Disability News Service December 11th

All Posts, Assisted Dying Bill, Benefits, DWP, Independent Living, legal challenges, local authority cuts, Mental Health, Motability, News, PIP, Politics, transport, UNCRPD, Universal Credit, welfare cuts, Welfare reforms No Responses »

Dec 112025

McFadden brags about cutting disability benefits, just as his own strategy warns of ‘deep material poverty’ 1

Minister misleads MPs as mystery deepens over new £2 billion cuts to disability benefits 3

Duty to disabled passengers in railways bill is ‘too vague’ and must be strengthened, MPs are told 5

Peers urged to ‘err on the side of caution’ and raise minimum age limit in assisted suicide bill 7

Scottish and UK governments are failing to uphold disability rights, says watchdog 9

Thousands of disabled people in one county should benefit from care charging legal case victory 11

Other disability-related stories covered by mainstream media this week 14

McFadden brags about cutting disability benefits, just as his own strategy warns of ‘deep material poverty’

The work and pensions secretary has bragged about cutting disabled people’s support, three days after launching a child poverty strategy which warned that more than a million children in families where someone was disabled were living in “deep material poverty”.

Pat McFadden told the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg on Sunday that his government had halved the health element for new claimants of universal credit because “under the Tory system we inherited, people got double the money for declaring themselves unfit for work”.

And he said he did not rule out further cuts to benefits.

But his comments on Sunday morning came three days after his Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), alongside the Department for Education and the prime minister, had launched Labour’s new Child Poverty Strategy.

The strategy’s evidence pack states that “single parent families and families where someone has a disability (are) particularly overrepresented in deep material poverty”.

In 2023-24, according to the strategy, there were 1.3 million children in a family where someone is disabled (22 per cent of those children) who were in “deep material poverty”.

The evidence pack points to disabled people’s “high additional living expenses such as transport, home adaptations, or specialist equipment”, while “caring responsibilities or accessibility issues can mean that it is difficult or not possible to find work that suits [those families’] requirements”.

The report itself says that “deep material poverty is especially pronounced for children in single parent families and children in families with disability”.

And it adds: “There are parents who may not be able to work, for example due to severe disability, or who fall on difficult times outside of their control.

“It is not right that we have a system where children are penalised through no fault of their own.”

Three days later, McFadden boasted to Kuenssberg about doing exactly that by slashing the health element of universal credit for most new claimants by about £50 a week from next April.

Announcing the Child Poverty Strategy, the government said it would lift about 550,000 children out of poverty by 2030 and tackle the “root causes of poverty by cutting the cost of essentials, boosting family incomes, and improving local services”.

Measures include making it easier for new parents who receive universal credit to return to work by extending eligibility for upfront childcare costs to those returning from parental leave; ending the unlawful placement of families in bed and breakfasts beyond the six-week limit; introducing a new legal duty for councils to notify schools, health visitors, and GPs when a child is placed in temporary accommodation; and taking measures to help families buy more affordable infant formula.

The government had already announced at last month’s budget that it was removing the universal credit two-child limit that was imposed by the last government in 2017.

Asked by Disability News Service (DNS) to respond to McFadden’s comments, and to say whether he would apologise for his misleading statement about claimants “declaring themselves unfit for work” – when there is a lengthy and harsh “fitness for work” assessment process – a government spokesperson said: “We are reforming the broken system we inherited by tackling perverse incentives around sickness claims, increasing face-to-face assessments, and investing £1 billion to help sick and disabled people into good, secure jobs.

“We want a welfare state that supports those who need it while helping people into work and delivering fairness to the taxpayer.

“That’s why we’ve launched the Timms Review to make PIP fair and fit for the future, while Alan Milburn’s investigation into young people and inactivity will help us tackle the key barriers behind youth unemployment.

“Thanks to our decision to scrap the two-child limit and introduce a wider package of measures for families we will lift 550,000 children out of poverty by the end of this parliament.”

This week, McFadden also released a written statement updating MPs on his department’s plans to improve its record on safeguarding benefit claimants.

It details a series of actions taken since a report on “safeguarding vulnerable claimants” was published by the Commons work and pensions committee in May.

Much of the statement had already been included in a letter he wrote to the committee on 18 November, on which he was questioned by the committee the following day.

McFadden admitted in this week’s statement that an assessment of DWP’s safeguarding approach had found “some good practice, but also variation in awareness, skills, and accountability”.

He said the first year of a new five-year DWP strategy would focus on “raising staff awareness of safeguarding responsibilities, building capability through training, and strengthening relationships with local authorities, health services, and voluntary organisations”.

He will publish a DWP safeguarding policy framework next year, setting out the department’s “comprehensive approach”.

McFadden said DWP “remains open to adopting a statutory duty” to safeguard claimants, one of the key recommendations in the committee’s report.

But there was no mention in his statement of the committee’s call for a new independent body to investigate cases where claimants have been seriously harmed by DWP’s actions.

DNS has previously shown how senior civil servants and ministers spent more than a decade covering up evidence that linked DWP’s actions with hundreds, and probably thousands, of deaths of disabled people who relied on the social security system*.

Documents secured through freedom of information requests, inquest reports, and investigations by bereaved family members show how DWP destroyed incriminating records, failed to share crucial evidence with its own independent reviewers and grieving relatives, and even lied to a coroner.

*The Department: How a Violent Government Bureaucracy Killed Hundreds and Hid the Evidence, DNS editor John Pring’s book on the years of deaths linked to DWP’s actions and failings, is published by Pluto Press

11 December 2025

Minister misleads MPs as mystery deepens over new £2 billion cuts to disability benefits

The disability minister has refused to apologise after misleading MPs about concerns over nearly £2 billion in new cuts to disability benefits.

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has added to these transparency concerns by itself providing misleading information about the cuts, and again refusing to clarify how many disabled claimants will be affected, and how much they will lose.

Two weeks on from the budget, it is still unclear how DWP and its ministers intend to cut £85 million next year, £310 million in 2027-28, £520 million in 2028-29, £580 million in 2029-30 and £455 million in 2030-31, from spending on disability benefits.

Treasury documents, published on the day of the budget, show the cuts are connected with increasing DWP’s “capacity” to carry out reassessments of claimants through the work capability assessment (WCA), increasing the number of face-to-face benefit assessments, and “extending Personal Independence Payment [PIP] award reviews periods”.

The budget costings document says these changes will “ensure people receive the right health or disability benefit and the system is sustainable”.

But it is unclear from budget documents exactly how these changes will cut spending on disability benefits, and how any cuts will be split between disabled claimants of PIP and universal credit.

Last week, Disability News Service (DNS) reported the government’s refusal to explain how it will cut spending through these measures, despite repeated requests for clarity.

Following the DNS story, the Liberal Democrat work and pensions spokesperson, Steve Darling, asked in Commons work and pensions questions for an explanation of how disabled people would be impacted by the cuts, which he said had been “quietly sneaked into the budget the other week”.

DNS has been seeking clarification on the cuts from DWP and the Treasury since 26 November, the day of the budget.

And on 1 December, DNS copied in Sir Stephen Timms – the minister for social security and disability – to an email to DWP’s press office, highlighting concerns that he was breaching the post-election pledge he made 14 months ago to improve transparency within DWP.

The email asked for an explanation of how the £1.95 billion in cuts would be achieved.

But responding in parliament on Monday (8 December) to Darling’s question about the DNS report, Sir Stephen told him: “I do not know what the honourable gentleman is referring to.

“I will happily look into the report he has spoken of.”

When DNS then asked if Sir Stephen would apologise for misleading Darling and fellow MPs, the DWP press office itself produced a misleading statement.

It said: “The £1.9 billion in welfare savings were announced by the chancellor at the budget and set out in full in the budget document.

“This will be delivered through measures such as tightening eligibility for overseas pension accrual, reforming Motability, and reducing duplication in benefit administration.”

This is not correct.

The budget costings document makes no mention of the Motability tax changes or pensions in its brief section on the £1.95 billion cuts to “health and disability benefits”.

Instead, the document refers to “operational improvements to health assessments”, including the WCA, “changing the frequency of Personal Independence Payment (PIP) award reviews”, and plans to “increase the number of face-to-face health assessments conducted across both PIP and the WCA”.

Asked why it had provided further misleading information on top of Sir Stephen’s misleading answer to Darling, DWP had not responded by 11.30am today (Thursday).

Meanwhile, Liberal Democrat MP John Milne asked Sir Stephen on Monday if he agreed that the widely-ridiculed claim by Tory shadow work and pensions secretary Helen Whately that “millions are getting benefits for anxiety or ADHD along with a free Motability car” was “clearly nonsense” and “one of the least accurate claims ever made by a politician”.

Sir Stephen said he agreed, although he said that “choosing the most misleading claim is a tough contest”.

Another minister was asked by Liberal Democrat MP Caroline Voaden why one of her constituents in South Devon had spent “nearly two weeks calling the DWP every day to find out why his employment and support allowance had been stopped without warning”, but “each time he called, he waited for over an hour, only for the line to be cut off with no reply”.

DWP minister Andrew Western said such service was “unacceptable” and he promised to “look into it on her behalf”.

The SNP’s Chris Law asked Sir Stephen what action he was taking after nearly 1,000 new and existing claimants had a work capability assessment cancelled by private sector contractor Maximus since 9 September 2024.

He said a whistleblower had told him cancellations were “a regular occurrence, largely because of IT services provided by the DWP”, with one of his Dundee constituents having their WCA cancelled five times.

Sir Stephen said he would be “happy to look into the details”.

11 December 2025

Duty to disabled passengers in railways bill is ‘too vague’ and must be strengthened, MPs are told

A statutory duty in the new railways bill to ensure ministers and public bodies promote the needs of disabled passengers is “too vague” and must be strengthened as the legislation passes through parliament, MPs were told yesterday (Wednesday).

The transport select committee was hearing evidence from experts a day after the government’s railways bill passed its second reading in the House of Commons.

Emma Vogelmann, co-chief executive of the disabled people’s organisation Transport for All (TfA), welcomed the inclusion in the bill of a statutory duty that will force those in charge of the railways to take account of “the needs of disabled persons”.

Labour had previously dropped plans to ensure there was a statutory duty on accessibility in the bill.

