humiliation of being denied what she needed” left her “intensely anxious about the future” and “traumatised and deeply depressed”, and eventually she was forced to move into a care home when her condition worsened.

Rev Jacobs told the meeting: “This betrayal of Rosy by our health and our care system has taken a terrible toll.”

She said her “resilient, hilarious, gracious friend” had been left “really broken by the cruel inadequacy of our healthcare system.

“For me it is horrifying hearing about the proposed assisted dying legislation when so many are not even given sufficient assistance to live in dignity and safety with all the challenges you face.”

Sophia Kleanthous, an Inclusion London trustee and a disabled campaigner who ended up in supported accommodation when she was homeless and suicidal, said she had experienced mental and verbal abuse and had seen how other disabled people had been treated within a service that is “already at breaking point”.

She said: “That’s a fear that I fundamentally have – if I had been offered [assisted suicide] when I was in that state, I don’t know if I would have said no.”

Kevin Caulfield, former chair of Hammersmith and Fulham Coalition Against Cuts, which played a key role in campaigning for an end to care charges in the borough, told the meeting that there was “systemic and societal coercion in every aspect of our lives”, while social care provision is “threadbare”, and many health services are “on their knees”.

He said access to quality end-of-life support was “extremely limited” and “for many of us that results in a feeling that we can’t afford to go on living”.

He said the bill’s safeguards were “mostly an illusion” because “in reality, society is unable to regulate against the impact of societal coercion and abuse”.

Caulfield said he had been diagnosed with a terminal condition in 1997 before his condition started to stabilise.

But he said: “If assisted dying had been on the menu and my doctor had put it on the table for discussion, I might well have gone for it.”

Dr Miro Griffiths, who is co-director of the Centre for Disability Studies at the University of Leeds and has a progressive condition, told the meeting via a recorded video message: “The danger is that if you are trying to access support or trying to access medical practitioners to support you then having a permanent question about whether you should have your death facilitated by the state or have your death accelerated by the state means that you are in a very vulnerable and dangerous position.

“While there are arguments for having freedom of choice and personal autonomy to make decisions over your life, we must remember that the role of the state and the role of legislation is to protect the majority of people, and individuals do not have complete control to do what they want, when they want, because there is a need to provide safety and security for the collective.”

He said that by defeating the legislation “we can focus our attention on making sure that individuals receive sufficient support to live the best quality of life that they can as their needs progress over time”.

He added: “There is the opportunity to defeat this, and it’s important that we recognize there is an alternative world which we can build, which is more inclusive, more accessible, more participatory, and more safe for disabled people.”

The meeting came as the Guardian reported how a group of Labour MPs opposed to legalisation had called the bill “irredeemably flawed and not fit to become law” in a letter to their parliamentary colleagues, saying “significant new risks” had emerged during the committee process.

Meanwhile, the Isle of Man parliament has passed a law that will give terminally-ill adults the right to choose to end their own lives, the first British parliament to do so. The bill will now be sent for royal assent.

Under the Isle of Man bill, adults with 12 months or less to live will be given the right to choose to die, if they are over 18, and have lived on the island for five years.

*This week, she won presenter of the year award for the documentary at the Royal Television Society Programme Awards

27 March 2025

Online provider charges disabled students thousands more for same qualification in ‘blatant discrimination’

An online education provider has been accused of “blatant discrimination” after charging disabled students thousands of pounds more a year than non-disabled students for the same qualifications.

The Cambridge-based Online College of Art and Design (OCAD) describes itself as the UK’s “most established online art college”, but it has been accused of “systemic and structural ableism” over the extra fees it charges disabled students.

Its website shows it is charging disabled students thousands of pounds more to sign up for courses such as a foundation diploma in textile design, a foundation diploma in architectural design, and a certificate in art and design.

Under the Equality Act, an education provider is legally required to make reasonable adjustments for disabled students but cannot charge for those adjustments.

But prices quoted on the site show it appears to be doing exactly that.

It charges £3,999 for its level three online foundation diploma in textile design – designed for “serious career-oriented students who wish to be artists or designers” – but charges £9,000 for students with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) studying for the same qualification.

Those enrolling on the SEND version of the course benefit from “a SENDCO, more tutor time, additional bespoke learning materials, progress reports and attendance to online meetings with local authorities”, all of which are likely to be considered reasonable adjustments under the Equality Act.

Prices are similarly inflated for SEND students on the level three foundation diploma in architectural design, as they are asked to pay £9,000, compared with £3,999 for non-SEND students.

And students studying for the level two certificate in art and design – equivalent to a GCSE – pay £999 for a two-year course, compared with £4,000 a year for SEND students studying for the same qualification.

OCAD says on its website: “For students with learning difficulties, please apply for our SEND courses. 

“It is considerably more difficult and time consuming to teach these students.”

Iyiola Olafimihan, campaigns and justice lead for The Alliance for Inclusive Education, said: “This is another blatant discriminatory act on disabled people by businesses within the education industry.

“We already see similar practices within the education system, which monopolises and profits from the lives of disabled people.

“This is a clear example of systemic and structural ableism, enabling businesses to exploit disabled people while reinforcing segregated educational practices.

“Once again, it demonstrates that the Equality Act remains meaningless when it comes to protecting the human rights of disabled people.”

OCAD is part of Cambridge Online Education, which is registered under the government’s UK Register of Learning Providers, and claims it has “built a reputation as a trusted leader in delivering high-quality, personalised online learning experiences”.

Asked about the extra charges for disabled students, Dr Troy Page, OCAD’s director and founder, said: “We have no desire to discriminate which is why we are offering courses for students with SEND.”

He told Disability News Service (DNS) the SEND courses “are not the same course even if the qualification obtained is the same” because they “offer the additional support required”.

He said: “Any student with or without disabilities may apply for any of our courses including the lower priced non-SEND courses and so no discrimination is present.

“All students with or without disabilities can choose which course they wish to purchase.”

He added: “Some students prefer/need a higher number of tutor sessions, more bespoke learning materials, require progress reports, online meetings with local authorities, and the higher price of the SEND courses reflects the additional cost of paying for tutors.

“It is disingenuous to say the courses are the same.”

He said he did not believe that OCAD’s behaviour was unlawful.

He told DNS: “You are conflating standard courses with SEND courses and the course description make it very clear they are different and says how they are different.”

Page said he was not aware of other parts of Cambridge Online Education that offered higher fees for SEND versions of courses.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission had not commented by noon today (Thursday).

The Department for Education also failed to comment by noon today.

27 March 2025

DWP make tens of thousands of life-threatening errors, while planning more interaction with disabled claimants

Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) staff are making tens of thousands of potentially fatal errors every month when dealing with disabled people’s universal credit claims, just as the department prepares to increase its level of interaction with claimants.

Last week’s disability benefits green paper and consultation, Pathways to Work, said DWP would change the current universal credit system from one “based on almost no contact” with disabled people found not fit for work “to one based on keeping in touch and generating opportunities to help people improve their health and employment prospects”.

But three new reports obtained by Disability News Service (DNS), following a freedom of information request, show DWP staff are already failing to keep disabled claimants of universal credit safe, and are making repeated blunders in their day-to-day work, even before the government increases their workload and responsibilities.

The reports analyse whether DWP staff are meeting 17 customer support standards (CSS), which were introduced by the last government to “improve the experience of customers with complex needs and significantly reduce instances of serious cases by providing the right support at the right time”.

The reports admit that the impact of CSS errors “can affect customer life chances” and “can negatively affect departmental reputation”.

DWP has been carrying out these checks for nearly two years, as part of its regular “quality assurance checks” on how staff are dealing with new claims, changes of circumstances and other interactions with claimants.

But the three quarterly reports – from June, September and December 2024 – also show that DWP has now made it impossible to see exactly how often DWP civil servants are making potentially fatal blunders.

Earlier versions of the reports, issued monthly, showed how many cases involving CSS were being checked every month in each category, and therefore what proportion of these checks involved safeguarding errors.

But since welfare rights expert Owen Stevens, from Child Poverty Action Group, first obtained the monthly reports under the Freedom of Information Act, DWP has now replaced the reports with quarterly versions and has stopped showing how many cases they are sampling.

This means – in DWP’s latest attack on transparency – that it is impossible to estimate how often staff are making safeguarding mistakes.

The latest report still shows 284 occasions on which DWP staff failed to record that a universal credit claimant had “complex needs” in the section showing if they need additional support.

And there were 476 failures around additional support and homelessness, while staff failed to record a summary of the claimant’s additional support needs on 143 occasions.

Although the report is not entirely clear, it appears these figures show a running total over two quarters.

The report also shows that staff failed 240 times to record that a disabled claimant had accessibility needs in the “additional support” section.

It is impossible to say from the report how large the sample was, although a previous monthly report checked a sample of 1,653 universal credit (UC) claims for CSS failings.

But it is likely that if scaled up across the country – with tens of thousands of new health and disability UC claimants every month – these blunders are likely to be happening many thousands of times a month.

DWP has previously argued that it is “misleading” to suggest that its staff are making thousands of potentially fatal errors, because in “the unlikely event an error occurs, we have safeguards in place to resolve them swiftly and take action to reduce the likelihood of it re-occurring”.

But the new figures suggest that the errors keep re-occurring, even though it is now impossible to estimate how frequently this is happening across the country.

Recent history shows DWP does not have “safeguards in place” to resolve errors “swiftly”.

The fatal impact of such errors was demonstrated two years ago by the death of Nazerine Anderson, from Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire.

Among the errors made in her case, DWP was repeatedly told of her mental distress and suicidal ideation, but her work coach failed to record her “vulnerability” on her profile, while also failing to record updated information about her repeated visits to hospital on the relevant part of the system.

Last May, DNS reported how a survey by the Commons work and pensions committee found two-thirds of DWP staff did not have enough time to deal with safeguarding concerns “carefully” and “correctly”, despite years of deaths of benefit claimants linked with DWP’s actions and failings.

And in December 2023, a dossier of evidence submitted by the PCS union to DWP showed the department to be a failing organisation in a “state of crisis” and facing a “near collapse” of its benefits systems, with staff accusing DWP of “deliberate neglect” and revealing that claimants in vulnerable situations were “falling through the gaps” in the system.

27 March 2025

DWP cannot say how many disabled people it is sanctioning, despite plans for conditions on many more claimants

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has admitted it has no figures to show how many disabled people who cannot work are having their benefits “sanctioned”, just as the government announced reforms that will expose many more to strict conditions.

Although the department regularly releases data that shows how many universal credit claimants are being sanctioned for failing to follow its rules, these figures do not show how many of those in the limited capability for work (LCW) group are being sanctioned.

The LCW group is for disabled people and others with health conditions who have limited capability for work now but need to prepare for work in the future.

But last week’s disability benefits green paper and consultation, Pathways to Work, said the government planned to “change the current system from one based on almost no contact” for disabled people who have been found not fit for work “to one based on keeping in touch and generating opportunities to help people improve their health and employment prospects”.

This will include those in the LCW group but also most of those in the limited capability for work-related activity group.

DWP says this move towards “active engagement” will have the “ultimate backstop of sanctions to underpin the expectations of engagement”, although it claims this will be used “only as a last resort”.

But despite announcing these sweeping reforms, DWP has now confirmed to Disability News Service (DNS) that it cannot provide figures that show how many disabled people in the LCW group are currently having their benefits sanctioned, and for how long, and that it is too expensive to find out.

DNS had asked through a freedom of information request for versions of the latest universal credit sanctions statistics, released last month, that showed figures only for those in the LCW group.

But DWP said in its response that it would be too expensive to produce those figures.

It said the department “cannot break down any of the Universal Credit (UC) sanctions data by stage of UC health, as the UC Work Capability Assessment information, which is only available from April 2019, is held separately and not included in the sanction dataset.

“To perform the complex and iterative data merging required to be able to provide any sanctions data for those in the limited capability for work group would exceed the cost limit [of the freedom of information request].”

The February figures show that, in the year to October 2024, the department made more than 600,000 decisions to sanction a universal credit claimant’s benefits, with the most common reason being a failure to attend or take part in a mandatory work-related interview.

The most frequent sanctions were those imposed for between four and 13 weeks.