But Vogelmann told MPs on the committee that the duty’s wording was “very vague” and “too unenforceable” and “doesn’t guarantee improvements for disabled passengers”, despite the “desperate change that is needed in terms of accessibility”.

She said TfA wanted the bill strengthened so there was a duty to “actively and continuously improve accessibility across the rail network” and ensure there are “measurable outcomes” that show what progress is being made every year.

The bill currently says that ministers, Great British Railways (GBR) and the Office of Rail and Road will have a duty to carry out their roles – alongside other statutory duties – in “the manner best calculated to promote the interests of users and potential users of railway passenger services including, in particular, the needs of disabled persons”.

But Vogelmann told the MPs the legislation should be strengthened to “make sure that accessibility is enforceable and that it is an over-riding, consistent priority for Great British Railways as opposed to at the moment where we feel it is potentially not given enough enforcement power and it is subject to political will in some instances”.

She said the current wording of the duty was “almost purposefully vague”, which risked perpetuating the “tick box” culture and lack of meaningful action on accessibility across the rail system.

She added: “The lack of enforceable standards, the lack of enforceable actions, is really why disabled people feel excluded from the rail network at the moment and why many of us face so many barriers.”

The previous day, a string of MPs had highlighted the need for meaningful improvements to accessibility on the railways, during the bill’s second reading.

The bill will create GBR, a new publicly-owned company that will bring together management of passenger services and rail infrastructure.

The government also plans to use the bill to introduce a stronger passenger watchdog and to simplify fares and tickets.

Transport secretary Heidi Alexander told MPs the bill would “sweep away the fragmentation and dysfunction that have plagued the railway for too long and will bring the 17 organisations involved in running the railway together into one public body, Great British Railways, which is the directing mind that this industry has long called for”.

Many MPs in the debate called for improvements to the government’s Access for All programme, which funds access improvements at rail stations.

Conservative MP Mark Pritchard said “more needs to be done on step-free access” because there was “currently very little in the bill that suggests that more will be done, particularly for rural stations such as Cosford, Shifnal or Albrighton in Shropshire.

“If it cannot be done at every station, and there is no money for that, there at least needs to be step-free access and improved disability access somewhere along inter-county railway lines.”

Adam Dance, the Liberal Democrat MP for Yeovil, said: “Too many rural railway stations are not accessible for disabled people.

“Without support staff, constituents in Yeovil have had serious accidents at railway stations.

“Although the government’s accessibility priorities, which we are debating today, are welcome, does my honourable friend agree that we need a strengthened Access for All programme?”

Keir Mather, a junior transport minister, told MPs he had “heard the calls from colleagues across the house about the importance of the Access for All scheme”, and that the government was continuing to fund the scheme.

Disability News Service reported last month that the government’s new “roadmap to an accessible railway” – covering England, Scotland and Wales – appeared to suggest a reduction in real spending on the Access for All programme, with the roadmap promising a future commitment to only spend “up to” £70 million a year.

Conservative and Liberal Democrat MPs voted against the bill receiving a second reading, but it was easily passed by 329 votes in favour to 173 votes against.

11 December 2025

Peers urged to ‘err on the side of caution’ and raise minimum age limit in assisted suicide bill

Peers have been urged to “err on the side of caution” and raise the minimum age limit for an assisted death from 18 to 25, as part of a controversial bill that aims to legalise the practice.

As the House of Lords again debated some of the hundreds of amendments proposed to the terminally ill adults (end of life) bill, peers were told that a minimum age of 18 was “contrary to the mounting evidence of when the brain is fully formed”.

Labour peer Baroness [Luciana] Berger told fellow peers last Friday (5 December) that social media had become “a powerful driver of harm” and that research showed young people in vulnerable situations were “disproportionately exposed to posts that glamorise suicide or present suicidal thoughts as normal, appealing or even fashionable”.

She said she was “haunted” by the words of a young disabled woman who had said in evidence at an earlier stage of the bill: “I’m in care. I’ve got disabilities. The government will pay for me to die under this bill, but it won’t pay for me to live.”

Baroness Berger reminded peers that the children’s commissioner, Dame Rachel de Souza, had said she would “far rather that we erred on the side of caution, protecting those who have had terrible lives, terrible experiences, have been abused, have had their families turn them out, protecting those [with] extreme mental illness, protecting those with special educational needs and disabilities, protecting anorexic children who are heading into adulthood”.

Baroness Berger said: “I am clear that we must continue to say to children and young people: ‘Yes, your life matters. Even if it will be a short life, it matters.’”

Labour peer Lord Falconer, who is sponsoring the bill in the Lords, said he believed 18 was still the right age, but that “maybe the answer is some assurance that there is a more intense assessment for people aged between 18 and 25”.

The issue is likely to be debated again at the bill’s report stage.

Meanwhile, the disabled Conservative peer Lord [Kevin] Shinkwin warned of a further attempt to “weaken” the bill’s protections after Lord Falconer proposed an amendment that would affect the adjustments that must be made for those with language and literacy barriers, including people with learning difficulties.

The bill currently states that doctors assessing someone for an assisted suicide “must first ensure the provision of adjustments for language and literacy barriers”.

But Lord Falconer suggested in his amendment that doctors should instead “take all reasonable steps to ensure… effective communication”.

Lord Shinkwin said he failed to see how the change would “do anything other than weaken this bill” and would “fundamentally weaken one of the bill’s safeguards, such as they are”.

He said the bill “makes a mockery” of the Labour party’s “fine, noble and honourable tradition” of “advancing disability rights”.

He said: “It shreds a tradition that deserves to be preserved, not sacrificed in such a profoundly cynical and misleading way as to make out, as the amendment does, that this is somehow only a drafting change.

“There is a reason why not one organisation of or for disabled people supports the bill; they know that disabled people need the bill like a hole in the head.

“I marvel that the noble and learned lord does not seem to realise that the bill is dangerous enough already without the removal of provisions that would at least acknowledge the obligation to first ensure that communication adjustments were made; for example, for people with learning disabilities or users of British Sign Language.”

There was also criticism of Lord Falconer’s proposed amendment by Baroness [Nuala] O’Loan, the human rights expert and former police ombudsman for Northern Ireland, who said his amendment would introduce “a far less specific test, and consideration must be given to setting standards for the level of communication which is required”.

She asked Lord Falconer whether his amendment would “inadvertently disadvantage those with specific learning difficulties and similar vulnerable groups”.

Lord Falconer insisted that the amendment was “not a watering down at all” but he said he would discuss Lord Shinkwin’s concerns with him before the next stage of the bill, although “at the moment, it looks to me to offer just as good, if not better, protection”.

Peers have now dealt with only six groups of amendments, out of the – currently – 84 they will need to get through to move onto the next stage of the bill in the Lords, with further debate planned tomorrow (Friday).

The Hansard Society said this week that if the Lords continued at its current pace it would “far fall short of what is needed to complete the remaining groups in time”, with parliament’s current session due to end in the spring, probably in May.

11 December 2025

Scottish and UK governments are failing to uphold disability rights, says watchdog

The Scottish and UK governments are both failing to uphold the rights of disabled people in key areas, according to an annual report by Scotland’s human rights watchdog.

Two of the 10 areas of “urgent concern” highlighted by the Scottish Human Rights Commission in its State of the Nation 2025 report focus on continued breaches of disabled people’s rights.

The report – presented this week to the Scottish parliament – says the support for people with learning difficulties and autistic people to live in their own homes is “inadequate”, with many forced to live in accommodation that is “institutional, inappropriate, and not in the area that they would call home”.

The Scottish government has failed to put in place the necessary community-based support to deliver the right to independent living, it says.

It also points to the lack of “transparency and monitoring” to ensure action in this area meets human rights requirements.

The report also warns that disability benefits fail to provide a “decent standard of living” and are at risk of being cut, even though disabled people are more likely to live in poverty than people living in households where no-one is disabled.

Disabled people and disabled people’s organisations told the commission last year that social security payments that are meant to cover additional disability-related costs for daily living “are in fact being used to cover basic household expenses such as food”.

Disabled people are “going without enough income to meet costs” and facing rising debt, and are often unable to pay for fuel, including the cost of charging their medical equipment.

The report adds: “Despite these impossible choices, UK politicians have been actively considering further cuts and changes to disability support.”

And, it says, some of the proposed policy choices “actively undermine the rights of disabled people”.

It particularly highlights the £50-a-week cut to the health element of universal credit for most new claimants, from next April, which is happening at a time when disabled people “are struggling to make ends meet”.

The cut, it says, “is particularly inconsistent” with the UK government’s obligation to realise rights progressively under the UN International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

Despite the UK government failing to rule out future cuts to spending on personal independence payment (PIP), the Scottish government – which is now responsible for its own version of the extra costs benefit, adult disability payment (ADP) – has “indicated that it does not intend to change ADP to reduce spending”, the report says.

But it says that the Scottish government has still not demonstrated that it has taken a human rights approach to budgeting “that both aims to ensure there is no worsening of disability-related poverty” and, where there is such poverty, to reduce it.

It adds: “Devolution is no excuse for failing to respect, protect and fulfil human rights.”

Derek, a disabled person interviewed for the report, says: “It feels like a lot of the human rights are being chipped away.

“We keep working away to make sure disabled people’s voices are being heard, but sometimes it can be disheartening, and I feel like I don’t have the energy.”

He has been supported by Glasgow Disability Alliance, and he told the commission: “My confidence came, not as an individual but from being involved in and as an ally to a movement.

“The barriers affect so many areas of life. It took me 20 years of fighting my local housing authority to get information in an accessible format, never mind accessible housing.”

Among the report’s calls for action from the Scottish government, it says the necessary housing and social care support must be in place to ensure a right to independent living.

And it says ADP and “other forms of social security and financial support to cover the costs of disability” must “meet those specific needs”, in line with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

Other areas of concern highlighted by the report include healthcare provision; the housing crisis that is denying people across Scotland access to “safe, affordable and adequate housing”; high levels of food insecurity and unaffordability; and changes to the UK social security system that “disadvantage the most marginalised people and families”.

Professor Angela O’Hagan, chair of the Scottish Human Rights Commission, said: “People are struggling to heat their homes, feed their families, or access basic services, and this is fuelling real frustration and tension across our communities.

“At times like these, human rights matter more than ever. They provide the framework that requires public bodies to act fairly, protect people’s dignity, and direct resources to those who need them most.

“The most effective way to rebuild trust and reduce anger is to make these rights a lived reality for everyone.”

She added: “This report is a clear call to action.

“We urge the Scottish parliament and all public bodies to use its findings to make better decisions about legislation, budgeting and service delivery.

“Human rights set the minimum standards that people in Scotland should be able to depend on, especially during tough times.”

Meanwhile, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has warned the UK government it is failing to uphold “fundamental” human rights, including access to healthcare for disabled people, the right to peaceful protest, and freedom from exploitation for migrant workers.  

In a new report, published on Human Rights Day, the commission assessed progress on some of the 302 recommendations (PDF) made by other UN member states at the UK’s Universal Periodic Review in November 2022.

The EHRC report says successive government disability strategies and action plans have failed to focus on improving health services for disabled people, despite data showing disabled people in England face greater barriers to healthcare and are more often on NHS hospital waiting-lists than non-disabled people.

11 December 2025

Thousands of disabled people in one county should benefit from care charging legal case victory

Hundreds, or even thousands, of service-users in Kent should benefit from a legal case taken by a disabled woman who spent years over-paying care charges because the county council failed to tell her about crucial rules.

Kent County Council – which is now run by the right-wing Reform UK party after a landslide election victory earlier this year – has now backed down and agreed to do more to tell disabled people in the county how calculating their disability-related spending could reduce their care charges.

A disabled woman known as PXA had been forced to cancel her council-funded support because she could not afford the higher charges imposed in September 2024 when the council changed its charging policy, leading to her and thousands more disabled people in the county seeing sharp increases in their weekly care charges.

After seeking legal advice, she learned that she had been overpaying her care charges for years because her disability-related expenses had never been assessed.

PXA won permission for a judicial review of the council’s actions, but the local authority backed down and settled the case, days before a trial was due to begin last week.

The case revolved around the council’s failure to do enough to tell disabled people about the disability-related expenditure (DRE) system.

When calculating a person’s social care charges, a local authority must – if it treats their disability benefits as income – deduct what that person spends in DRE.

But Kent County Council’s policy since 2003 had been to deduct a standard amount for DRE and only to carry out an assessment of their actual spending if the disabled person asked for one.

The council set this standard amount at £21 in 2003, and reduced it to £17 in 2011, failing to increase it to allow for inflation for the next 14 years.

Legal firm Gold Jennings, which represents PXA and three other claimants, found that between them they had overpaid tens of thousands of pounds in care charges.

The firm believes there are “hundreds if not thousands” of other disabled people in Kent who were unaware that they should request an assessment of DRE to try to reduce their care charges.

The council’s own statistics show that, of about 16,000 individuals paying for their care in the county, only a few hundred had requested a DRE assessment.

Gold Jennings said PXA’s case was assisted by “compelling” evidence from the disabled people’s organisation Inclusion London, which used its virtual DRE assistant to highlight how disability-related spending for many people was likely to be significantly more than the £17 per week used by Kent County Council.

Even the council’s own figures – using individual assessments carried out in the 11 months after the September 2024 policy change – put average DRE at £55.46 per week.

Disabled people with this average level of DRE would have been overpaying care charges by nearly £2,000 per year.

PXA provided evidence that she had “never properly been told about DRE or that she could request an assessment”, said Gold Jennings.

The council has now agreed to make significant changes to its policy, including referring to DRE in its annual charging letters; providing clearer guidance in its DRE factsheet; and changing guidance to ensure council staff tell claimants about DRE and its importance in cutting charges.

It has also agreed to credit a “goodwill” amount to PXA to reduce her future care charges.

Svetlana Kotova, director of campaigns and justice at Inclusion London, said: “We are pleased with the outcome of this legal challenge and sincerely hope the changes that Kent agreed to make will enable many disabled people who use social care to keep more of their money.

“This case shows very powerfully the problems in practice with the DRE assessment process, which in theory allows disabled people to prove their extra disability costs so that they can keep more of their disability benefits, but is often unworkable.

“People don’t know about DRE and the process of claiming it is very complicated and often demeaning.

“It is wrong that people with very high support needs end up being overcharged for the essential care they need.

“This just pushes disabled people into deeper poverty.

“This is why Inclusion London have been campaigning to scrap care charging altogether.”

Clare Jennings, head of public law at Gold Jennings, said the consequences of the council’s actions were that her clients had been overpaying by thousands of pounds a year for their care, for many years.

She said: “I am deeply concerned that my clients’ situation is not unique and that there will be hundreds, if not thousands, of others like them in Kent, and thousands more in other local authority areas who operate similar policies, who have overpaid for their care, enriching local authorities by tens of millions of pounds.”

A council spokesperson said: “Faced with increasing demands for complex care, rising costs of care and a lack of adequate funding from central government, we are having to take tough decisions to make sure future essential services are sustainable.

“Unlike a number of other UK councils, Kent County Council delayed using powers given to local authorities under 2014’s Care Act to take into account higher, or enhanced, rates of disability benefits when assessing how much people should contribute to the cost of their care.

“Following public consultation in 2024, the decision to change this policy and increase the amount some people contribute to the cost of their care was not taken lightly and we included a £900,000 contingency in the budget to help with increased disability-related expenses.”

11 December 2025

DPAC

[1] DWP figures released in response to an FOI request from the Benefits and Work website show how many people with different disabilities and illnesses currently receive the PIP daily living allowance having scored under four points in all categories. They include:

214,000 claimants with arthritis – that’s 77% of all arthritis claimants receiving the daily living allowance

38,000 with cardiovascular diseases – 62%

45,000 with respiratory diseases – 55%

38,000 with multiple sclerosis and neuropathic diseases – 48%

23,000 with cancer – 33%

11,000 with cerebral palsy and neurological muscular diseases – 24%

26,000 with psychotic disorders – 23%

UN Committee slams government failure to address disability rights violations

UNCRPD, Universal Credit, WCA, welfare cuts, Welfare reforms No Responses »

Apr 252024

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 25 April 2024

UK Deaf and Disabled People’s Organisations’ Coalition

UN Committee slams government failure to address disability rights violations

A report published yesterday by the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Disabled People concludes that the UK Government has made “no significant progress” in addressing the grave and systematic violations of Deaf and Disabled people’s rights that it highlighted more than seven years ago.

Instead, the report notes areas of further regression and numerous issues of “deep concern”.

The report states that:

“The Committee finds that the State party has failed to take all appropriate measures to address grave and systematic violations of the human rights of persons with disabilities and has failed to eliminate the root causes of inequality and discrimination.”

The report is the outcome of a follow up to the Committee’s unprecedented special inquiry which in 2016 found evidence of grave and systematic violations of Deaf and Disabled People’s rights due to welfare reform and austerity measures.

The inquiry focused on three specific areas: equal chances to live and participate in the community; right to good work; and, adequate social protections and standard of living.

On publication of the 2016 report the then government dismissed its findings.

Andy Greene from the National Steering Group of Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC), who triggered the special inquiry said:

“The process of evidence gathering, taking witness testimony and objective scrutiny of policy and its impact, is one that’s very difficult to ridicule or dismiss. The facts speak for themselves. As such, the inquiry vindicates the experiences of Deaf and Disabled people whose voices are too often ignored.”

John Kelly, musician and campaigner who also sits on the DPAC National Steering Group said the report is:

“…damning on the lack of this government listening to our real lived experiences as Disabled people and doing anything to support what we really need which is to live and contribute in our community as equal citizens along with our peers.”

Deaf and Disabled People’s Organisations (DDPOs) across the UK, who took part in reporting to the Committee, along with DPAC, through the UK DDPO Coalition, have welcomed the report.

Svetlana Kotova, Director of Campaigns and Justice, Inclusion London, said:

“This report is a damning verdict on the government’s track record in upholding our human rights…

“It is shocking that our country that positions itself as a world leader is yet again found to breach our rights on a systematic level.

“It is also shocking that the government has failed to listen to the UN in the past and has actively dismissed the previous recommendations….

“Inclusion London welcomes the report and urge the government and the opposition to take it seriously and develop policies on welfare reform, employment and independent living that comply with the UK’s obligations under the UNCRDP.

“The report shows that the current system is not fit for purpose and the government cannot carry on punishing Disabled people.”

Dermot Devlin, spokesperson for DPAC Northern Ireland said:

“ DPAC NI thank the UN Committee for their work and due diligence on our behalf and call on the Westminster Government to properly implement the recommendations of the 2016 inquiry and the current report.

“The absence of Government in Northern Ireland has failed Disabled people here. With the Executive now restored, bringing forward a Disability Strategy that addresses the Committee’s recommendations must be an absolute priority.”

The report documents how the UK government requested postponement of the session at which they were due to give evidence to the Committee in August.

Their request for postponement was just six days before the deadline for written evidence submissions to the inquiry was due and after many cash-strapped DDPOs had already booked their flights and accommodation to attend and give evidence.

The result was that the Committee, which is made up of Deaf ad Disabled members from around the world, had to split the oral evidence section of the inquiry into two separate sessions.

Rhian Davies, CEO for Disability Wales, said:

“The UK Government’s approach to this review has been utterly disrespectful and matches the contempt shown to Disabled people for over a decade. We deserve better and we demand better.”

Ellen Clifford, UK Coalition Co-ordinator, said;

“The government’s attitude towards the UN special inquiry is evidence that their treatment of Deaf and Disabled people is wilful and calculated. This is reflected in the damning findings of the report.

“The limitations of the inquiry process are that there are just too many deliberate rights violations to include in one report.

“However, the report validates the experiences of Deaf and Disabled people across the UK and is a much-needed counter to government rhetoric claiming they are “protecting the most vulnerable” when they are doing the exact opposite.”

The report highlights numerous areas of government policy that are not only failing Deaf and Disabled people, but that are causing serious rights violations.