But none of these figures, and others in the statistical release, show how many disabled people in the LCW group have been sanctioned.

Dr David Webster, a sanctions expert and an honorary senior research fellow at the University of Glasgow’s School of Social and Political Sciences, has been publishing regular, influential briefings on DWP sanctions for more than 11 years.

He said: “Almost nine years on from the start of universal credit rollout in May 2016, we still don’t have a suite of official statistics which is comprehensive enough to tell us how the system is working.

“Data on sanctions on disabled people is only one of the obvious gaps. Information on the appeal system is another.

“Given that the government now seems set on keeping universal credit, publishing fuller statistics should be a priority.”

Caroline Selman, senior researcher at Public Law Project, which is running a project on sanctions with Central England Law Centre, said: “Sanctions can push people into extreme financial hardship, poor physical and mental health and harmful spirals of debt, as we know from the work we are undertaking with Central England Law Centre, through which they have received 200 enquiries about sanctions.

“Meanwhile, a DWP internal evaluation has suggested that sanctions also lead to people moving into work less quickly and earning less when they do.

“It is therefore concerning if the government is making decisions about its approach to these harmful measures without understanding, or being transparent about, who is impacted by them and how.

“Last year DWP started to publish data about sanctions and ethnicity for the first time.

“It is important that they also publish the equivalent data that we understand they hold on disabled people who are sanctioned.”

Ministers under the last government were repeatedly told the impact of sanctions on disabled people was “harmful and counter-productive”.

Among the many deaths in which the sanctions regime has played a part was that of David Clapson, who died in July 2013 after being left destitute by having his benefits sanctioned.

Although he was on jobseeker’s allowance (JSA), DWP was aware that he had diabetes, and he died from an acute lack of insulin, three weeks after having his JSA sanctioned.

Because he had no money, he couldn’t afford to pay for electricity that would have kept the fridge where he kept his insulin working, and he had also run out of food.

27 March 2025

Other disability-related stories covered by mainstream media this week

The government expressed concerns about the timeline for implementing assisted suicide, the BBC understands, before measures were tabled to delay when it could be available. Kim Leadbeater, the Labour MP bringing the bill, said she was “disappointed” to be proposing deferring when it must be in force until 2029: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c2er99xmjjwo

The number of people in the Netherlands who died by euthanasia increased by 10 per cent last year, figures have shown, as the official watchdog warned doctors to exercise “great caution” in cases where a person has a psychiatric illness. The Netherlands, which has one of the world’s oldest and broadest euthanasia laws, allows doctors to end a person’s life if they are “suffering unbearably, with no prospect of improvement”. They must be diagnosed with a medical condition, but this can include mental illness or dementia: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/mar/24/euthanasia-death-increase-netherlands

27 March 2025

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

View key locations on our map:

Please click on these images to make them larger on your screen

Or view these locations on Google Maps

Please note that the Sanctuary House pub is 0.4 miles away from the end of the march, on Tothill Street. The best step-free entrance is via Dean Farrer Street, as the main entrance on Tothill Street has a small step/lip. The side entrance on Tothill Street is step free and goes straight to the accessible toilet (Radar key, no purchase necessary), but there is a set of double doors between this door and the main pub area. Non-accessible toilets are in the basement.

National Day of Action – Wednesday 26th March

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DPAC Aberdeen

Wednesday 26th March, 12pm

Outside Marischal College, Broad Street, Aberdeen

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Brighton

Wednesday 26th March, 11am-1pm

Hove Town Hall, BN3 3Bq

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DPAC Cambridgeshire & Essex

Wednesday 26th March Cambridge, outside Grafton Centre (Fitzroy Street) Leafleting 12:30-1:30pm

Cambridge outside the Guildhall, Rally 5:30-6:30pm

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Cardiff

Wednesday 26th March, 6:30pm

Office of Jo Stevens MP, Secretary of State for Wales, 116 Albany road, Cardiff, CF24 3RU

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Chesterfield

Wednesday 26th March, 4:30pm

Outside Chesterfield Labour Club

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DPAC Darlington

Wednesday 26th March, 12-2pm

Darlington Town Hall

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DPAC Lancaster and Morecamble

Wednesday 26th march, 6pm

Dalton Square, Lancaster

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DPAC Leeds

Wednesday 26th March, 11-1pm

Leeds Bus Station

More info

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DPAC London

Wednesday 26th March, 11am at Downing Street, Whitehall, London, SW1A 2AA

Balls to the Spring Statement

Then March to Parliament for a protest 

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DPAC Margate

Wednesday 26th March, 11am

Outside Polly Billington MP’s East Thanet office, 44 Northdown Road, Cliftonville, Margate, CT9 2RW

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DPAC Newcastle

Wednesday 26th March 12-2pm

Grey’s Monument, Newcastle

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DPAC Norfolk

Wednesday 26th March 12-2pm

Norwich City Hall, Norwich

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DPAC Northern Ireland

Wednesday 26th March 1-1:30pm

Guildhall Derry

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DPAC Swansea

Wednesday 26th March, 1pm

Castle Square,  Swansea  SA1 3PP

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Actions after 26th March:

Community Day of Action – Manchester

No Return to Austerity, No Cuts for Benefits, Energy for All

Tuesday 1st April, 12pm

Outside Boots, 32 Market Street, Manchester, M60 1TA

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Portsmouth

Saturday 5th April, 2-4pm

Portsmouth Guildhall

DPAC and allies have called a National Day Of Action across the UK 

Wednesday 26th March 2025

To begin the fightback  against Rachel Reeves Spring Statement & Disability Benefit Cuts 

Join us and help us resist what disabled people are now calling the appalling Green Paper “Labour Government  Disability Poll Tax”

London action: 

Meet at 11am at Downing Street for a rally and speakers 

Downing Street

Whitehall

London

SW1A 2AA

Then March to Parliament to link up with Homes for All and Stop The War activists for a protest at Parliament or you can lobby your MP

Nearest accessible underground Station 

Is Westminster: 

Bridge Street London SW1A 2JR

(Accessible from platform to street level ) 

TFL Journey Planner link : 

https://tfl.gov.uk/plan-a-journey/

DPAC has some limited funding available for reasonable travel and accommodation costs.  Please contact DPAC directly mail@dpac.uk.net

Rob Donnelly – Equality Trust 
Secretariat for the APPG on Poverty and Inequality

Nurse used benefit assessment info to launch campaign of harassment that left disabled neighbour suicidal

A nurse who carried out benefit assessments on behalf of the government obtained a medical report belonging to his disabled neighbour and then used it to launch a campaign of bullying and harassment that left him suicidal.

Carlo* has told Disability News Service (DNS) that he had fallen out with his downstairs neighbour, who he knew worked as a nurse, after having to complain repeatedly to their landlord, and then the police, about cannabis fumes from his flat that were making his life a misery.

After both the landlord and police issued the nurse with a warning, contractors working in Carlo’s London flat, and neighbours, began asking him about his mental health and why he was not working.

An electrician told him this information had come from the nurse.

Carlo, who was recovering from serious illness and had developed associated mental distress, said: “He had basically said that I don’t work, I sit at home all day, that I’m on benefits, and that I was ‘mental’ and ‘crazy’.

“I know he said these things to the landlord as well.”

He discovered that the nurse worked for US outsourcing giant Maximus and had been sharing deeply personal information about his mental health that had been taken from the 2017 work capability assessment (WCA) carried out by the company after he had applied for universal credit.

Carlo reported his actions to the police – as well as the other harassment he had experienced – and to Maximus.

He was told by the police that the nurse had admitted searching for his details and viewing an assessment report carried out by Maximus in 2017.

Maximus investigated the allegations, suspended the nurse, and eventually admitted to Carlo in an email that there had been an “unacceptable and egregious action taken which is contrary to all policies and the ethos of our organisation”.

Carlo told a senior Maximus executive he felt his “privacy has been totally invaded”, which had “destroyed the little confidence and self esteem I had left”.

Maximus offered Carlo a £200 “consolatory payment” as “full and final settlement of this matter”, although it continues to insist that it was not legally liable for the nurse’s actions.

By the time Maximus had completed its investigation, the nurse had transferred to Ingeus UK, which took over the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) contract for all disability assessments in London, south-east England and East Anglia last September.

Ingeus continued the disciplinary case and sacked the nurse, and he now faces a police investigation.

But DWP and Maximus are still facing questions over how the nurse was able to access the medical details of a claimant he had not assessed himself.

Although Maximus no longer carries out assessments in London, it still has a contract to carry out PIP assessments and WCAs in northern England, as well as carrying out WCAs in Scotland.

Carlo told DNS the experience had been personally “devastating”.

He said: “I feel my privacy has been completely violated.

“I am quite a strong person, but I felt suicidal. I just felt my privacy had been completely violated and nobody was taking me seriously.

“The report he had access to was primarily about my mental health.

“For him to read that and express it to contractors and neighbours, calling me names such as crazy and mental, is completely unbelievable.”

He said the case “opens up a can of worms” relating to the security of deeply personal information shared by disabled benefit claimants with DWP contractors.

He also fears the nurse could have accessed a later assessment report that included a further “very serious” health diagnosis he has not yet even discussed with those close to him.

He said: “These are things I don’t even tell my friends and family. To find that someone can just go in and review it so easily – it’s just unbelievable.”

Carlo lodged a complaint about the nurse’s behaviour with the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC), but the regulator told him: “We’ve considered the fitness to practise concern raised and we’ve decided we won’t be investigating it further at this time.”

The regulator told Carlo it was “not satisfied that we have evidence of a concern that meets our seriousness criteria as outlined in our guidance” and that there was “clear evidence that [the nurse] has addressed the concerns” and that it “can be confident there is no longer any risk to the public”.

It said the evidence suggested the nurse “accessed the customer’s record once (22 January 2024)” and that there was “no evidence” that “any actions were performed by [the nurse] in relation to the record accessed”, while the nurse had been “open and honest about his conduct at the time they occurred and demonstrated sufficient regret and remorse in respect of his actions”.

NMC said there had been “no evidence of previous concerns in relation to [the nurse’s] performance at work” and it claimed the incident “was distressing for both parties involved”, while there was evidence that the nurse “had reflected on this incident and identified things he could do differently in future”.

Carlo replied to NMC: “The letter actually makes [the nurse] sound more of a victim than me when in fact I am the only victim in all of this.

“It was him who deliberately and maliciously searched and accessed my deeply personal medical information, then disclosed it to other people.

“Even though the findings state he accessed my medical information only once, it only takes one time to breach someone’s privacy and cause them considerable distress.

“The only thing that [the nurse] regrets is getting caught and found out by me.”

Carlo has asked DWP to investigate if the nurse might have carried out assessments while under the influence of cannabis, as he worked from home.

The Metropolitan police are also investigating the nurse for alleged unauthorised access to Carlo’s “personal medical information”, and are in touch with Maximus, and plan to interview the nurse at a police station.

The Nursing and Midwifery Council, which has a history of failing to act on complaints against nurses working for assessment companies, refused to explain why it cleared the nurse, or if it would reopen the investigation, when there was an ongoing police probe.

It also refused to explain how it concluded there was no evidence that the nurse did anything with the information he accessed, despite being told by Carlo that he had shared it with neighbours and strangers.

Instead, an NMC spokesperson said: “While we can’t comment on individual cases, we want to reassure people that we look at every concern that’s raised with us about someone on our register very carefully, in line with decision making guidance that’s published and available on our website.

“Wherever necessary and possible, we will always take appropriate action to protect the public.”

Maximus declined to say if it had taken any action on data privacy as a result of the case or if it was still possible for one of its assessors to access the details of benefit claimants they are not responsible for assessing.

But a Maximus spokesperson said: “We have apologised to [Carlo] for the unacceptable actions of [the nurse] who previously worked for us.

“He is no longer employed by our organisation.

“We take all complaints relating to data security incredibly seriously.

“Upon receiving this complaint, we took immediate action to gather the required information and a formal investigation was launched.

“Our colleagues undertake regular training on information security and data protection, and we have rigorous policies in place to ensure the correct handling of personal information.

“We understand this is subject to an ongoing police investigation, it would therefore be inappropriate for us to comment further.”

Ingeus declined to say if it had taken any action on data privacy as a result of the case, or if it was still possible for its assessors to access information from disabled people they are not responsible for assessing.

But an Ingeus spokesperson said: “As a result of the disciplinary process started by Maximus and completed by Ingeus, [the nurse] no longer works for Ingeus.

“During his time with us, he never carried out any health assessments.

“Doing all we can to protect people’s personal information is absolutely vital to us.

“We have a proactive programme of mandatory training to ensure our staff know and understand our policies and process on information security and data protection.”

He confirmed later that the nurse had been sacked for “breaching data privacy”.

A spokesperson for the Metropolitan police said: “Officers received reports on Sunday 10 November of an individual’s confidential medical information having been accessed without their consent.

“There have been no arrests. Enquiries are ongoing.”

Despite the police investigation, DWP refused to say if it was concerned by the case or if it was taking any action.

A DWP spokesperson said: “We cannot comment on individual cases.

“We take data protection very seriously. 

“We ensure all our assessment suppliers are aware of their legal responsibility, including that it is an offence to access or disclose any information obtained which relates to customers, and are required to demonstrate how they have fully met this obligation.”

*Not his real name

6 March 2025

DWP is broken and needs to be scrapped and replaced, say Liberal Democrats

The Liberal Democrats have called for the “completely broken” Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) to be scrapped and replaced with a new department that is “more supportive and inclusive” for benefit claimants.

The call has come from Steve Darling, one of the new intake of disabled MPs at last year’s general election, who speaks for his party on work and pensions issues.

He told Disability News Service (DNS) this week that it was clear that DWP was “completely broken” and could not be fixed.

He told DNS this week: “I’ve now drawn the conclusion that actually the DWP is just completely broken and we need to think about how we reshape our world, and could it be done in a different way that actually is more supportive and inclusive to people who claim benefits.”

Darling said he was clear DWP needed to be scrapped and replaced, and he was now working on “the model we replace it with, and how we can best seek change, because for many years now it has been a broken system”.

He also said he was “sympathetic” to a possible public inquiry into the links between DWP and the deaths of hundreds, and probably thousands, of deaths in the post-2010 austerity years.

But he said he wanted to examine the “full implications” of such an inquiry and “immerse myself more in it and have confidence that it would be bringing the change that we need to see” before deciding whether to call for an inquiry.

Darling said the message from The Department* – the book written by DNS editor John Pring, which exposes the “violent government bureaucracy” within DWP that has led to so many deaths since 2010 – was that the culture within DWP continued to be a concern.

He said: “Clearly what’s portrayed within your book should give major cause for concern.

“One would hope that a public inquiry would result in significant change within that organisation, and hopefully even root and branch change, which I think we need to be seeing within the DWP, because it has been broken for so many years.”

He said the book showed there had also been a “toxic mix” between parts of the media and politicians “of a number of different colours” from the early 1990s onwards that led to the “demonizing of people who are on benefits when evidence clearly portrays that on a number of benefits the levels of fraud are minuscule”.

And, he said, there was “conflation between error and fraud, so that it is almost seen as the same”.

Darling has previously spoken out as a member of the Commons work and pensions committee about his concerns with the government’s Access to Work disability employment scheme.

He said he was “really worried that it is a system that is not performing”, and he pointed to a friend who is owed more than £3,000 by Access to Work for travel costs.

He also highlighted comments made by Sir Stephen Timms, the minister for social security and disability, about Access to Work, in which he suggested major changes to the scheme that would shift the cost of support towards employers and away from DWP.

Darling said he has heard from people who have attended roundtable meetings with ministers, and other sources close to the government, that although they have not used the word “cuts”, ministers appear to be planning “changes to the system where they are relying on employers to do much, much more”.

He said: “I shudder at what that actually means.

“They often describe it as the best kept secret; well, make it bloody well work and then we can actually get people into work because the issue is that we know that we’ve got a real challenge with finding enough people for some of the jobs that we’ve got out there, so we need to make sure that we support employers so they can have a bit more flexibility and then people can get into work.”

As well as the government’s imminent green paper on disability benefits and the “Pandora’s box of challenges that will bring up for the disability community”, Darling said he is also focused on the government’s public authorities (fraud, error and recovery) bill, which will force banks to examine individuals’ accounts for potential breaches of benefit eligibility rules, and then pass that information to DWP.

Darling said that, although those currently in power in the UK government might be “reasonable people”, it was important to look at the recent election of Donald Trump and the subsequent “carnage” being done to government in the US.

This means there will need to be “genuine checks and balances” in the fraud and error bill, he said.

“While this may go through now with reasonable people in power, in ten years’ time, who knows what the politics of the UK will be.

“We need to make sure that there are genuine independent safeguards to protect people from those who have a really dodgy worldview around people with disabilities.”

Darling said he had not come into parliament as a new MP wanting to speak for his party on work and pensions issues, so the appointment last September had been a “bolt from the blue”.

But he said he believed that his personal experience of the benefits system, as a recipient of personal independence payment (PIP), and having disabled friends with similar experiences of benefits and DWP’s creaking Access to Work system, had helped equip him for the role.

6 March 2025

UN calls for ‘corrective measures’ to Tory disability benefit reforms, just as Labour prepares cuts of its own

A report by the United Nations (UN) has called on the UK government to take “corrective measures” to address the impact of cuts to disability benefits introduced under Conservative governments, just as Labour ministers prepare to introduce further such cuts.

The recommendation by the UN’s committee on economic, social and cultural rights (CESCR) comes in its “concluding observations” on the UK’s progress in implementing the International Covenant of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

The committee concluded that “welfare reform” measures introduced by Conservative-led governments in 2012 and 2016 had disproportionately affected disabled people, low-income families, and workers in “precarious employment”.

And it says this led to “severe economic hardship, increased reliance on food banks, homelessness, negative impacts on mental health, and the stigmatization of benefit claimants”.

Among its recommendations, it calls for increased spending on social security, and for the government to take “corrective measures” to address the impact of post-2010 welfare reforms on the most disadvantaged groups.

It also calls for the level of disability-related benefits, including personal independence payment (PIP) and employment and support allowance, to be increased so they “adequately cover additional disability-related costs”.

The report was published by the committee just as the government is set to announce new austerity measures that are expected to include significant cuts to social security spending, including disability benefits, at the spring statement on 26 March.

The government’s long-awaited green paper on disability benefits will also be published in the next three weeks, ahead of the spring statement.

The UN committee calls on the government to carry out an independent assessment of the cumulative impact of post-2010 austerity measures on disabled people and other “disadvantaged groups” and to take “all measures necessary” to reverse those impacts in areas such as social security, social care and public transport.

It also calls for wide-ranging action to address disability-related discrimination and inequality across employment, housing, education, and access to sport and culture, and to introduce targeted measures to support disabled women.

The government had failed to comment on the CESCR report by noon today (Thursday).

Last year, another UN human rights committee concluded that the UK government had made “no significant progress” in the more than seven years since it was found guilty of “grave and systematic” violations of the UN disability convention.

The committee on the rights of disabled people said last April that it had even found “signs of regression” – backward steps – in the UK’s progress towards fully realising the rights described in the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

Disabled campaigners this week called on the government to listen to CESCR and step away from any planned cuts to social security.

Ellen Clifford, a member of the national steering group of Disabled People Against Cuts and award-winning author of The War on Disabled People, said: “It’s tragically ironic that the CESCR report has been published at the same time as the government is boasting about plans to cut the welfare budget. 

“CESCR is recommending that more needs to be spent on social security at exactly the same time as the chancellor is set to announce taking billions out of the system, attacking disability benefits and hitting the poorest and most disadvantaged in society to make up for her inability to fix low productivity growth.

“After a decade and a half of austerity and welfare reform, such cuts will devastate our communities in ways we cannot imagine.

“It’s clear this Labour government has no concern for human rights and sees the lives of disabled people as something they see no value in.

“So it’s up to us to make sure we create a problem for them and make it clear they cannot get away with visiting such levels of harm on us without consequence.”

She said DPAC was holding an online campaign planning meeting on Sunday (9 March, 2 to 4pm) “to discuss how we can work together to do that”*.

Fazilet Hadi, head of policy for Disability Rights UK, said: “Just weeks away from the government publishing its proposals to cut billions from the social security budget, leading to millions of disabled people being pushed into even deeper poverty, we have a UN committee putting the spotlight on the grave injustices and inequalities faced by UK citizens, including disabled people.

“In a series of hard-hitting recommendations, the committee asks that the impact of austerity be examined, that social security payments are increased, that poverty and high costs are tackled, that inadequacies in relation to health, housing and education are addressed.

“But is anyone listening?

“The new government is wedded to a financial strategy that gives no priority to investing in public services, to tackling poverty or to embedding disability inclusion.

“Eight months after coming to power, we still have no mention of any concerted strategy to achieve disability equality.”

Carole Ford, from the WOWCampaign, said the UN findings were “particularly concerning at this time, when the government are planning further cuts to the welfare budget”.

She said the government was “likely to choose to ignore the UN, as previous Conservative governments have done”.

Mark Harrison, a member of the Reclaiming Our Futures Alliance (ROFA) steering group, said: “This report is calling for a reappraisal of the Labour government approach. 

“Their adoption of planned Tory tax rises and austerity cuts to benefits and services will continue to redistribute wealth from the poor to the rich. 

“Rachel Reeves’ spring statement [on 26 March] promises to bring more poverty and misery to poor and disabled people.”

He said that work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall and ministerial colleagues were “continuing to ramp up the Tory – now Labour – culture war on disabled people, labelling us as benefit scroungers and cheats. 

“This government, whether they like it or not, were elected because people wanted and demanded change, not to carry on and step up the attacks on our rights and living standards. 

“The UN report calls for a cumulative impact assessment of the combined measures and a change of direction in line with the UN conventions signed and ratified by the UK government. 

“We are putting Starmer and his government on notice that we will fight them all the way. 

“Disabled people and our organisations will not accept more of the same. 

“After 14 years, we say enough is enough.”

*Click here to register

6 March 2025

Councils now only able to offer the ‘bare minimum’ of adult social care support, MPs are told

Local authorities in England are now only able to provide the “bare minimum” of services to disabled and older people who need support through the adult social care system, MPs were told yesterday (Wednesday).

Three senior local government figures were giving evidence to the Commons health and social care committee as part of its inquiry into the “cost of inaction” on adult social care reform.

Hugh Evans, executive director for adults and communities for Bristol City Council – whose council has come under repeated attack in recent years for its cuts to social care – told the committee that he and his colleagues were having to focus on the council’s financial “survival” every year.

He said his council’s ability to raise revenue through council tax was “not sufficient to meet the increased cost of adult social care”.

Evans said: “That’s certainly happened in Bristol. Spendings outpace local government funding and so we have to make savings.”

The council spent 75 per cent of its revenue on adult and children’s social care in 2023-24, compared with 56 per cent in 2017-18.

He said: “We’re having to emphasise the bare minimum of statutory services in order to be able to fulfil our duties under the Care Act.”

Melanie Williams, president of the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services and executive director of adult social care for Nottinghamshire County Council, said her local authority was focused on “just providing the minimal amount of support in their homes” for older people.

She said: “It may be that… they may take a direct payment and we would be looking at what is the minimum they would require to stay relatively well.

“What we wouldn’t be able to invest in is necessarily having friendships, being able to get out and about more.

“So, what somebody’s receiving probably is the basic personal care, the bare minimum, rather than what would be needed for an older adult to really enjoy a great quality of life as they age.”

She added: “That’s kind of where we are, there’s a sort of a rationing over time, if you like, because of focusing on the most immediate need.”

David Fothergill, chair of the Local Government Association’s community wellbeing board and a Conservative councillor on Somerset Council, told the committee that adult social care was now “more or less half the budget of local authorities”, and adding children’s social care increased this to “well over 70 per cent of budgets”.

He said this left “very little for the remaining services, which many of your residents and many of my residents as well depend upon, including roads and libraries and things like that”.

Fothergill said that about £24 billion in savings had been taken out of council budgets since 2010, and local government was now facing an estimated funding gap of more than 20 billion pounds in total over the next four years.

He said adult social care was “really, really putting local government under a lot of pressure”.