Among the many areas where the Committee is “deeply concerned” are: the social care recruitment crisis follow EU withdrawal; the inadequacies of social care support provision to cover anything more than “bare subsistence”; incarceration of Disabled people “in secure psychiatric facilities due to a lack of community-based support”; “disabled people who are housebound due to inadequate support to access the community”; “abuse, mistreatment and the increasing use of restraints, restrictive practices and… unexpected deaths in the mental health care system”.

Dorothy Gould, founder of Liberation, a grass-roots organisation led by people with personal experience of mental distress/trauma, said:

“…it is an utter disgrace that many of us are forced into institutions, continue to be locked up against our will in places such as psychiatric hospitals and continue to be forcibly treated and abused, in complete breach of human rights which other citizens hold.”

The Committee’s recognition of the increasing barriers to employment have been welcomed by Deaf and Disabled trade unionists.

Natalie Amber, Co-chair, Deaf and Disabled Members Committee, Equity Trade Union, said:

“Ill-thought through cuts, particularly as a result of welfare reform, are making it impossible to work in the creative industries unless you have independent wealth. This is directly and negatively impacting who we see on our stages and screens.”

The report acknowledges the devastating impact of previous welfare “reform” measures.

The report states that:

“The Committee is appalled by reports of “benefit deaths” referring to fatalities among disabled people in the State party, subsequent to their engagement with the process for determining eligibility for benefits…

“Testimonies have also been received regarding the minimal, unsuitable, and/or abusive responses to individuals’ mental health emergencies that are frequently precipitated by the benefits assessment procedure.”

It recommends that the UK government:

“Take comprehensive measures to ensure that persons with disabilities are adequately supported through social security payments, benefits and allowances,… ascertain the additional costs of living with disabilities and adjusting benefit amounts accordingly to reflect these costs;”

Alison Turner, daughter-in-law of Errol Graham, who starved to death after his benefits were stopped, said:

“I am pleased that the report highlighted the need for proper review and monitoring of the deaths of benefit claimants… It shows that this government has learned nothing and cares not for its direct actions to cause harm.”

The report comes less than a week after the Prime Minister announced a new round of cuts to disability social security payments and amidst political and media rhetoric that directly contravenes the 2016 findings and recommendations by demonising disabled benefit claimants.

The report states that:

“There is a pervasive framework and rhetoric that devalues disabled people and undermines their human dignity. Reforms within social welfare benefits are premised on a notion that disabled people are undeserving and wilfully avoiding employment (“skiving off”) and defrauding the system. This has resulted in hate speech and hostility towards disabled people.”

Kamran Mallick, CEO of Disability Rights UK, said:

“Under this Government, the UK has lost its status as a nation that leads in disability rights to one that is actively attacking Disabled people.

“In just the last week we have seen an onslaught of new policy proposals and legislation which will not only harm us but also lead to avoidable deaths…

“At a time when we’re all struggling to make ends meet and cannot access the healthcare and support that we need, the Government are scapegoating Disabled people for a failing economy.

“We are not at fault for simply existing. The Government are at fault for their complete disregard for international treaties and contempt for Disabled people’s rights.”

John McArdle, spokesperson for the Black Triangle campaign in Scotland, said:

“To proceed with the plans announced by Conservative Prine Minister Sunak last Friday will definitely lead to a surge in deaths by suicide and other avoidable harm which falls short of death but is nonetheless catastrophic.

“The U.K. has abrogated the Convention on the Rights of Disabled People by its treatment of Deaf and Disabled people in the UK.”

Disabled President of the National union of Journalists (NUJ), Natasha Hirst, made a call to all journalists to reflect the evidence as reflected in the report rather than unquestioningly repeating inaccurate and harmful government rhetoric:

“There has never been a more important time for journalists and the wider media industry to tackle harmful negative rhetoric against disabled people.

“I call on journalists to take time to understand the concerns raised by the UN Committee and scrutinise why the Government is so keen to dismiss their failure to uphold disabled people’s human rights.

“Deaf and Disabled People’s Organisations have thoroughly evidenced the harm caused by policy changes and cuts to services and yet the UK Government is intent on pushing this even further.

“Disabled people’s voices need to be heard and not drowned out and demonised by people who have never experienced the sharp end of the social security system.

“As journalists, we should report ethically to hold power to account, and not be complicit in the scapegoating of disabled people.”

ENDS

For more information including speaking to people personally affected by issues covered in the report or to be put in touch with ‘;#anyone quoted above, contact:

Ellen Clifford, UK Coalition – 07505144371

Rensa Gaunt, Inclusion London – 07561 064227 `

Bethany Bale, Disability Rights UK – Bethany.bale@disabilityrightsuk.org

For Northern Ireland enquiries contact: Dermot Devlin – 07899 962209

For Scotland enquiries contact John McArdle – 07379 612778

For Wales enquiries contact: Megan Thomas – 07990 425823

Notes for Editors

The special inquiry was triggered under Article 6 of the Optional Protocol of the Convention on the Rights of Disabled People (CRDP). This was the first time an investigation into allegations of “grave and systematic violations” of CRDP rights had even taken place. Since then, following the precedent set by UK DDPOs, inquiries have taken place into allegations of breaches by Hungary and the EU and by the Spanish State.

The three articles of the CRDP which the special inquiry focused on are articles 19, 27 and 28.

The UK DDPO CRPD Monitoring Coalition co-ordinates written and oral evidence from UK DDPOs for examinations and inquiries by the UN Committee on the Rights of Disabled People.

The UK DDPO written submission to the inquiry can be found here: https://www.inclusionlondon.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/UK-DDPO-CRDP-Special-Inquiry-Shadow-Report-final.docx

The deadline for written submissions to the inquiry was midnight on 1 August 2023. The report states that the UK government asked for postponement on 26 July 2023.

The special inquiry oral evidence session in August which heard from UK DDPOs as well as representatives from the equality and human rights commissions of the four nations can be seen here: https://webtv.un.org/en/asset/k1o/k1o8b7239p

The UK government’s evidence to the Committee can be seen here: https://webtv.un.org/en/asset/k1s/k1svtljvtr

Media reporting linked to the government’s welfare reforms plans has been found to be inaccurate and to incite hostility against disabled benefit claimants. For example: the Information Commissioners Office (ICO) ruled that it has upheld a complaint against the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) in relation to media reports that appeared to be aimed at ‘stirring up hostility’ towards disabled people claiming benefit; the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO) recently upheld complaints against The Telegraph for inaccurate and misleading articles about disability benefit entitlements that gave a false impression about eligibility and the generosity of the social security system.

For full quotes from all DDPO and trade union representatives received please see: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-XkQNo2tXgRTQGARgtcpmF7m0qkDXJx5iuaEbstVdlo/edit?usp=sharing

Deaf and Disabled People to witness United Nations scrutiny of UK Government’s human rights record

UNCRPD No Responses »

Mar 182024

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Deaf and Disabled People to witness United Nations scrutiny of UK Government’s human rights record

On Monday 18 March Deaf and Disabled campaigners and trade unionists from across the UK will gather in Geneva to watch the UK governments give evidence to the United Nations. The public session is part of a follow-up to the special inquiry undertaken by the UN Committee for the Convention on the Rights of Disabled People. The special inquiry report published in 2016 found the UK guilty of grave and systematic violations of Disabled people’s rights due to austerity and welfare reform measures.

Deaf and Disabled People’s Organisations gave their evidence to the Committee for its follow-up in August 2023 along with equality and human rights commissions from the four nations. The government did not attend, stating it was not ready and would instead appear before the Committee at its following session in March 2024.

The Committee’s scrutiny of the government’s human rights record is a rare opportunity to expose the worsening inequalities and injustice experienced by disabled people in the UK.

Linda Burnip, co-founder of Disabled People Against Cuts who triggered the special inquiry, said:

“The UK government’s failure to turn up in August showed the utter contempt they have, not only for Deaf and Disabled people but also for the UN Disability Committee. At this stage we’re not even sure if they will turn up on Monday. The last written report they sent to the Committee was in December 2022.

“The Convention holds great importance for us because it sets out a vision of full equality and inclusion. The Government’s record on disability since 2010 is of great international concern because they have so deliberately and flagrantly driven the UK backwards in terms of its treatment of Deaf and Disabled people with the Department for Work and Pensions leading the charge in callousness and sheer brutality.”

The special inquiry focuses on three specific areas: social security, employment and community living.

Burnip added:

“There have been massive cuts to Local Authority budgets, a failure to implement the appeals process in the Care Act 2014, and a massive increase in charges for social care with only one increase in the amount of money Disabled people should be left to live off in 9 years. This is leaving more and more Disabled people trapped not just in poverty but also in their homes without the support they need to take part in the community or stay in contact with family and friends.”

A consultation held to inform a report from disability organisations to the UN submitted at the end of March 2022 found that overwhelmingly Deaf and Disabled people across England had experienced life as getting worse since 2017.

Alongside continuing deterioration in living standards, incomes and community inclusion, respondents cited difficulties arising from EU withdrawal and the pandemic leading to a recruitment crisis in social care among other issues.

Worsening attitudes towards Deaf and Disabled people and a devaluation of the worth of our lives was also a common theme, sparked by denial of life saving treatment to Disabled patients and political and public debate blaming the “clinically vulnerable” for adverse economic impacts linked to lockdown.

One consultant respondent expressed their view that: “What unsettles me is that we have a government who would gladly drop help to those of us who are disabled while they are in power.”

Another said: “It feels like people hate you more than they did before.”

In the past year alone, several further regressive policies affecting large numbers of Disabled people across the UK have been announced alongside inadequate measures to mitigate the impacts of the cost of living crisis.

Transforming Support: the health and disability white paper published in March 2023 plans to cut benefits to around 632,000 Disabled people who have been unable to earn a living through paid employment.

Under the same plans all Disabled people, no matter how severely Disabled, will potentially be liable to having their benefits stopped if they don’t engage in activity to find work.

At the moment, medically qualified professionals are required to determine a person’s capability for work but the government wants to pass this responsibility onto already over-worked frontline work coaches to make judgement calls on what Disabled benefit claimants can and can’t do.

In November 2023, the government announced proposals to tighten the Work Capability Assessment which will cut benefits to an estimated 630,000 Disabled people.