Last year, he said, 15 local authorities had applied for emergency funding support, and that had risen this year to 34 councils, and “most of them are driven by social care pressure”.

He said his own council had “declared an emergency financial crisis, and that is purely based upon social care pressures”.

Meanwhile, Bristol City Council has finally produced most of the details of a contract it signed last spring with a consultancy that is using locum social workers to carry out up to 1,400 “strength-based reviews” of disabled people’s care packages as a cost-saving measure, at a cost of up to £700,000.

It provided the contract details to Disability News Service in response to a freedom of information request, following intervention from the Information Commissioner’s Office.

The council has been at the centre of controversy for more than two years since it revealed proposals to offer disabled people a “residential or nursing home placement” if a care package that would allow them to remain at home “would substantially exceed the affordability of residential care”. 

The concerns about what the council called its Fair and Affordable Care Policy were first raised by the grassroots disabled people’s organisation Bristol Reclaiming Independent Living (BRIL). 

The policy was eventually withdrawn, but last year the council brought forward new cuts worth millions of pounds that campaigners feared were also likely to push disabled people into residential care. 

BRIl is now “very concerned” about the council’s latest plans and this week it issued a statement about the council’s 2025-26 budget, which includes £14.6 million projected savings from adult social care.

The budget includes plans for more reviews of care and support plans that will “support approaches which focus on an individuals’ personal strengths… in order to promote their wellbeing and independence”, and reviews of people who have previously been detained under the Mental Health Act that will result in “the need for less care and therefore reduced costs”.

BRIL said there was “a real risk” that millions of pounds of planned savings would be made by “redefining needs as mere wishes, leaving disabled people without essential support”, an approach that is “alarmingly similar to the Fair and Affordable Care Policy”.

Mark Williams, BRIL’s chair, said: “Every time I have a review, I feel under attack and worried that my care will be revoked or cut back.

“In one review they tried to tell me that being alone for half an hour would make me more ‘independent’.

“I refused. I am not independent on my own. I am independent when I have the right to the support I need.”

6 March 2025

Extra costs evidence from grassroots group provides stark warning to ministers set to cut disability benefits

New research from disabled activists has shown the huge variety of ways in which mental health impairments can cause significant extra daily living costs, just as the government appears set to announce fresh cuts to disability benefits.

The grassroots, user-led mental health group Recovery in the Bin, which carried out the research, warned that they were the group of benefit claimants with “with the highest suicide and starvation rates” so any further cost-cutting of benefits would “cause more suffering and deaths”.

RITB said the evidence it had collected was a warning to ministers that “if you proceed with cuts, you will proceed with deaths”*.

The BBC reported yesterday (Wednesday) that the Treasury had “earmarked several billion pounds in draft spending cuts to welfare and other government departments”.

It is just the latest signal that chancellor Rachel Reeves is about to announce cuts to “welfare spending”, and particularly to disability benefits.

The news reports come despite evidence from the Office for Budget Responsibility that total spending on social security as a proportion of GDP** is predicted not to increase at all next year, and then to stay at the same level for the next four years, and is predicted to be lower this year than it was for every year from 2010-11 to 2015-16.

Last week, Disability News Service (DNS) also revealed how Labour and Conservative ministers sat on research for three years that linked the sharp increase in claims for disability benefits with a deterioration in disabled people’s health, an increase in the financial hardship they were facing, and their need for independence.

That report, Triggers to Claiming Personal Independence Payment, provided strong evidence to explain the need for increased spending on personal independence payment (PIP), and even called on the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) to do more to increase awareness of PIP.

John McDonnell, the suspended Labour MP, has now tabled an early day motion in parliament that welcomes DNS’s efforts in securing the report and expresses concerns that the government “delayed publication of the report for so long” when it “provides strong evidence to explain the need for increased spending” on PIP.

RITB has now published the results of its own research that shows how those claiming benefits for mental health-related reasons have significant costs that justify them receiving extra support through universal credit, employment and support allowance, and PIP.

They had asked RITB members and followers about their mental health-related costs, because, they said, “the cost of living for people with mental illness/distress is no less pressing than the extra costs for people with physical illness or disability” and “benefits are essential to support a basic, acceptable standard of living”.

In response, they were told of costs to cover taxis, legal advice, extra cleaning products, health services not covered by the NHS, food deliveries, inflated utility bills, advocacy, therapy, cleaners and counselling.

Among those who provided evidence, one said: “Needing to throw out £15 worth of food because voices have changed or ruined it some way.”

Another said: “Wasting money on fresh food and then being too unwell to cook and buying takeaways is the big ongoing one.

“Paying for therapy so I can get therapy that doesn’t harm me.”

A third person who contributed told RITB: “I pay £120 per week to see my (incredible, life changing) autism-informed ex NHS clinical psychologist.

“It eats all of my PIP, leaves absolutely nothing, but her approach, experience and expertise has helped me more in four months than CMHT [community mental health team] has in 13 yrs.”

Another told RITB: “Stress induced psychosis spending on fixing things that don’t actually need fixing! Also heightened vulnerability to scams.”

And another said: “Extra costs because you can’t shop around, can’t access discounts, can’t remember reward cards, get sold bad deals.”

An RITB spokesperson told DNS yesterday (Wednesday): “Mental illness/distress claimants are the most stigmatised claimants, lacking support from the NHS, while professional groups exploit us as they seek power and opportunistically support government policy.

“Our costs are every bit as high as for people with physical disabilities, yet political and media gaslighting are now attempting to say many of us are not even experiencing disability distress or illness.

“We are the group of claimants with the highest suicide and starvation rates, any cost cutting agenda and continued austerity will cause more suffering and deaths.

“This is our warning to ministers: if you proceed with cuts, you will proceed with deaths.”

The Public and Commercial Services Union, which has 46,000 members working within DWP, also spoke out yesterday about the reports of spending cuts.

PCS general secretary Fran Heathcote said: “Cutting civil service jobs will damage public service and cutting disability benefits will condemn people to poverty.

“We’d have hoped we wouldn’t have to explain the damage wreaked by austerity to a Labour government.”

*The following organisations are among those that could be able to offer support if you have been affected by the issues raised in this article:  Mind, Papyrus, Rethink, Samaritans, and SOS Silence of Suicide

**Gross domestic product, the size of the country’s economy in a particular year

6 March 2025

Cautious welcome for Arts Council England report that shows striking increase in disabled leaders

Arts Council England (ACE) has reported a significant increase in the number of disabled people in leadership positions within the organisations it is funding, although leading figures in the disability arts world say there is still much more to do.

In its new Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Review, ACE says the proportion of arts organisations funded through its national portfolio programme who have a disabled chair has trebled in four years (from five to 15 per cent).

The proportion of funded arts bodies with a disabled chief executive has also risen, from nine per cent in 2018-19 to 13 per cent in 2022-23, while the proportion with a disabled artistic director rose from eight to 10 per cent, and the proportion of board members identifying as disabled increased from eight to 12 per cent.

ACE also reported significant increases in the proportion of its own staff and council members who identify as disabled people.

The proportion of disabled people in its workforce rose from seven to 12 per cent; the proportion of disabled directors increased from two per cent to 7.6 per cent; and the proportion of managers identifying as disabled more than trebled, from three per cent to 11.3 per cent.

The proportion of ACE area council members identifying as disabled more than quadrupled, rising from six per cent to 25 per cent, although the proportion of disabled national council members remained at seven per cent.

The proportion of disabled applicants who were successful with National Lottery-funded project grants fell from 53 per cent to 35 per cent, but the report suggests that was probably because of a significant increase in the number of applications.

The proportion of audience members identifying as disabled people also increased slightly, increasing from nine per cent in 2018-19 to 10 per cent in 2022-23.

Andrew Miller, a member of ACE’s national council, and chair of its disability advisory committee, says in the report: “Clearly there is still work to be done to improve the representation of disabled people in the sector, and that is something that we will continue to advocate and strive for.

“But for the proportion of disabled people working in our creative and cultural organisations to have doubled in five years is something truly to celebrate.”

Dr Ju Gosling, artistic director of Together! 2012, a disability arts organisation which receives ACE funding through the national portfolio programme, said questions remained as to whether the figures showed an increase in the employment of disabled people and more opportunities for disabled people to engage with the arts or instead “an increase in disability rates among certain demographics as a result of Covid and an ageing population”.

She said: “Chairs, artistic directors and CEOs all tend to be middle-aged or elderly, and many arts audiences are slanted towards older people too.

“We’ve also seen a lot of people departing the creative arts for economic reasons, including as board members.

“Disabled people are less likely to have access to these alternative employment opportunities, so are more likely to have remained with Arts Council-funded organisations despite flatlined budgets in many areas.

“Disabled people have also been less likely to be invited onto boards in the first place and are less likely to be in employment, so there is a bigger pool of people available to replace departing non-disabled volunteers.

“However, outside of London there was a genuine increase in the funding of disabled-led organisations in the last round [of ACE funding], which was definitely good news.”

Gosling said she would “obviously like to see these figures continue to increase, not least because it would reflect better retention of arts workers as they age”.

But she warned that “the continued slurs on the abilities of disabled workers coming from the US, plus the rise in national insurance and the continuing squeeze on arts organisations’ budgets, makes the future picture less clear”. 

And she said cuts to arts training and work opportunities over the last 15 years “means there are already far fewer young people coming up to take over than previously”.

She added: “I’m not at all sure that mainstream organisations will be so keen now as they were 10 years ago to employ a young disabled person in a first or early career job, for the reasons above.

“So we could easily see a fall over the next five to 10 years rather than a continuing increase.”

Trish Wheatley, chief executive of Disability Arts Online, another disability arts organisation which receives ACE funding, said: “It is encouraging to see an increase in disabled people in positions of leadership and in the wider arts workforce.

“This progress should be celebrated because we have more people with lived experience making decisions and creating work.

“However, despite the increases shown in the report, disabled people remain significantly underrepresented, so it is vital that Arts Council England continues to work with the sector to address ableism and remove barriers.”

Sir Nicholas Serota, ACE’s chair, says in the report: “The boardrooms of 2023 were far more diverse than those of 2018, with significantly higher proportions of female, Black, Asian and ethnically diverse, and disabled and LGBTQIA+ members.

“The same shift was also seen in leadership roles across organisations, with a greater proportion of women and Black, Asian and ethnically diverse, and disabled people occupying the roles of chairs, chief executives and artistic directors at the end of the last Portfolio than at its beginning.

“Diversity also grew across the total workforce, in each of the four protected characteristics, race, sex, sexuality and disability, that this report covers.

“These changes are profound, particularly in the context of the range of challenges from the pandemic to the cost-of-living crisis, and we should all take pride in them.”

But he says there is “still much more to do to make sure that our sector is drawing on all available talents and appealing to audience members from all backgrounds”.

And he says that while the proportion of disabled people in the arts workforce “rose significantly”, it still remains below the level of disabled people in the population.

Sir Nicholas also says in the report that there is still work for ACE to do, which was why it established a disability advisory committee and a race advisory committee in 2022 and commissioned an independent review of inclusion within ACE in 2023.

He adds: “Our adoption of our own statement on the social model of disability, and the related policies we have introduced to implement it, are examples of the work we are doing in this area.”

6 March 2025

Other disability-related stories covered by mainstream media this week

A man with learning difficulties was filmed eating out of a bin after being neglected by care home staff, an investigation has found. Workers were also caught sleeping on the job and ignoring the 23-year-old after his concerned mum placed a camera in his room. The ITV News investigation said the man, Connor, is autistic and has bipolar disorder. He was living in a residential home in Coventry run by Lifeways, the UK’s largest provider of supported living for adults with learning difficulties, caring for around 4,000 people: https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/vulnerable-care-home-resident-caught-34788125

An autistic woman with learning difficulties was wrongly locked up in a mental health hospital for 45 years, starting when she was just seven years old, the BBC has learned. The woman, who is believed to be originally from Sierra Leone, was also held on her own in long-term segregation for 25 years: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cly43png991o

Leading disability charities have called on the government to ensure that people will continue to be able to use physical cash in shops. It comes after a government minister said that shops will not be forced to accept cash, despite concerns that millions of disabled people rely on it. Disability Rights UK and RNIB are warning that making card payments the default creates “more barriers” for disabled people: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp3yz40r2zyo

6 March 2025

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

Contents

Family say DWP has unanswered questions over death of disabled woman whose benefits were stopped 1

Death of disabled woman failed by multiple agencies ‘must be catalyst for change’, say family 3

Research that ministers sat on for three years shows no evidence to support call for PIP cuts 7

Bank surveillance bill could lead to greatest miscarriage of justice in British history, disabled activist tells MPs 10

Government’s railways consultation has ‘betrayed’ disabled passengers, campaigners tell minister 13

Government claims of ‘spiralling’ spending on benefits are false and ‘ideological’, official figures show 14

Rayner to push ahead with evacuation plans that are ‘insult’ to disabled people who died at Grenfell 16

Labour assembly members reject plan for disability equality champion for London, despite previous backing 17

Other disability-related stories covered by mainstream media this week 19

Family say DWP has unanswered questions over death of disabled woman whose benefits were stopped

The family of a disabled woman whose body lay undiscovered in her flat for more than three years after her benefits were stopped say they have serious unanswered questions about the actions of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).

Laura Winham’s body was not found until May 2021, more than three-and-a-half years after she was last seen alive.

But her family say DWP appeared to have failed to carry out checks on her welfare before cutting off her benefits.

They spoke out this week at the end of an inquest and the publication of a safeguarding review into the multi-agency failures that contributed to her death.

She is believed to have starved to death in November 2017 in her council-owned flat in Sheerwater, Woking.

Her death has clear similarities with other deaths of disabled claimants, including those of Errol Graham, whose body was also discovered in his flat in June 2018 after starving to death when his benefits were removed; Mark Wood, who starved to death in his home in 2013 after being found ineligible by DWP for employment and support allowance (ESA); and Timothy Finn, who starved to death in his home in autumn 1998 after his benefits were stopped.

Laura Winham, who was living in Woking at the time of her death, had been receiving disability benefits since the age of just two, after being born with Goldenhar Syndrome and later developing several connected health conditions.

She was also diagnosed with persistent delusional disorder in 2009 and had two spells of detention under the Mental Health Act, in 2006 and 2010.

DWP wrote to her in early 2016 to say her disability living allowance claim would be ending and she would need to apply for the new personal independence payment (PIP).

But she told Woking Borough Council that she could not cope with the “invasive medical check-up” the application would involve, almost certainly a reference to the much-criticised PIP assessment process, and her DLA was stopped in March 2016.

Her ESA had been stopped three years earlier, although it is not clear why.

The coroner, Dr Karen Henderson, said there had been a “lost opportunity” to “proactively investigate” the loss of Laura’s benefits, but that it was not possible to say if this would have prevented her death.

She said DWP had since taken steps to be “more proactive” and to carry out more coordination with other agencies.

Both the inquest and the safeguarding review into her death – published this week (PDF) – stressed that she had cut her family out of her life due to her delusional disorder.

They had been forced to respect Laura’s wishes because every time they tried to contact her it caused her significant mental distress and put her safety at risk.

Over the 18 months after losing her DLA, her savings ran out, and her last food shop probably took place through a Tesco delivery on 4 September 2017. She recorded on her calendar against that day that she had no money left.

At some point, probably in early November 2017, she appears to have starved to death, although Dr Henderson concluded on Tuesday that it was impossible to determine the cause of death and recorded an open conclusion.

By the time DWP was eventually alerted to her death, several years later, many of her records had been destroyed.

The family of Laura Winham have shared with Disability News Service the secret internal process review (IPR) carried out by DWP into her death, obtained by her legal team and marked “Official Sensitive” by the department.

The case review and findings take up less than one page, with the document admitting there were “limited records of the customer’s interactions” with DWP because they had been destroyed, although it confirmed that her ESA stopped in April 2013 and her DLA in March 2016.

The records show she failed to attend two face-to-face work capability assessments (WCAs) before her ESA was stopped, so it is possible that DWP again failed to carry out safeguarding checks.

Despite the unanswered questions about DWP’s safeguarding actions, and the lack of remaining evidence, the IPR somehow concluded that DWP “acted appropriately during the customer’s benefit claims”.

This week, DWP did not challenge the suggestion that it failed to carry out any safeguarding visits when Laura Winham did not complete her PIP claim, and also when she failed to attend two WCAs.

It also did not dispute that there had been a “lost opportunity” to “proactively investigate” the loss of her benefits.

And it failed to explain how its IPR had concluded that DWP “acted appropriately during the customer’s benefit claims” when there were so many unanswered questions about its safeguarding actions, and when it had destroyed most of the relevant records.

It also failed to apologise to the family or say if it accepted the coroner’s criticism. 

It declined to issue a statement, but instead produced a series of background briefing notes which suggested that the department’s “condolences” remained with the family, and that it had introduced measures to support “vulnerable” claimants since her death, and had introduced strengthened guidance around safely stopping payments to claimants identified as vulnerable.

In a statement issued on Tuesday at the end of the inquest, Laura’s family – who described her as a “much-loved, much-missed daughter and sister” – said she had been left to “fend for herself” by agencies including DWP, Surrey County Council, Woking council, and Surrey and Borders Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (see separate story).

In a statement delivered by their solicitor, Iftikhar Manzoor, of Hudgell Solicitors, Laura’s family said: “The circumstances of Laura’s death have been absolutely devastating for her loved ones.

“They are a caring and loving family who I have come to know well over the past few years.

“Laura was a much-loved, much-missed daughter and sister.

“Her family did everything in their power to support her as she battled her mental health struggles until it became apparent she may harm herself unless they backed away.

“They believed Laura would be in the best possible hands when handing her into the care of professionals – people with much more knowledge and understanding of supporting those with serious mental health issues.

“Sadly, in this instance, that was not the case.”

27 February 2025

Death of disabled woman failed by multiple agencies ‘must be catalyst for change’, say family

The family of a disabled woman whose body lay undiscovered in her flat for more than three years say her death must be a “catalyst for change”, after the failure of multiple organisations to support and protect her.

They say Laura Winham was left to “fend for herself” by agencies including Surrey County Council, Woking Borough Council, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), and Surrey and Borders Partnership NHS Foundation Trust.

The county council had been alerted to concerns about her “vulnerability” by the police, but all its adult social care team did was try to call her – before realising her phone was no longer working – and then send her a letter, before closing her case when she failed to respond.

In a statement issued on Tuesday at the end of an inquest into her death, her family – who described her as a “much-loved, much-missed daughter and sister” – said: “Laura was clearly a person potentially at risk, but she wasn’t deemed worthy of visiting.

“She was left to fend for herself. Even her own diary entries illustrate she was unable to cope.

“Had adult social care visited Laura’s home within a few days of the referral in October 2017, then Laura would be alive.”

Shortly after the end of the inquest, a local safeguarding review – commissioned by Surrey Safeguarding Adults Board – revealed widespread failings by agencies that had had contact with Laura.

It concluded that there had been “many missed opportunities” that could have helped her in the months and years before she died in her flat in Sheerwater, Woking.

Laura was born with Goldenhar Syndrome and later developed several connected health conditions, one of which led to open heart surgery when she was 18.

She was also diagnosed with persistent delusional disorder in 2009, and had two spells of detention under the Mental Health Act, in 2006 and 2010, through the Surrey and Borders trust.

But when she was discharged from mental health services in 2010, the trust provided her with no care plan, no crisis plan, and no offers of advocacy.

From 2007, she had been living in a flat on Woking’s Sheerwater estate, which was managed from 2012 by New Vision Homes on behalf of Woking council.

But in 2013, after her employment and support allowance was stopped by DWP – possibly because she had failed to attend two work capability assessments – she fell into rent and council tax arrears and was served with an eviction notice.

Her disability living allowance was also stopped, in March 2016, apparently after telling the council she would not be able to cope with the assessment process for the new personal independence payment.

DWP appears to have failed to carry out the necessary safeguarding checks, although most of the records connected with her case have now been destroyed (see separate story).

She began to receive support from Woking council, and referrals were made to her GP and the mental health trust, but she soon moved to a new GP practice, which never saw the record of her mental health referral.

By the autumn of 2017, Laura was living on her dwindling savings and obtaining food through online deliveries.

The review said she had clearly “found the outside world frightening and oppressive”, and that her family were “frequently and consistently rebuffed”, while she was “determined to exclude her family from her life”.

Although she had some money in a savings account, she felt unable to visit the high street bank in person, which would have allowed her to withdraw cash from that account.

The safeguarding review report and coroner said she had engaged for years in a one-sided email correspondence with a member of the clergy, but he failed to seek support for her and eventually contacted the police in September 2017.

As a result of his complaint, a police officer visited Laura on 7 October 2017 to ask her to stop the correspondence, which she agreed to do, but he also asked about her welfare, and she told him she was short of money and food.

He provided her with details of a local foodbank and raised concerns about her “vulnerability” and lack of access to services through an “adult at risk referral”, which was passed to Surrey County Council’s adult social care team six days later.

But after writing just one letter that offered information about local food banks and Citizens Advice, and offering further assistance if she got in touch, and trying to call her – before realising her phone was no longer working – the care team closed her case without an assessment of her needs when she failed to respond, which the coroner described as a “lost opportunity”.

Her case remained closed until the council was told of her death four years later.

Despite the council’s failures, the coroner concluded that it was not possible to conclude that this had made a “material contribution” to her death, partly because it was not possible to “speculate” on how she would have responded if the adult social care team had visited her, and because the cause of death “remains unknown”.

She also said there had been “lost opportunities” for Woking council to “flag up Laura as vulnerable”, but she again could “not find on the balance of probabilities that these lost opportunities contributed to her death”.

Evidence suggests her last food shop took place via a Tesco delivery on 4 September 2017, and she recorded on her calendar that day that she had no money left.

She crossed off the days as they passed on her calendar and the last day she marked was 1 November 2017.

Her family believe she died soon after that date, at the age of 38.

Laura’s housing benefit and council tax continued to be paid until 2021, while a gas safety certificate was issued for her flat in January 2018, although it is likely that this was not issued lawfully. Her gas supply was cut off in 2019.

Her flat and other nearby properties were due to be demolished and other neighbours gradually began to move out, and by autumn 2020 every other near neighbour had left.

But because Woking council’s housing records did not flag her “additional needs”, no attempt was made to check how she was managing during lockdown in the early months of the pandemic.

When her father became unwell the following year, her family visited her to try to let her know about his poor health, and on seeing a build-up of post behind her front door, they began checking local hospitals and contacted the council.

When her brother returned to the flat, he saw what appeared to be part of a body in the hallway and called the emergency services.

The safeguarding review said that agencies involved in her support had made changes to their practices since the events of 2017 – although not all of them as a result of her death – including the Church of England, DWP, Surrey and Borders NHS trust, and Woking council.

Surrey County Council carried out a review of its adult social care team in February 2023, which included an audit of 158 contacts received by the social care team between 2017 and 2021 “which were closed without apparent management oversight”. This review led to a “rapid improvement plan”.

The safeguarding review concluded that, as Laura “withdrew from contact with others, the extent of her challenges became less and less visible to people and agencies who might have been able to intervene.

“When her mental health needs did become visible on occasions, we can see with hindsight that services did not mobilise to respond in ways that secured help for [her]*.”

The review also found that, if the adult social care team had visited Laura, it would have had an opportunity to “form a view about her mental state and the precariousness of her existence, offer an assessment and attempt to take appropriate action”.

Among its conclusions, and despite changes made since 2017, the safeguarding review’s recommendations include action for Surrey’s adult social care department, Woking council and DWP, and for the results of the review to be used to improve national safeguarding work.

The safeguarding adults board, which commissioned the review and whose members include Surrey County Council, Woking council, Surrey and Borders NHS trust, and Surrey police, said: “We fully accept the findings of the review which examined the role of agencies before and after [Laura’s] death.

“The review found that there were many missed opportunities, which included the need for better communications across all agencies in order to support [Laura].

“We are reassured that agencies have taken steps to address much of the learning from the events of [Laura’s] life.

“We have shared the review with all relevant agencies and will hold them to account in making sure the recommendations are acted on.”