Svetlana Kotova, Director of Campaigns and Justice for Inclusion London, who led on the 2022 report said:

“Deaf and Disabled people are very frightened about the planned changes to disability benefits.

“Half of all poverty in the UK is already linked to disability and new figures show a sharp increase in disability poverty even before the cost of living crisis. The recent budget announced an end to cost of living payments, despite the fact that Disabled people have been hardest hit by inflation.

“To then cut benefits to people with no realistic chance of employment through absolutely no fault of their own is inhumanly cruel and will undoubtedly lead to more benefit deaths.”

Ellen Clifford, co-ordinator for the UK Coalition who leads on UK-wide monitoring under the Convention said:

“Both of the main political parties in Westminster are competing over who can appear toughest on welfare. In the process, and with help from sections of the media, they are presenting an entirely skewed picture of the social security system.

Far from the record numbers of out of work benefit claimants the government claims, analysis shows that figures have remained fairly stable. However, we do know that disability prevalence is rising.

“A more responsible approach than disability denial would be to look into why that is happening. Instead, both parties are happy to punish Disabled people in order to get elected.

“All of this – the targeting of Disabled people to make budget savings when other choices could be made, and the unfounded rhetoric increasing hostility against Disabled people – is in direct contravention of the recommendations from the 2016 special inquiry. There is simply no credible way that the UK Government can defend itself against a charge of continuing, indeed worsening, grave and systematic violations of Disabled people’s rights”

For more information and access to case studies contact: Ellen Clifford 07505144371

The evidence session on March 18^th can be viewed live online from 2-3:30pm GMT.

The UK DDPO shadow report can be found here: crdp.org.uk

Notes for Editors

1) The UK-wide delegation includes members from: All Wales People First; Black Triangle; CWU; Disability Rights UK; Disability Wales; Disabled People Against Cuts; DPAC Deaf Group; DPAC Northern Ireland; DPAC Cambridgeshire & Essex; Equity; Inclusion London; Inclusion Scotland; Liberation; Manchester RAPAR; North West Disability Forum; Omnibus Partnership; PCS union; People First Scotland; Reclaiming Our Futures Alliance; TUC Disabled Workers’ Committee; Unite the Union.

2) The UN’s finding of grave and systematic rights violations was the result of a comprehensive investigation taking place over a number of years under the Convention on the Rights of Disabled People. The Committee reviewed thousands of pages of robustly evidence-based research and reports and met hundreds of people during their visit to the UK. The report and recommendations, published on 6 November 2016, were dismissed by the UK Government.

3) In 2017, the UK was publicly examined as part of routine monitoring procedures to which all signatories to the Convention on the Rights of Disabled People are subject. The findings were again damning with the Chair of the Committee stating that “social cuts had caused a human catastrophe”.

4) One of the 2017 recommendations was for the UK Government to report back to the Committee on its progress implementing the recommendations from the special inquiry. Three reports were submitted by the UK Government in December 2022.

5) Written reports submitted by Deaf and Disabled People’s Organisations in 2022 evidence the retrogression of Deaf and Disabled People’s rights. Key findings:

The situation for Disabled people got worse after 2017 when UN last looked at the UK’s progress.
Westminster Government has taken some positive steps, but they have not addressed key problems.
The COVID-19 pandemic response discriminated against Disabled people and violated our equal right to life
Disability equality and human rights approaches towards disability have been further undermined since 2017
There is insufficient monitoring and promotion of the CRDP by Westminster Government

6) 89% of respondents to the DDPO coalition consultation expressed the view that things have got worse, 9% that things have stayed the same and only 2% said they think things have got better.

7) While the UK Government’s cuts to benefits and services have profoundly negative impacts across the UK, the devolved administrations have responsibility for some areas of policy that are of key importance to disabled people and different approaches have been taken. Journalists with questions about the devolved nations can contact: Scotland: John McArdle 07379612778, Wales: Megan Thomas 07990 425823, Northern Ireland: Michael Lorimer 07528464350.

End Torture of Disabled People – meeting in Parliament Monday 11 December – please ask your MP to attend

News, UNCRPD 1 Response »

Dec 102023

Date: Monday, 11th December 2023

Time: 3pm – 5pm

Place: Grimond Room, Portcullis House, SW1A 2LW

British Sign Language Interpretation will be provided

Co-chairs: John McDonnell, MP & Navin Kikabhai, Chair, Alliance for Inclusive Education [ALLFIE]

Speakers: John Harris, journalist; Ellen Clifford, Disabled People Against Cuts and author of The War on Disabled People; Chelsea Hughes (mother of survivor); Mark Harrison, Reclaiming Our Futures Alliance; Maresa MacKeith, ALLFIE Youth Parliamentary Officer; Lucy Wing, ALLFIE Our Voice, Simone Aspis, Inclusion London Free Our People Network; Sanneke Fidler, Free Our People Network; Asha Nauth, Deaf Ethnic Women’s Association; Tracey Norton, WinVisible

All too frequently we hear in the media about scandals exposed in under-cover reporting revealing abuse and torture of disabled people perpetrated by staff within institutional settings. The public are rightly outraged by such incidences of cruelty and neglect. Investigations, safeguarding reviews and public inquiries follow, yet the lessons are never learned and the scandals keep coming. This is because behind the public exposés is a system that relies on abuse and neglect in order to make up funding short falls and to maximise shareholder profits. The government has missed successive targets for de-institutionalisation. Disabled people and their families are told that institutionalisation is the only option because there is no available support in the community.

A number of Deaf and Disabled People’s Organisations [DDPOs] and allies have come together to form a campaign to end the torture and abuse.

This meeting will hear from DDPOs and from individual survivors about why we need a campaign and will be a chance to discuss how we can take action to secure justice for disabled people subject to torture and abuse and to prevent further rights violations.

Hashtags: #JusticeNotProfit #EndTortureOfDisabledPeople

Directions and access information

Nearest accessible tube station is Westminster accessible from platform to street level Jubilee line

Buses 3, 11, 12, 24, 53, 87, 88, 149, 211, 453 all stop near Parliament/Portcullis House

Nearest train stations: London Charing Cross (Southeastern), Waterloo (South West trains)

UK Under the United Nations Spotlight – webinar 18 July

UNCRPD No Responses »

Jun 302023

Tuesday 18 July 2023

7 – 8pm

Online:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81570206769?pwd=RXNuUVd4YlJ0My9BTzczRHNvNkxEZz09

Meeting ID: 815 7020 6769
Passcode: 910122

This webinar organised by DPAC and other Deaf and Disabled People’s Organisations (DDPOs) will provide an update on activities that are happening to monitor Deaf and Disabled people’s rights in the UK under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Disabled People.

We will give feedback from the big consultation that our organisations carried out in 2021—22 into how far the major issues facing Deaf and Disabled people in the UK had changed since the last examination by the Disability Committee in 2017.

We will also provide information about the reporting that we are undertaking this Summer as the Disability Committee prepares for a special one day examination of the UK. This examination will focus specifically on the government’s progress implementing the recommendations from the Committee’s 2016 investigation which found evidence of grave and systematic violations of Deaf and Disabled people’s rights due to welfare reform and austerity measures.

Speakers: Linda Burnip (Disabled People Against Cuts), Ellen Clifford (UK DDPO CRDP Monitoring Coalition/Disabled People Against the Cuts)

United Nations Disability Event – 20 October – Watch live or on demand

UNCRPD No Responses »

Oct 132021

UN Disability Treaty Online Event

20 October 2021 6 – 7.30pm

Watch live or on demand via YouTube, Facebook and Twitter

BSL interpretation and speech to text

What is the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Disabled People (CRDP), why do we have it and how can Deaf and Disabled People’s Organisations (DDPOs) use it to advance our rights? – all these questions and more will be answered by our panel of experts as the UK gets ready to be examined again by the CRDP Committee.

Panel to include:

Gertrude Fefoame, current member of the CRDP Committee and Chair of both the Committee’s Working Group on Women and Girls with Disabilities and the Committee’s Task Force for developing a General comment about the right to work and employment (Article 27).
Catherinne Pedreros Puentes, from the CRDP Secretariat who has supported the CRPD Committee for 9 years as well as working with other UN Committees.
Tara Flood, UK disabled people’s rights campaigner, involved in drafting the CRDP in 2006.
Linda Burnip, who gave evidence to the CRDP Committee for their special investigation in 2015.

At the event, the England Shadow Report Project will also launch our call for evidence to feed into the next examination of the UK under the CRDP. Watch to find out how you can get involved.

@InclusionLondon

www.facebook.com/inclusionlondon/

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnzKmTH5r0MCiNWQmaajD6Q

Please note that for information about how to get involved in evidence gathering within Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland you should contact Disability Wales, Inclusion Scotland or Disability Action Northern Ireland.

Free Book Draw – The War on Disabled People

Access to Work, Bedroom tax, Benefits, charities, council cuts, Independent Living, Independent Living Fund ILF, local authority cuts, Maximus, Mental Health, Social Model, UNCRPD, Universal Credit, UNUM, WCA, welfare cuts, Welfare reforms No Responses »

May 262020

A picture of the front cover of the book titled: "The War on Disabled People: capitalism, welfare and the making of a human catastrophe by Ellen Clifford". Behind the text is the image of a man on crutches. The full background, including the image of the disabled man, is rendered in shades of red and black. The text is in white.

The War on Disabled People is now available to pre-order from Zed Books:

https://www.zedbooks.net/shop/book/the-war-on-disabled-people/forthcoming/

Zed are offering a discounted price but DPAC realises that the cost will still be beyond the reach of many people – not least because of the issues covered in the book.

We will be giving away a few free copies kindly donated by Zed to names pulled out of a hat on 15th June. To enter please email your name to mail@dpac.uk.net with ‘Book Draw’ in the subject line.

Very sadly the battle for accessible formats to be available is ongoing… watch this space.

ODI live streaming of Periodic examination of the UK by UN Disability Committee

News, Action, All Posts, UNCRPD 3 Responses »

Jul 272017

INVITATION: from the Office for Disability Issues

The UN Convention for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

Periodic examination live streaming.

The Office for Disability Issues would like to invite you to attend this event, where you will be able to watch the live streaming of the face to face dialogue between the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with a Disability (the Committee) and UK delegates.