But in a statement delivered by their solicitor, Iftikhar Manzoor, of Hudgell Solicitors, Laura’s family said: “The circumstances of Laura’s death have been absolutely devastating for her loved ones.

“They are a caring and loving family who I have come to know well over the past few years.

“Laura was a much-loved, much-missed daughter and sister.

“Her family did everything in their power to support her as she battled her mental health struggles until it became apparent she may harm herself unless they backed away.

“They believed Laura would be in the best possible hands when handing her into the care of professionals – people with much more knowledge and understanding of supporting those with serious mental health issues.

“Sadly, in this instance, that was not the case.”

They added: “The safeguarding review made it clear that Laura was never failed by her family.

“They sought professional help, but input was lost from people who truly loved her.

“Laura and her family need a system that cared enough about a vulnerable person.

“Laura’s death must act as a catalyst for change.”

*The review did not use her real name

27 February 2025

Research that ministers sat on for three years shows no evidence to support call for PIP cuts

Ministers have sat on research for three years that linked the sharp increase in claims for disability benefits with a deterioration in disabled people’s health, an increase in the financial hardship they were facing, and their need for independence.

Successive governments have refused to publish the research, just as Conservative and Labour ministers – and prime ministers – and their contacts in the right-wing media have repeatedly called for action to clamp down on the “unsustainable” increase in spending on disability benefits.

But the report, Triggers to Claiming Personal Independence Payment, provides strong evidence to explain the need for increased spending on personal independence payment (PIP).

And it even says the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) should do more to increase awareness of PIP with the public sector, charities and the general public, a suggestion that appears to have been ignored.

But successive work and pensions secretaries have hidden the report’s conclusions, which challenge the rhetoric of ministers and right-wing commentators.

The report was obtained through a freedom of information request by Disability News Service (DNS), which has been trying to discover what efforts DWP has made to research the reasons for increases in spending on disability support.

The existence of the report also raises further questions over the insistence of ministers such as Sir Stephen Timms – the minister for social security and disability – that they want to increase transparency and openness within DWP.

Earlier this month (PDF), Sir Stephen told the Commons work and pensions committee that he wanted DWP to be “much more open than has been the case in the past” and move “towards much greater transparency about how we are doing things”.

He said: “Things that ought to have been published and made public have been hidden, and that has contributed to a loss of trust.”

But the research, carried out in-house by DWP, was sat on for more than two years by Conservative ministers, and it has yet to be published nearly eight months into the new Labour government.

The continuing refusal to publish the research comes as reports suggests the government is set to announce plans to restrict future spending on PIP in next month’s disability benefits green paper.

The unpublished report suggests there are clear reasons for the increase in spending on PIP, with the “main triggers” for applying for the extra costs benefit being health deterioration, financial hardship and employment concerns, with some claims triggered by a “recent decay in circumstances”.

The research was commissioned by Conservative work and pensions secretary Therese Coffey, after she identified a “noticeable and sustained increase” in new PIP claims in October 2021, about 18 months into the Covid pandemic.

It was completed in March 2022 while Coffey was still work and pensions secretary, but she failed to publish it.

Three years after its completion, successive secretaries of state – Chloe Smith, Mel Stride and Labour’s Liz Kendall – have all failed to release the report.

The DWP researchers said: “Most of the interviewed individuals had not considered applying for PIP previously, either because of no previous need or because they were previously unaware of the benefit, although they may have been eligible.”

One of the report’s “key messages” was that disabled people were being made aware of PIP through their contact with formal services, including JobcentrePlus, and not through the media or social media.

Most of the 21 claimants interviewed by researchers – all new PIP claimants at the time – had multiple health conditions.

They spoke of daily living expenses, household costs and utilities as the “primary targets” for how they would spend their PIP, with some saying they were planning to buy aids and adaptations, or to pay for therapy or treatment.

The report said: “Most individuals cited financial support as the driving purpose of PIP, with bills and basic survival mentioned prominently.”

Many spoke of how PIP helped them maintain their independence, with some of those interviewed saying they needed it because they “felt stigma and shame associated with relying on informal care”.

One told DWP: “I didn’t realise working people could claim anything like that.”

Another said: “In a sense, DWP are helping people like me… survive.”

And a third claimant told researchers: “That’s why I applied – to try and get some of [my] independence back. I’m 31 my parents shouldn’t have to bail me out.”

Another claimant said: “I think it would make me more independent. It would allow me to get a bath or a shower without my husband having to help me.”

Paula Peters, a member of the national steering group of Disabled People Against Cuts, said the report showed again that there was “no evidential basis for these cuts to financial support”.

She said: “The Labour government will harm disabled people with their ideological austerity agenda.

“Cutting financial support will lead to more poverty and marginalisation of disabled people.

“How many disabled people will we lose before the end of this parliament as a result of these cuts?”

Caroline Collier, from Inclusion Barnet’s Campaign for Disability Justice, said: “Security in the face of disability or illness is something we should all be able to rely on.  

“That’s why it’s so important that research like this is made public, so that we can make informed decisions as a society knowing how much benefits like PIP are needed. 

“PIP allows people to live better lives, and this research demonstrates that. 

“It helps people to maintain their independence and, in some cases, to manage without being driven into debt. 

“At the Campaign for Disability Justice, we implore the government not to make unfair changes based on condition specific criteria, which can only lead to more uneven support, and to value PIP as the enabler of independence and security that we might all need one day.”

DWP declined to produce a statement, but it said the research would be published in due course, as well as a larger piece of work that built on the study.

It also claimed that it regularly promoted and raised awareness of the benefits that are available, while information on benefits is available through the gov.uk website.

But it refused to explain why the department has so far failed to publish the research, or whether ministers agreed with its suggestion that there are clear reasons for the increase in spending on PIP.

27 February 2025

Bank surveillance bill could lead to greatest miscarriage of justice in British history, disabled activist tells MPs

A disabled activist has told MPs that parliament could set in train the greatest miscarriage of justice in British history, if it approves new laws that would force banks to carry out mass surveillance of millions of disabled people.

Rick Burgess, from Greater Manchester Coalition of Disabled People, told a Commons committee on Tuesday that the proposed new powers were adding to an “absolutely enormous” level of “anger and distress in the disabled community”.

He said the bill appeared to be a new “attack” on disabled people and to be motivated by “ableist assumptions about how disabled people run their lives, or whether they’re more or less honest, or whether they’re more or less genuine than people who are not disabled”.

He told work and pensions minister Andrew Western, Cabinet Office minister Georgia Gould, and backbench MPs: “It’s really, really hard going for us. I have to tell you that.

“Disabled people in Britain have had a decade and a half of being the scapegoat of this country. And it has to stop.

“And this measure is actually making it worse, as opposed to stopping that scapegoating.”

He was giving evidence to the Commons committee examining the government’s public authorities (fraud, error and recovery) bill.

The government plans to use the bill to force banks to examine individuals’ accounts for potential breaches of benefit eligibility rules and then pass that information to the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).

The government currently plans to use the new powers to focus on claimants of universal credit, pension credit, and employment and support allowance (ESA).

Burgess told MPs on the committee that, even if there was an error rate of just 0.1 per cent during this process, that would still mean thousands of people showing up as “false positives”, even if it just examined those on means-tested benefits.

He said: “Bear in mind, the Post Office scandal is less than a thousand people.

“You are at the inception stage of something which could be the greatest miscarriage of justice in British history.”

He also warned of the impact of the new powers on people with diagnoses such as paranoia, schizophrenia, depression or anxiety, as it would add to their feeling of “being monitored, of being followed, of being surveilled, because you quite literally are being surveilled by your bank on behalf of the government”.

And he said the bill treated disabled people as “a separate population who should have lower rights to privacy than the general population” and was “further marking disabled people for additional state oppression and surveillance”.

He said: “Give that the United Nations has condemned the UK twice in a row for grave and systemic human rights abuses, this is further going in the wrong direction and failing to address those failures identified by the United Nations.”

He added: “We’ve continued to go down a road that is removing rights and not respecting them and subjecting disabled people to greater scrutiny, greater surveillance and greater tests of their basic rights to be a citizen of this country.”

Western, the minister for transformation in DWP, said he accepted that the new powers may lead to “some indirect discrimination against disabled people” because they were over-represented in the three groups subject to the new powers.

But Burgess said he believed it was even worse than that and would cause direct discrimination of disabled people, and he called for “public and transparent equality impact assessments”.

He said there was an over-representation of disabled people among the groups who will be subject to the new powers, and they were already “exhaustively monitored, reviewed, tested, having to provide proof, whether it’s for a blue badge, for PIP, for ESA, for universal credit, for a concessionary pass on public transport.

“I mean, the life of a disabled person is to be constantly tested, examined, having to produce proof, and this is another step in that.”

Burgess suggested that it would be fairer – although still a significant breach of privacy – if the government applied the new laws to everyone.

This is because the tax gap – the proportion of tax owed that the government is unable to collect – is more than £39 billion a year, more than four times bigger than the benefit fraud and error the government is targeting through the bill.

He told Western: “I would suggest that the reason you don’t subject the whole country to it is because there’d be outrage because people would find their rights to privacy being completely abused.

“If you’re happy to have your bank account monitored in this way, fine, but you’ve not suggested this should apply to the general population.”

In response to Burgess’s concerns, Western said that, although there were “some things there that I don’t recognize as part of the bill, but clearly that is how people are feeling and the people that you represent are feeling.

“I’m very happy to ask officials to pick up a conversation to go through the detail there.”

The committee also heard from Geoff Fimister, head of policy for Inclusion Barnet’s Campaign for Disability Justice.

He said the new powers would “disproportionately affect disabled people because disabled people are more likely to be on low incomes than others”.

He also raised concerns about the risk of “false positives” when banks trawl people’s accounts.

Fimister said that “even a small percentage of a big number is a lot of people, and people being left without any income, if the technology triggers the cessation of the benefit, it’s a serious business.

“Not having any income can cause hardship, death, and lots of stress.”

He called for a safeguard where benefits could not be stopped “unless and until it had been established” that there was an overpayment of benefits, rather than the proposed “shoot first and ask questions later approach” where DWP thinks there might have been fraud “because the tech spotted something”.

He told the committee: “There is a really raw feeling among disabled people that they are being targeted, and in the context of quite a lot of negative media publicity around the interface between employment and unemployment among disabled people, it is an unpleasant atmosphere for disabled people.”

27 February 2025

Government’s railways consultation has ‘betrayed’ disabled passengers, campaigners tell minister

Disabled campaigners and allies have accused the government of “betrayal” after it dropped plans to put accessibility at the heart of rail reforms from a hugely important public consultation.

In a letter to transport secretary Heidi Alexander, they warn that current plans for the new Great British Railways (GBR) now risk sacrificing the chance of a “proper equality, human rights, and climate framework for the railway”.

They say the consultation has dropped the key commitment that the introduction of GBR – which will eventually run both Britain’s rail infrastructure and its passenger services – would “maximise social and economic value”.

They have also demanded an extension of the consultation from eight weeks to 12 weeks, and for Alexander to do much more to make the consultation accessible to disabled people.

Representatives of four national campaigning organisations have signed the letter, which tells Alexander of their “shock and concern” at the consultation document’s failure to mention a legal duty that would have ensured GBR puts accessibility “at the core of its strategic decisions”.

Disability News Service reported last week that the consultation document includes only a handful of sentences about disabled passengers and the accessibility of the rail network.

The letter has been signed by Emily Sullivan (née Yates), co-founder of The Association of British Commuters; Paula Peters, member of the national steering group of Disabled People Against Cuts; Jan Shortt, general secretary of National Pensioners Convention; and Andrew Hodgson, immediate past president of National Federation of the Blind of the UK.

Last February, in The Plan for Rail (PDF), the Conservative government confirmed earlier pledges that it would introduce a statutory accessibility duty for GBR.

But the letter says that last week’s consultation, issued by the new Labour government, removed the accessibility duty, and a statutory environment duty, from these plans.

It adds: “Disabled people’s rights have been betrayed by this consultation, with most commitments relating to accessibility being dropped, and proposals for regulation noticeably confused.

“There are no questions whatsoever on passenger experience, nor any of the transport policy issues of most concern to the public, for example: fare reductions; ticket office closures; or disabled people’s right to ‘Turn Up And Go’.”