Dates: 23^rd August 2017 12:00-17:00

24^th August 2017 8:45 -12:00

Address: Caxton House, Tothill Street, London, SW1H 9NA.

Places are strictly limited and will be on a ‘first come’ basis, and will be limited to one attendee per organisation (plus a support worker if required).

Please note that the UK’s examination is also available to live stream from a place of your convenience via the UN’s website.

Please do RSVP your place as soon as possible by completing the form below and sending it to the email address: UN.CRPDINBOX@DWP.GSI.GOV.UK.

We will let you know with a confirmation email if you have a reserved place on the day of your choice.

Lunch and refreshments will be provided. Please note that we are unable to cover the costs of travel, hotels or other related expenditure.

(If you do not wish to receive any further communications on the UK UNCRPD periodic examination please let us know.)

————————————————————–

Response to invitation

UNCRPD periodic live streaming

Caxton House, Tothill Street, London, SW1H 9NA

Receipt of this form will be taken as confirmation that you wish to attend.

Thank you for taking the time to let us know of any communication, access or dietary requirements.

Attendee information

Name:

Organisation:

Email:

Phone number:

Date you would like to attend.

………………………………………………………………………………

Communication or Access requirements

Please indicate any communication or access requirements below:

……………………………………………………………………………….

Do you require a support worker? Yes/No

Dietary requirements

Food will be provided at breakfast (24^th August only) and lunch time (on both dates). Please do indicate if you have any specific dietary requirements below.

Jacqui Wyatt | Office for Disability Issues | Department for Work & Pensions | Caxton House, Ground Floor, Tothill Street, London, SW1H 9NA, 0207 449 7779 ext 64779

Jacqui.wyatt@dwp.gsi.gov.uk

More on UN report -200 interviewees and 3,000 pages of evidence were all wrong.

News, Action, All Posts, UNCRPD 5 Responses »

Feb 142017

The Government has responded to the petition you signed – “Force the government to act on the eleven recommendations of the UNCRPD report”.

Government responded:

This Government engaged fully with the inquiry process. However, we strongly reject the findings and believe that the core intentions of many of the recommendations are already being fulfilled.

This Government engaged fully with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (the Convention) inquiry process. In their report, the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (the Committee) expressed appreciation for our support throughout the process, which included facilitating a visit to the UK and providing written evidence on numerous occasions.

On receipt of the report, we considered the findings alongside our own evidence. In making this comparison, it was clear that there were individual facts in the report that were incorrect. Additionally, the report failed to place the reforms investigated in the wider context of improvements made and the support available. For example, in discussing Article 27 ‘Work and Employment’, the report barely mentions the raft of work-related support available to disabled people and therefore presents a highly partial view.

The UK supported the development of the Convention and was among the first countries to sign it in 2007. Our approach to disability equality, which focuses on inclusion and mainstreaming (with additional support provided as necessary) and on involving disabled people in decision-making, is very much aligned with the Convention. The report itself recognised that “at a national level, it appears that the welfare system together with a social and health care system provide a solid base for the protection of the rights of persons with disabilities and that the system has allowed persons with disabilities to achieve an acceptable level of autonomy and
DWP E-Petitions Response independence”. It also recognised measures to reinforce choice and control in the UK through the increased personalisation and localisation of services.

This Government considered the recommendations made by the Committee. Many of the recommendations promote approaches and actions that we already take, such as actively engaging disabled people in policy design and delivery. Others promote actions that the UK Government has already identified as areas for improvement; the Government response sets out some of the work being done across the UK to ensure progress in these areas, such as increasing the accessibility of information and tackling negative attitudes towards disabled people. Several recommendations are prescriptive in nature, sighting specific methodologies that should be implemented. The UK is committed to meeting its obligations of progressing towards the full participation and inclusion of disabled people in all aspects of life on an equal basis. However, how we ensure this progression remains for the UK Government, and the wider parliament, to decide.

The UK is a strong parliamentary democracy, where the voices and opinions of disabled people are represented and listened to, and disabled people’s rights are respected, promoted and upheld. It is also a world leader in disability issues. We are proud of the work we do to support people with disabilities and health conditions, both domestically and abroad. And we believe that the core intentions of the recommendations are already incorporated into UK policies and practices, and delivered in a way that fits with the values and structures particular to the UK.

However, we do recognise that there is more to do to meet the Convention’s ambition of full participation and inclusion, and this Government is committed to continuing progress towards this. Taking employment as an example, our aspiration is for disabled people to get the same opportunities as others to find work while ensuring that people who cannot work because of a disability or health condition receive the support they need. That is why this Government is committed to, and working towards, halving the disability employment gap. The ‘Improving Lives’ Green Paper seeks views on how to ensure that health and welfare systems support people who can work with better opportunities to stay in employment, while protecting people who can’t work, with a view to meeting the Government’s ambition.

This Government champions work because of its power to transform people’s lives. We strongly believe that, though welfare provides necessary social protection, it is not the only way to help disabled people live independent, inclusive lives in which they can fulfil their potential. Implementing the Convention articles requires more than higher welfare payments. It requires society-wide shifts in attitudes and behaviours, innovative approaches to health provision, and concerted efforts to break down persistent barriers preventing disabled people from living independently, working, and enjoying full inclusion in their communities. This Government remains committed to working across government and sectors to ensure that these changes take place, supporting disabled people in the UK to fully participate in all aspects of life on an equal basis.

Department for Work and Pensions

Click this link to view the response online:

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/172393?reveal_response=yes

The Petitions Committee will take a look at this petition and its response. They can press the government for action and gather evidence. If this petition reaches 100,000 signatures, the Committee will consider it for a debate.

The Committee is made up of 11 MPs, from political parties in government and in opposition. It is entirely independent of the Government. Find out more about the Committee: https://petition.parliament.uk/help#petitions-committee

Thanks,
The Petitions team
UK Government and Parliament

TFL consultation: fewer Buses in Central London because we can all use the inaccessible tube

Action, All Posts, Disability Rights, News, transport, UNCRPD No Responses »

Nov 292016

Have your say on fewer buses and the need for more changes in central london

https://consultations.tfl.gov.uk/buses/west-end-bus-changes/

Transport for London are currently consulting on reducing the frequency of buses in Central London and changing the route, and terminus of others. This is bad news for disabled people due to the lack of alternative accessible transport options in the city.

Many journeys across London already require disabled people to change buses, however adjustments to the line of route, and shortening of the routes will make bus changes, and lengthy waits in the dark, cold and rain far more likely. Routes like 73 from Stoke Newington to Victoria and 390 Archway to Victoria are examples of routes that would be affected by these changes.

In particular, getting from Euston and Kings Cross to parts of London where there is no accessible tube service is a major issue and in zones 1 and 2 – much more difficult.

Transport for London are justifying this planned change as they claim more people are using the tube. This is not an option for disabled people as only 15% of Central London tube stations have step-free access and often not to all lines/directions. Central London stations which still do not have step-free access include numerous major hubs such as Bond Street, Oxford Circus, Leicester Square, Covent Garden, Tottenham Court Road, Vauxhall, Victoria, Euston, and Charring Cross.

Further, despite promises from TfL and the Mayor of London, that the closure of ticket offices would improve services for disabled travellers up to October 2016 the number of lifts being out of service due to staff shortages increased by a massive 118% compared to the previous year. In some cases lifts were closed for 20 hours.

TFL state in their consultation that the opening of the Elizabeth line (Crossrail) will reduce the need for buses. However, given the issues with acceptable levels of staffing at existing stations to provide lifts, and the fact that Crossrail will not be level from the platform to the train, requiring a bridging ramp, can disabled people trust that they will be able to access the new line’s services?

On top of all of that there are often planned closures of lifts for maintenance work lasting months and with no alternative usable tube stations nearby.

In most areas of central London Blue Badges cannot be used so disabled drivers are unable to park there. For those in work with a Motability vehicle who might need to travel into central London for work by taxi due to the lack of parking available this too is no longer an option as Access to Work will no longer provide taxis for those who have a Motability vehicle – not even so they can work.

At peak time, buses are often delayed due to traffic, or are so full that drivers refuse to allow wheelchair users onboard, meaning commutes are harder, longer and more arduous for disabled people.

These proposals risk causing disabled people more difficulties accessing the community, their places of work, and will reduce their ability to undertake leisure activities.

Important UN inquiry into care and support provision – respond by October 21st

Access to Work, Action, Disability Rights, ILF, News, UNCRPD 3 Responses »

Sep 272016

Please submit evidence to this enquiry by October 21^st if you use care and support or Personal Assistants or are a parent of someone who uses these services. It is important that individuals let the rapporteur know what has happened since the closure of the ILF both to new applicants in 2010 and to all in 2015 and due to the cuts to Local Authority funding.

https://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Disability/SRDisabilities/Pages/Provisionofsupporttopersonswithdisabilities.aspx

Questionnaire on the “provision of support to persons with disabilities” – Call for submissions

The Special Rapporteur on the rights of persons with disabilities, Ms. Catalina Devandas-Aguilar, is currently preparing a study, to be presented at the 34th session of the Human Rights Council in March 2017, on the provision of support to persons with disabilities.

The Special Rapporteur welcomes inputs, in accessible formats (Word), in English, French, Russian or Spanish, from Member States, international and regional organizations, UN agencies, funds and programmes, organizations of and for persons with disabilities, civil society, national human rights institutions and other national independent mechanisms designated or established to monitor the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, disability or equality Ombudspersons, scholars, research institutions and policy think tanks, private sector businesses and networks, community movements, and private individuals, to provide information on the provision of support to persons with disabilities.

Submissions should be sent by e-mail to the address sr.disability@ohchr.org no later than 21 October 2016. Concise responses are encouraged, inclusive of relevant attachments where available.

Kindly indicate if you have any objections with regard to your reply being posted on this website.

Questionnaire on the provision of support to persons with disabilities

Please provide information on the following services that are available for persons with disabilities in your country, including data on their coverage, geographic distribution and delivery arrangements, funding and sustainability, challenges and shortcoming in their implementation:
Personal assistance;
In-home, residential and community support;
Support in decision-making, including peer support; and
Communication support, including support for augmentative and alternative communication.