The letter also raises serious concerns about the accessibility of the eight-week consultation process.

It points to the consultation’s “heavy technical jargon and absence of passenger questions”, and it says the Department for Transport (DfT) must extend the consultation to 12 weeks, and publish it in all the necessary accessible formats, provide a helpline, and carry out online and face-to-face seminars, as part of a “systematic and comprehensive engagement strategy”.

The letter also calls on the government to publish equality impact and cost assessments of the reforms.

It adds: “The Department should turn back from this new idea of a stripped down, deregulated GBR, and must not sacrifice the chance to create a proper equality, human rights, and climate framework for the railway.”

A DfT spokesperson said: “Accessibility will be a key focus under Great British Railways and we want to hear the views of disability groups to shape its future.

“These duties are still under consideration, and we will set out more details once the consultation has concluded.”

DfT also claimed the consultation was clear that accessibility would be central to GBR, that GBR’s functions and duties would be informed by responses to the consultation, and that it welcomed views on whether there should be an accessibility duty.

It said it was consulting on whether a passenger watchdog should set minimum standards in areas like passenger accessibility or passenger information, with the ability to refer issues to the regulator for enforcement.

DfT claimed it had ensured the consultation was accessible for disabled people, with accessible formats for those who use assistive technologies and need large print.

It said an equality impact assessment and a broader impact assessment would be published when legislation was introduced.

27 February 2025

Government claims of ‘spiralling’ spending on benefits are false and ‘ideological’, official figures show

Official figures prove that government claims that social security spending is “spiralling out of control” are “not based on any real facts”, say disabled activists.

The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) figures show instead that total spending as a proportion of GDP* is predicted not to increase at all next year, and then to stay at the same level for the next four years.

It is also predicted to be lower this year, again as a proportion of GDP, than it was for every year from 2010-11 to 2015-16.

This provides a stark contrast to claims from the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, and the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), of “spiralling” spending on benefits.

The figures were originally highlighted on Twitter/X by Ratigan, a disabled welfare rights campaigner.

He told Disability News Service: “It’s perplexing to me that the government is choosing to push a narrative that can be so easily discredited by publicly available information.

“Data from the OBR clearly shows that not only is welfare spending lower than a decade ago, it’s also not forecast to rise over the next five years; saying that welfare spending is ‘out of control’ is simply false.”

Linda Burnip, co-founder of Disabled People Against Cuts, said the figures “show that the continuing attacks against disabled people are purely ideological and not based on any real facts.

“Their behaviour is the cause of an increasingly hostile environment for disabled people and unlikely to facilitate people getting into work and remaining in employment.”

The government’s repeated claims of “spiralling” spending are likely to be aimed at softening up the public ahead of announcing cuts to future spending on benefits in next month’s spring statement, and DWP’s imminent green paper on disability benefits.

Caroline Collier, from Inclusion Barnet’s Campaign for Disability Justice, said: “At the Campaign for Disability Justice, we are pleased to see Disability News Service highlighting this important OBR finding, and helping it get the attention it deserves. 

“This is an important counterbalance to unhelpful narratives about welfare affordability, and supports our view that a decent benefit system is a vital – and affordable – building block in ensuring that we can all access support in times of need.”

Last August, chancellor Rachel Reeves said the previous government had “let welfare costs spiral out of control”.

In January, DWP said in a press release on benefit fraud that it wanted to “tackle the spiralling welfare bill”.

And earlier this month, in a press release on disability employment, DWP claimed again that benefits spending was “spiralling”.

DWP refused to confirm that the figures were accurate, or to say if Kendall would now correct the record to show that the social security bill was not “spiralling”.

Instead, it offered figures relating to spending on disability benefits, and on total “welfare spending for Great Britain” over a different time period – and without putting it in the context of rising GDP – which it said had risen from £97.3 billion to £137.5 billion “since the pandemic” and was “expected to be” £164.6 billion by the end of the decade.

*Gross domestic product, the size of the country’s economy in a particular year

27 February 2025

Rayner to push ahead with evacuation plans that are ‘insult’ to disabled people who died at Grenfell

The government has confirmed that it will push ahead with “watered down” proposals for the emergency evacuation of disabled people who live in high-rise residential buildings, in response to the Grenfell fire inquiry.

In its “full response” to the Grenfell Tower Inquiry’s final report, the government yesterday (Wednesday) set out plans to act on the inquiry’s 58 recommendations.

One of the recommendations was for the government to further consider the inquiry’s call for a legal right to a personal emergency evacuation plan (PEEP) for all residents who might find it difficult to “self-evacuate” from a high-rise residential building.

That recommendation was made by the inquiry in October 2019.

But both the last Conservative government and the new Labour government refused to accept this recommendation in full and instead came forward with their own weakened versions of PEEPs.

Labour yesterday confirmed that it will go ahead with implementing its watered-down plans, which it calls Residential PEEPs, and which will apply to all high-rise residential buildings, and some medium-rise residential buildings.

This will impose a duty on the building owner or manager to engage with their “vulnerable and disabled residents”, consider how to improve their fire safety and evacuation, “enable” all residents to be clear on what they should do in the event of a fire, and give fire and rescue services information “in case they need to support their evacuation”.

It would be up to the building owner or manager to decide what measures are implemented, while the disabled resident may have to pay to ensure some measures “within their flat” are carried out.

The government will introduce these measures through secondary legislation later this year, and it said it would “engage widely” on producing the statutory guidance that will underpin the new requirements. 

When the plans were announced in December, Adam Gabsi, co-chair of Inclusion London, who himself is a wheelchair-user who lives on the sixth floor of a high-rise building, said the government had “gone back on its word”.

He described the plans then as “a misrepresentation of the original recommendations but also an insult to those who lost their lives at Grenfell and to all disabled people still waiting for meaningful action”.

And he said PEEPs, as recommended by the inquiry, were “an essential safeguard for disabled people, particularly those living in high-rise buildings” and would ensure that those who face barriers to evacuation are not left behind in emergencies.

The Grenfell Tower fire, which began in the early hours of 14 June 2017, led to the deaths of 72 residents, and analysis of the inquiry’s final report by Disability News Service suggested about 20 of them were disabled people.

The English Housing Survey estimates that up to three-fifths (59 per cent) of social rented households in England “contain someone with a long-term illness or disability”, the government report says.

Despite the report confirming that Labour will water down the inquiry’s PEEPs recommendation – against the wishes of disabled people – deputy prime minister Angela Rayner told MPs yesterday: “In September, the prime minister rightly said that this tragedy poses questions about what social justice means in Britain today, and whether the voices of working-class people, those with disabilities and those of colour are ignored and dismissed.

“I am here to say that we will not be that country.

“We will be a country where decent housing, security, safety and peace of mind are shared by all and are not just the privilege of a few.”

27 February 2025

Labour assembly members reject plan for disability equality champion for London, despite previous backing

Labour politicians have rejected plans put forward by a disabled people’s organisation that would have created a disability equality champion for London, despite backing the idea last year.

The plans were drawn up by the disabled people’s organisation (DPO) Inclusion London and Liberal Democrat London Assembly member Hina Bokhari, and received cross-party support from the assembly last September when they were voted through unanimously.

Inclusion London believes the mayor needs to appoint a disabled person to coordinate and develop policies that address the barriers faced by the 1.2 million disabled Londoners.

The plans would also have seen the development of a new London Disability Action Plan, covering policy areas such as energy, climate change, technology, health, housing, transport, the environment, police and emergency planning.

Inclusion London said last year that disabled Londoners were “tired of empty commitments” and urgently needed “real meaningful action”.

An online petition, launched in December by Inclusion London, which calls for a disability equality champion, has secured more than 1,400 signatures.

Bokhari told Tuesday’s assembly meeting – which was discussing mayor Sir Sadiq Khan’s proposed budget for 2025-26 – that appointing a disability equality champion would hold the “threads” of policy together.

She said a London disability action plan would “ensure actions are followed through and [hold] decision-makers to account and [create] a flagship model of policy co-creation”.

And she told fellow assembly members that Inclusion London had said the mayor’s existing forum of Deaf and disabled people’s organisations appeared to be “all talk and no action”, with “little scrutiny and no co-creation of policy”.

Bokhari said the new disability equality champion – who would be a disabled person – would be a “ground-breaking and transformative” position.

The assembly’s Conservative group also suggested appointing a disability champion, as part of its own proposed amendment to the budget, but it called for the position to be independent of the mayor as a non-executive director.

Both the Liberal Democrat and Conservative amendments were defeated.

Adam Gabsi, co-chair of Inclusion London, said after the vote: “Inclusion London have been working closely with the Liberal Democrats and other political groups on the assembly to get this amendment through.

“Though we are disappointed by the outcome, housing, transport, the built environment, are among many things in London that continually fail to meet disabled people’s varied needs, and this is mainly down to the lack of meaningful engagement with the disabled community.

“It is our hope that, despite this outcome, the mayor will take note of the amendment and ensure that disabled Londoners finally have a seat at the table, taking a leading role in policy formulation and implementation.”

A spokesperson for the mayor said he was “committed to creating a more equitable, accessible and inclusive city for all Londoners” and had “worked closely with organisations representing those with disabilities to ensure City Hall is placing their needs at the heart of its work”.

She said the mayor’s forum and his equality, diversity and inclusion advisory group, both “scrutinise policies and programmes, while representing, championing and advocating for disabled Londoners”.

She added: “The mayor will continue to do all he can to support disabled Londoners.”

Len Duvall, the London Assembly’s Labour group leader, said he welcomed ongoing discussions to strengthen the work of the forum, and he said that his group was “clear that the needs and voices of disabled Londoners must be at the heart of any decision making”.

He said: “Given ongoing conversations, it would not have been right to make changes to the budget to commit a specific amount to this issue. 

“However, we will continue to work with disabled Londoners, and welcome the opportunity to work cross-party across the assembly to lobby the mayor to make sure City Hall is working to make our city accessible and open to everyone.”

27 February 2025

Other disability-related stories covered by mainstream media this week

The first round of cross-party talks on social care in England have been postponed, BBC News has learned. The meeting was due to take place on Wednesday but those due to attend were emailed on Monday evening to say it was off and would be rescheduled: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cg5d2jg8dr1o

Ministers and councils have failed to plan effectively for the soaring numbers of pupils needing extra support in the classroom, according to a spending watchdog. Audit Scotland found around 40 per cent of Scottish pupils are now receiving additional support for learning, most of it delivered within mainstream schools. The report calls for ministers to “fundamentally rethink” how they fund and staff provision to meet demand: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0q1wyeevvgo

An academy trust is launching an independent investigation at a Solihull school for disabled children after the BBC contacted them about allegations of “bullying by teachers”. The Heights Academy opened in September 2023, promising a “unique educational approach” tailored to pupils who are autistic or have mental health needs. But some parents have expressed concern about the school’s culture, with one accusing bosses of “mis-selling them a dream”: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyze5lky7ko

27 February 2025

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

Contents

Anger after government appears to drop Tory plans to put accessibility at heart of new national rail body 1

Prime minister ‘should be ashamed’ after he fails to provide evidence for latest ‘fit for work’ attack 4

Years of evidence exposes minister’s claims in parliament that DWP is not to blame for deaths 7

Combined impact of different aspects of pandemic on disabled people ‘felt relentless’, Covid inquiry hears 12

Campaigners call for action to address shortage of wheelchair-accessible taxis 13

Government must set up independent panel to probe DWP deaths, says disabled researcher 16

Other disability-related stories covered by mainstream media this week 17

Anger after government appears to drop Tory plans to put accessibility at heart of new national rail body

Labour appears to have dropped the Conservative government’s pledge to place accessibility right at the heart of the new national body that will run the railways.

Concerns were raised by The Association of British Commuters (ABC) when this week’s consultation on the government’s plans for rail reform failed to include any mention of a statutory accessibility duty.

Last February, in The Plan for Rail (PDF), the Conservative government confirmed earlier pledges that it would introduce a legal duty on the new Great British Railways (GBR) that would “underpin cultural change” and ensure GBR put accessibility “at the core of its strategic decisions”.

But this week’s consultation on Labour’s plans for GBR – which will eventually run both Britain’s rail infrastructure and passenger services – includes no mention of the accessibility duty.