Please explain how persons with disabilities can access information about the existing services referred to in question one, including referral procedures, eligibility criteria and application requirements.

Please elaborate on how these services respond to the specific needs of persons with disabilities throughout their life cycle (infancy, childhood, adolescence, adulthood and older age) and how is service delivery ensured in the transition periods between life cycle stages.

Please provide information on the number of certified sign language interpreters and deafblind interpreters available in your country.

Please provide information on the existence of any partnership between State institutions and private service providers (e.g., non-governmental organizations, for-profit service providers) for the provision of support to persons with disabilities.

Please describe to what extent and how are persons with disabilities and their representative organizations involved in the design, planning, implementation and evaluation of support services.

Please provide any other relevant information and statistics (including surveys, censuses, administrative data, reports, and studies) related to the provision of support to persons with disabilities in your country.

So DPAC triggered the UNCRPD inquiry but what does it really mean?

All Posts, UNCRPD 16 Responses »

Sep 082015

We have received lots of emails from the UK, Europe and internationally asking us about the UNCRPD inquiry what it really means and what DPAC actually did. We set out the main questions and answers below:

What is the UNCRPD?

UNCRPD stands for the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. The Convention includes a set of Articles or points on the rights of disabled people. You can see the full text HERE

The Westminster Parliament signed up to respect those rights included in the convention, they also ratified the Optional Protocol 8^th June 2009. The Optional Protocol is a very important route for people to challenge any violation of rights by governments or authorities against the UNCRPD

What does the UK ratifying the UNCRPD Optional Protocol mean?

It means that the UK (state party) accepted the competence of the UNCRPD committee to conduct inquiries into the violation of the articles of the UNCRPD. So while anyone in any country can challenge governments through the UNCRPD –an inquiry by the UNCRPD committee can only be conducted under the Optional Protocol and only if that country (or state party) has ratified it. DPAC used the Optional Protocol to initiate the current inquiry into the UK because we saw violations of the rights enshrined in the UNCRPD and that disabled peoples’ rights were going backwards (retrogression of rights)

How was the inquiry initiated?

DPAC initiated the UNCRPD Inquiry using Article 6 of the Optional Protocol meaning that a formal process was carried out by DPAC to submit complaints and submissions. This process meant that documents needed to be written in a particular way with attention to specific Articles within the UNCRPD and that strong evidence needed to be framed accordingly. The use of the UNCRPD Optional Protocol is always a formal process with strict guidelines. It’s not something that people can do by accident or by sending through lists of media articles.

Is the UK inquiry really the first of its kind ever?

Yes, it is the first of its kind against a state party through Article 6 of the Optional Protocol, although inquiries have been conducted for individual complaints previously in other countries this is the first to be against a state party for grave and systematic violations. Also it’s useful to note that individual complaints to the UNCRPD must have first exhausted all domestic channels. That is they need to have exhausted the countries court mechanisms before making a complaint to the UNCRPD.

When did DPAC start doing this?

DPAC first contacted the UNCRPD in 2012. DPAC made it first submission to the UNCRPD committee in 2013 to attempt to initiate the process of inquiry, since then we have been providing further reports and submissions. We had to prove to the committee that there were grave (severe) and systematic (continuous and built into system of welfare ‘reform’ policies) violations (breaking) of rights enshrined in the UNCRPD. We also had to provide strong evidence of retrogression for the inquiry process to happen.

Does the government know about the inquiry?

Yes, they were given official notice of the inquiry in January 2014. They had also made their own submissions to the inquiry process attacking evidence that DPAC had put forward from 2013. However, the UNCRPD committee accepted DPAC’s evidence which is why the inquiry is happening. The devolved governments of Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales are also aware. However the most punitive policies come from Westminster and the Westminster government. The UK as a whole is treated as a state party under the UNCRPD

Who wrote the submissions and produced the evidence for the inquiry?

Three of us wrote the submissions: Debbie Jolly, Linda Burnip and Anita Bellows. We are grateful for the additional input and guidance of Nick Dilworth, Louise Whitfield, Dr David Webster and a person who wishes to remain anonymous who provided excellent admin and other support throughout.

Why didn’t DPAC tell people about the UNCRPD inquiry sooner?

We were told we must keep everything confidential or the inquiry would be halted. We didn’t want that to happen because we knew the inquiry was needed. It was only after the Scottish Herald produced the full details that we decided we needed to step in to stop some of the misconceptions and misunderstandings that were starting around the inquiry.

Early Press stories said that it was the Just Fair report that started the inquiry…

DPAC had also submitted evidence to the 2014 Just Fair report. But this report dealt with a different convention which was the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) People that submit reports under other conventions do not automatically somehow initiate an inquiry-it was quoted in early press pieces that the Just Fair report had somehow kick started an Inquiry by the UNCRPD. But this kind of thing just does not happen if you write a report on one convention ( there are several), it doesn’t suddenly set off a process on another Convention such as the CRPD or any other, despite its wealth of evidence or importance-formal processes need to be followed to initiate an inquiry, as we said earlier.

The Daily Mail has been attacking the inquiry process and says the UNCRPD people are meddling…

What else can we expect from the Mail? As we said the government have been aware of this process since 2013 so the inquiry is no surprise to them. The UK signed up to the UNCRPD and is therefore bound by its contents. There are processes and procedures that the UNCRPD committee must follow and that the government must follow which result in official procedural cooperation between the two. We also saw with the 2013 visit from Raquel Rolink (on the ‘bedroom tax’) that the Mail quoted MPs who said she had come uninvited to ‘interfere’ along with some more colourful accusations against her- again because of international procedures and protocols no person from any UN committee can come to the UK without government knowledge or acceptance first-again the Mail lied and inflamed the proper process of accountability.

Lots of people have written, blogged and raised the issues facing disabled people don’t they deserve credit?

Of course, lots of people have been fighting in lots of different ways and everyone deserves credit for raising the issues consistently-it’s something we must all keep doing

What does DPAC think will be gained through the inquiry?

Because it’s the first of its kind we can’t say –unfortunately we don’t think that things will suddenly return to the way they were in 2009. We don’t want people to think that the inquiry will solve everything because that would be creating false hope. We need to be realistic but also positive-what is happening is that the Conservatives are finally being held to account for their actions

We also hope that the publication and knowledge of the inquiry will aid other countries affected by austerity/ low levels of support to disabled people and the widespread disproportionate impacts on disabled people’s human rights.

We hope it will be of use in bringing other Governments (State Parties) to account through the use of the UNCRPD Optional Protocol. We would like it to provide hope and assistance to active grassroots organisations, where traditional disability organisations and big disability charities fail to act for fear of Government reprisals and/or funding cuts.

DPAC refuses any funds that limit our independence and we always will-we will also fight this and any other government where they destroy disabled peoples’ rights through punitive cuts, policies or actions

The battle for independent living and political hypocrisy

Action, All Posts, ILF, Independent Living, Independent Living Fund ILF, Politics, UNCRPD, welfare cuts, Who2Vote4? No Responses »

Jan 282015

While Labour profess to support fully the right to live independently for disabled people we are now in a situation following plans to close the Independent Living Fund where England is left as the only UK country which will not have it’s own form of a fund to continue to support the additional funding requirements of those who have high support needs.

For any political party to say they want disabled people to have the same rights, choices and chances as any other citizen rings hollow without a commitment to keep in place even if on a temporary basis the funding necessary for this to happen.

The Labour Party’s official response to many people who have contacted them with regard to supporting keeping the ILF open has outlined a number of points which we would like to address.

1) The “inconsistencies” in delivery which you mention were the result of unequal take up between different local authorities and was symptomatic of the failings of local authority administered social care support. As a national model of service delivery the ILF is far more successful and cost effective than local authority administered social care. The latest ILF annual report records a user satisfaction rating of 97%. Overheads for the ILF come in at just 2 % of the budget in comparison with an average of 16% for local authorities. It is in fact a model of service delivery that should be built upon rather than shut down. We understand that provisions in the Care Act are aimed at reducing inconsistencies between local authorities, nevertheless the inconsistencies you cite as a problem of the ILF are many times worse in the current system upon which ILF users will now be solely reliant as a result of the closure.

2) You also state that ‘ we understand the Fund is already being wound down, and staff numbers are already reducing’. This maybe correct but it is equally the case that there is very little being done in terms of winding down the ILF that could not very quickly be undone, even after actual closure of the ILF. This information has been provided by ILF staff and a former strategic director at ILF and has been shared with Labour’s shadow DWP team by PCS union and others. This means that if a Labour government were to be elected in May 2015 it will very much be Labour’s decision to go ahead with closure in June.

3) In turn that brings us onto the fact that should Labour be elected to government next May it is they who will be in power and responsible for the UK’s failure to protect disabled people’s human rights under the UNCRPD, and it is they who will be deemed responsible for the continuing grave and systematic violation of those rights when the UN investigation into the UK takes place after the election. We believe this would cause unnecessary and easily avoidable embarrassment to a newly elected labour government with international repercussions.

Whilst we welcome Labour’s goal of trying to ensure in the longer term that those currently supported by the Independent Living Fund can realise rights to live independently and with dignity, the ‘whole person care’ through which Labour intends to deliver on this goal is at this stage only a proposal and any benefits resulting from it are a long way off. Moreover, as respected experts in the field such as Professor Pat Thane have pointed out, the current system is simply not functioning at the necessary level. Relying on the integration of health and social care as a solution to the crisis in social care is thus an irresponsible gamble to take with people’s lives.

Since the closure to new applicants in December 2010 disabled people who missed out on the ILF have suffered dramatically worse outcomes than existing ILF recipients with equivalent support needs. We have provided Kate Green with a number of case studies showing the reality of independent living for disabled people who would have been eligible for ILF but are now only receiving LA social care support. We are not just talking about disabled people no longer being able to go to work, or ever have a holiday or go to university, we are talking about people unable to leave their homes, left without access to food or water, unable to wash more than a couple of times per week.

Whilst the intention of issuing guidelines to local authorities is well meaning, it is unrealistic within the current climate to see these securing the futures of existing ILF recipients. Cash strapped local authorities are very aware of the dangers of setting precedents for providing levels and types of social care support to some individuals and not for others. An LA could easily consider itself to have more to risk by following than not following the guidelines. In order to ensure equity between all adult service users they may well feel they have no choice but to level down.