And when challenged on its absence from the consultation by Disability News Service (DNS), the Department for Transport (DfT) said only that the government welcomed views on whether there should be such a duty, and declined to produce a statement on why it was not mentioned in the document.

Other GBR statutory duties – on promoting rail freight and collaborating with devolved leaders – were included in the consultation.

There are just a handful of sentences in the document that relate to disabled passengers and the accessibility of the network.

It says that GBR will “take over responsibility from [train] operators and Network Rail to ensure its trains and stations are accessible” and “will also be responsible for providing information and assistance to passengers, as well as staffing at stations and on trains”.

A “powerful” new watchdog will “act as an independent voice and champion for passengers” and will have an “explicit role on accessibility by monitoring how services are delivered to disabled passengers and advocating improvements where issues arise”.

It could also take on some of the regulatory functions currently carried out by the Office of Rail and Road, including producing guidance on accessible travel policies.

But Emily Sullivan (née Yates), a disabled researcher in equality and human rights, and ABC’s co-founder, who first spotted that the accessibility duty had been omitted from the consultation document, said: “This is a huge step back from the long-standing commitment that GBR would have statutory duties on accessibility and the environment.

“Both have been dropped, despite being well-acknowledged as the most urgent social justice issues in transport.

“Even more worrying, the duties have been dropped in the context of extremely vague and confused proposals for regulation.

“The idea that [the existing passenger watchdog] Transport Focus might produce and monitor the accessible travel policies, for example, is astounding.

“What’s actually needed is much stronger regulation of accessibility – closer to the level of importance that safety is given by the railway, not absorbed into consumer rights and ‘passenger experience’ monitoring.

“There is now a real danger that GBR could end up without either a statutory accessibility duty or adequate regulation – this can’t be allowed to happen.”

Sullivan said the government “must answer urgently” why it had dropped the duties at such “an historic time for public ownership” because “public ownership is the biggest opportunity we’ve ever had to establish an equality and human rights framework for the railway”. 

She said: “Why would they waste this and drop GBR’s main equality commitments when there is finally the chance to regulate in the public, not private, interest?

“Moving away from equality and climate policies like this should be considered a matter of shame for a Labour government.”

She said she had studied every policy paper on GBR since the process started in 2018, and this week’s consultation was “the most incoherent plan for accessibility yet”.

She said that “rail access has been badly betrayed by this process and plans for accessibility and ticket retail are even more fragmented and regressive than the Tories’ version of GBR”.

Labour’s commitment to accessible transport has also come under attack after DfT said it would allow only eight weeks for responses to the consultation.

So far, five organisations have called for DfT to think again and extend the consultation to 12 weeks.

Sullivan described the process as “the most important rail consultation since 1994, and the most important for access ever”.

Speaking before concerns about the statutory accessibility duty emerged, disabled activists expressed their frustration and concerns at the government’s decision to restrict the consultation to less than two months.

It came just weeks after the high court ruled that an eight-week consultation on Department for Work and Pensions plans on cuts to disability benefits, under the Conservative government, had been unlawfully “rushed”.

Sullivan said there needed to be “an urgent extension to 12 weeks” for the DfT consultation.

Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC) also called for a 12-week deadline.

Paula Peters, a member of DPAC’s national steering group, said the shorter consultation timeframe would breach the Equality Act.

She said: “We back the call from The Association of British Commuters for the government to extend the consultation time to 12 weeks and demand the Department for Transport carry out more outreach so that the consultation reaches all disabled people across Britain who will be impacted by the reforms to the rail network.

“It’s the biggest reform to the rail network for decades and disabled people need to know how this will impact on them.

“It is important to stress that we continue to demand that all rail ticket offices remain open, rail stations are fully staffed and the right to turn up and go remains firmly in place for disabled rail passengers.”

DPAC also raised concerns that some accessible formats of the consultation were not yet directly available on the DfT website, other than through a link to request the document in an accessible format.

The National Federation of the Blind of the UK (NFBUK), which played a key role in 2023 in defeating planned closures of nearly 1,000 ticket offices across the country, also called for a 12-week consultation.

Andrew Hodgson, an NFBUK executive council member, said: “NFBUK believe eight weeks to be an unrealistic timescale for this consultation and we would favour 12 weeks as an alternative.”

An NFBUK spokesperson added: “The short timescale and the lack of accessible formats on the website, is a sure sign the Department for Transport is failing to communicate with disabled people on the reform creating Great British Railways from the start.”

She said DfT should “swiftly organise outreach face-to-face seminars in towns and cities across the country”, and other measures including a helpline, and making watchdogs London Travel Watch and Transport Focus “an integral part of the consultation process”.

Another accessible transport campaigner, Sarah Leadbetter, said that eight weeks was “not long enough for anybody to fill in an important consultation like this”, particularly because of the extra time that many disabled people will need to secure and complete the document in alternative formats, with many needing assistance to fill in the forms.

Tony Jennings, co-chair of a rail accessibility panel and co-founder of the Campaign for Level Boarding, also backed the call for the consultation to be extended to 12 weeks.

He said: “This is a vital consultation, and disabled people need enough time to respond to it properly. Eight weeks will not be long enough.”

He added: “It is time for action and accessibility to be a central pillar of our railways, and this document does not suggest that this is going to happen.

“It is time for action to deliver primary legislation, with deadlines for action, and the investment needed to deliver step-free stations and level boarding, because at the current rate of progress, this will take 100 years.

“A legislative deadline of 25 years is required to deliver level boarding and step-free stations or else it won’t happen.

“I also want to see a commitment to increased compensation for passenger assistance failures, in line with the campaigning efforts of Doug Paulley and Sam Jennings.”

He said there needed to be “cultural and attitudinal change from the top, rather than the watered-down change suggested in this consultation”, and that disabled people were “bored of strategies and ‘warm words’”.

The disabled-led campaigning organisation Transport for All (TfA) supported the call from other organisations for a 12-week deadline.

Emma Vogelmann, TfA’s head of policy, public affairs and campaigns, added: “Transport for All will be examining all of the proposals in depth to understand the impacts they could have on disabled passengers – both positive and negative.”

DfT declined to make a statement but claimed the consultation was clear that accessibility would be central to GBR, while the public sector equality duty would apply to the new organisation.

It told DNS that work on GBR’s functions and duties was ongoing, and would be informed by responses to the consultation, which was particularly seeking views on what mechanisms could be used to hold GBR to account.

DfT also said that its advisory body, the Disabled Persons Transport Advisory Committee – which only yesterday (Wednesday) announced the appointment of 13 new members – had been made aware of the consultation deadline ahead of its publication.

20 February 2025

Prime minister ‘should be ashamed’ after he fails to provide evidence for latest ‘fit for work’ attack

The prime minister has failed to produce any evidence to back up “baseless” and “poisonous” claims in a newspaper article that large numbers of young disabled people are pretending they are not fit enough to work.

Sir Keir Starmer made the comments in an article for The Times, and it follows multiple similar attacks on young disabled people by other politicians and media commentators from both the right and the left.

He suggested in his article that disability benefit fraud was widespread, and he attacked what he described as “worklessness as a lifestyle choice” and said Labour would “never tolerate voluntary worklessness”.

His focus was on so-called Gen Z – those currently aged between about 15 and 30 – who he said were facing a Britain where there was “less breathing space for the joy and self-discovery of youth”.

But he then wrote: “Of course, none of this means Gen Z can opt out of the rights and responsibilities we owe to each other, including the scandal of claiming benefits designed to support people with genuine illness or disability.

“Make no mistake – worklessness as a lifestyle choice goes against the fundamental ethos of the Labour Party as a vehicle for the aspirations of working people.

“Our reforms to employment rights are a landmark shift in restoring dignity and security at work. We will make work pay. But we will never tolerate voluntary worklessness.”

But after Disability News Service contacted 10 Downing Street to ask for the evidence behind his claims of a “scandal”, a government spokesperson was unable to provide any.

Mark Harrison, a member of the Reclaiming Our Futures Alliance (ROFA) steering group, said the prime minister “should be ashamed of himself”.

He said: “Rather than pushing unevidenced accusations he should be working out how to properly fund benefits and public services for disabled people.”

He said that disability benefits have “the lowest rate of fraud”, with DWP’s own figures showing that fraud by claimants of personal independence payment fell from 0.2 per cent in 2022-23 to 0.0 per cent in 2023-24, while fraud by disability living allowance claimants was estimated to be just 0.1 per cent. 

Harrison said: “None of this war on disabled people is necessary if Labour went after the real cheats – the tax avoiders and evaders and the billionaires just getting richer by the day just for being rich while disabled people are labelled and scapegoated for a crisis not of our making. 

“They should be paying their fair share and Labour should end their phoney war on disabled people.”

Dr Jay Watts, a disabled activist and consultant clinical psychologist, who has played a key role in highlighting the impact of DWP’s actions over the last decade, said the prime minister’s claim that young disabled people were part of a “scandal” of benefit fraud “isn’t just baseless – it’s a calculated ploy to shift blame onto those already failed by austerity and crumbling public services”.

She said: “The real scandal isn’t people needing support; it’s a political class refusing to admit that low pay, insecure work, soaring living costs, NHS collapse, and gutted social care have driven more young people into illness.”

She said this illness had happened “not by choice, but because chronic stress and strain wear down the body over time, making disadvantage physically embedded, and when they seek help, NHS waiting lists leave them stranded, turning preventable conditions into chronic ones”.

She added: “Disability benefit fraud is statistically negligible, yet rather than address the systemic failures locking young people out of work, Labour peddles the lie that they are choosing not to contribute.

“This isn’t about ‘voluntary worklessness’, it’s about a government abandoning its duty to ensure young people can live with dignity.

“Illness thrives in neglect, in shredded safety nets, in a society that punishes vulnerability instead of protecting it.

“If Labour cared about fairness, it wouldn’t scapegoat a generation without evidence – it would ask why so many are struggling and act to change it.”

The government declined to provide any evidence for Sir Keir’s claims.

Instead, a government spokesperson said: “We have been clear that the current welfare system needs reform, so it is fairer on the taxpayer and people can get the support they need to move into work.

“Building on our Get Britain Working white paper, we will bring forward proposals for reforming the health and disability benefits system within weeks, and are working closely with disabled people, disability organisations, and people with health conditions so their views and voices are at the heart of our plans.”

Meanwhile, RoFA and other disabled people’s groups and allies have called on disabled people to record video messages explaining how Labour’s “poisonous rhetoric” has impacted them.

They highlighted the efforts of the prime minister, chancellor Rachel Reeves and work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall to use the media to “spin the lies about disabled people being benefit scroungers and frauds”.

They said: “This poisonous rhetoric is being used, like the Tories did over the last 14 years, to justify attacking our rights and cutting our benefits.

“Tell us what the impact has been on you and your family and loved ones.”

As well as RoFA, the campaign is led by groups including Disabled People Against Cuts, the UK-wide coalition of disabled people’s organisations monitoring the implementation of the UN disability convention, and the Campaign to Save Mental Health Services in Norfolk and Suffolk.

Harrison said: “This campaign has been initiated because of the trauma caused by the constant pernicious rhetoric from Labour framing disabled people as benefit scroungers and cheats. 

“This is creating mental distress on a massive scale. 

“Labour were elected because people had had enough of austerity and failing public services and demanded change.   

“After 14 years of a Tory war on us, Labour have come to power but have carried on where the Tories left off by adopting their policies and austerity budgets. 

“This would be bad enough, but they have also stepped up the attacks. 

“They refuse to invest in social care, and children’s and mental health services. 

“They have also adopted the Tory target of saving £3 billion from disabled people’s benefits – hence the blaming, scapegoating and gaslighting by Starmer, Reeves and Kendall, reminiscent of Cameron and Osborne 15 years ago.    

“It also coincides with millions of disabled people being forced on to universal credit where they will lose thousands of pounds a year in benefits and be subject to conditionality and sanctions, and is on top of the fear being caused by the assisted dying bill passing through parliament.

“Disabled people are angry and we are putting Labour on notice that we are going to fight them all the way. 

“We will challenge them on the streets, on social media, in the courts and at the United Nations.”

20 February 2025