In the short term we are asking that the ILF be retained as the only way to realistically guarantee protection for existing recipients. Disabled people are aware that this is not a big ask: the ILF represents a relatively small amount of money; the ILF will not be wound down beyond easy repair before May 2015.

The alternative is that disabled people’s right to independent living will be wiped out, potentially for generations. Once a people lose choice and control over their lives, disempowerment sets in and rights that have been smashed aside over-night can only be won back over a long and hard road.

As it stands, if Labour are elected in May 2015, the final nail in the coffin of disabled people’s right to independent living as it currently exists will be hammered in under a Labour government. It does not have to be like this. The Labour Party has a golden opportunity to make a principled stand in support of disabled people and our rights to equality, inclusion and equality by supporting the continuation of ILF. Disabled people are mobilizing and campaigning across the UK, through initiatives like Operation Disabled Vote. A principled stand by Labour on the ILF ahead of the General Election would be welcomed by the 12.2 million disabled people in the UK, our families, friends and supporters.

What you can do to help

We’re therefore asking people to email or tweet to Labour to say that England must not be the only UK country without an Independent Living Fund and that we know and have shown them the evidence that it is not too late to keep an ILF in England as well as in other UK countries. If Labour want disabled people’s votes then they must give an assurance that in the short term at least they will keep the ILF open until such time as something better can be put in place.

You can email Iain McNicoll, general secretary of the Labour Party at onenationpolitics@labour.org.uk

Ed Miliband at ed.miliband.mp@parliament.uk

And Kate Green at kate.green.2^nd@parliament.uk

Or you can tweet them @IainMcnicol

@ed_miliband

@kategreenSU

Please also contact your Prospective Parliamentary Candidates and let us know what replies you get.

Jan 032015

Different forms of Government Propaganda began and ended the year. We saw delays, backlogs, more cuts, more campaigns and direct actions. We reproduce some of the DPAC actions, research and call outs from 2014. Highlights included the Westminster Abbey Occupation against the closure of ILF as part of the #saveilf campaign, lowlights included the court case that arrived at the decision that Penning had taken appropriate process into account by saying that ILF users could be entitled to less under local authorities. Chaos with the DWP, PIP, ESA was compounded by misinformation, dodgy stats , backlogs and increasing sanctions. The brilliant Hammersmith and Fulham Coalition against Cuts achieved the abolition of ‘care’ charges by their local authority-proving it can be done. Esther McVey was awarded Scrooge of the year. DPAC was threatened with legal action for our support of the Anthony Kletzander campaign -in response we increased the campaign, and the relationship in the propaganda against disabled people between the DWP and the Mail was finally exposed

News that the UNCRPD Committee had initiated its first ever inquiry into grave and systematic violations of the UN Convention against the UK identified how far our disability rights and independent living had been eroded by the Coalition-although the Mail didnt seem to like it much

Our constant court cases against the DWP continued, and we have more lined up for this year too- yes, we could be talking to you Motability!

We look forward to 2015 and a change in the regime that has seen the poor grow poorer, while the richest grew richer. A year in which we launch Who2vote4? and the DPAC revenge tour. We will continue to fight for #saveilf with an event on 6^th Jan at the House of Commons and an online twitter event.

For an excellent review of the fight against cuts from 2010-2014 please download From Cuts to Resistance and if you want a count down to the election , then the DPAC downloadable calender can help

Here’s to a better year in 2015 with thanks to all our members and supporters. Keep up with news in 2015 by subscribing to posts through our website www.dpac.uk.net or follow us on twitter @Dis_ppl_protest

Some selected actions of DPAC in 2014

January saw the posting of a call for those who were waiting for PIP due to backlogs. This post has received over 40,000 views,shares and many comments. The situation has now been described as a backlog that , at the current rate , could take 42 years to clear. For those claiming ‘reforms’ are working have a look to see that they are not: https://dpac.uk.net/2014/01/have-you-waited-months-for-a-pip-assessment/ and let’s not forget the backlog in ESA either-in short complete chaos for disabled people.

In ‘Austerity Street: the real impacts’ we reproduced some of the stories we had received from those left without cash and homes via sanctions, delays and backlogs. This was in response to Love Production’s poverty porn , Benefits Street, part of the media’s continued demonization regime -the campaign incorporated a twitter fest against the format of biased programming. We supported our partners in Canada Sudbury Coalition Against Poverty (SCAP) and Ontario Coalition Aginst Poverty (OCAP). In an international campaign against increasing homelessness. Austerity is global. We supported Boycott workfare against CAPITA cashing in on poverty.

Through the excellent work of Nick Dilworth we exposed more BBC media double dealing and the fact that they weren’t publicizing the 88% success rates of those claiming ESA and asked ‘Are the DWP failing apart at every level? When a freedom of information response incorrectly claimed that PIP was subjected to sanctions. In another they claimed that the cap would be cut for those without children, both were incorrect. With Inclusion London we campaigned against the Care Act’s exclusion of ‘independent living’ and DPAC also joined Hands off London Transport against ticket office closures, as well as regional Rail protests

February We joined the many direct actions against the removal of legal aid. Raquel Rolnik ‘s report on the bedroom tax is published and recommends immediate suspension of the bedroom tax. The Government’s response is to accuse her of giving sacrifices to Marx and telling her to ‘sort out her own country’. We republish the excellent ‘Why the rise of UKIP is dangerous for disabled people’ and receive the usual abuse from Kippers proving the point. DPAC, Black Triangle and Wow publish a joint statement on Atos exit strategy , calling again for an end to the WCA. We expose how 9 out of 10 sanctions are dismissed when challenged

March More direct actions against proposed cuts in legal aid for judicial review.We publish ‘Punching Holes in Austerity’ an insightful analysis of DPAC and direct actions. DPAC supports #stopchanges2A2W against punitive changes in Access to Work. We publish an update on Anthony Kletzander and questions for HSE in Ireland with ENIL , a story of human rights abuse in Dublin, Ireland, a stand that we would later find invoked a threat of legal action against one of our co-founders.

DPAC joins protests against DWP and ATOS country wide. Protests that were reminiscent of the very first DPAC protests against Atos carried out by DPAC from 2011 onwards, culminating in the 2012 DPAC Atos games that saw Atos tarnished forever. DPAC leads direct actions and online protests against the despised disability Con-fident, leading to the highest number of tweets and retweets ever, exposing the scheme as no more than a Government gloss while they were cutting access to work and removing the means for disabled people to work. We produce a critical analysis of Pennings impact assessment regarding ILF. We reproduce the piece by John Pring asking ‘Where was your MP during the Wow Debate’

April The brilliant Ellen Clifford travels to Canada to embark on a successful speaking tour with raise the rates. We hold a well attended DPAC Grassroots Fightback conference. DPAC, Inclusion London, Equal Lives and the Greater Manchester Coalition of Disabled People promote the #saveilf postcard campaign. Top Corrie stars support the postcard campaign to #saveilf. DPAC supports Lifeworks and protests against cuts to mental health support. DPAC gives its response to Labour on reform of WCA

May DPAC releases its research documents for download. DPAC and ILF users block the DWP in protest. We learn that disabled students allowances are now under threat of cuts. DPAC publishes a powerful piece by one of our readers that sums up many peoples’ feelings: ‘I’ll never forgive or forget what this Government has done to me and thousands of others‘. We pay homage to the strength of Quiet Riot, celebrate the #dpactour and the success of the Freedom Riders.

June The Independent Living Fund’s Birthday protest happens in June with lots of action outside the DWP. We see JSA benefit sanctions sky rocket under the coalition Government. More actions happen to fight the bedroom tax.

We publish a piece by Angela 28 on how ‘care’ support has been threatened and why that threatens independent living and rights– legal representation was found for many people, but we were aware that this was happening to many more people through emails to dpac mail. Unlike some organisations we attempt to challenge these instances and reject the rhetoric that there is more ‘choice and control’ for disabled people.

At the end of June DPAC with UKUNCUT, and Occupy carry out a daring occupation of Westminster Abbey , after months of planning to highlight the #saveilf campaign. There were 3 police to every protester , and while we had no support from the dear old church , messages of support and publicity poured in

July We publish a joint statement in response to the Work and Pensions Committee on the WCA from DPAC, Black Triangle, the Mental Health Resistance Network, Pats petition, Wow and New Approach in which we again say the WCA should be scrapped.

An ILF user makes a plea to Disability Rights UK (DRUK) on ILF after he was denied the right to speak at their independent living conference. DRUK did not feel the need to offer any response. In Disability Rights UK : independent Living or new visions in Neo-Liberalism we ask why the DRUK ‘independent living ‘ conference was sponsored by an organisation running institutions, segregated schooling and ‘hospitals for those with mental health issues. We also launched a highly successful twitter campaign asking the same questions, again DRUK did not feel they owed disabled people any response to this outrage.

DPAC highlights more chaos at the DWP on appeals and sanctions. John McDonnell launches an Early Day Motion to #saveilf. Positive updates and actions on the WCA court case regarding mental health claimants by the Mental Health Resistance Network. We ask that people write to IDS to raise issues happening regarding mental health.

August Rethink calls people with mental health issues a ‘disease burden’ Mental Health Resistance Network respond to the outrage. We call for a stop to discrimination for those transferring from DLA to PIP who do not get backdated payments. DPAC continues to support anti-fracking protests with Reclaim the power.

We republish the excellent Nick Dilworth’s piece on how the media are ignoring what’s happening to disabled people https://dpac.uk.net/2014/08/a-national-scandal-4-million-people-face-chaos-in-this-country-and-are-ignored-by-the-media/

ILF user John Kelly speaks to BBC on the impacts of the potential loss of ILF. We ask what happens when ILF funds are not ring fenced to local authorities

September sees a national day of Protest against sanctions, bedroom tax and benefit caps.

The fantastic Brian Hilton produces a set of pics for party conference season on #saveilf. DPAC crash the Tory Party Conference via a successful tweet attack and in person. We do the same to Labour.

We publish The Great Farago: UKIP sleight of hand and receive more abuse from Kippers, Richard Howitt Labour MEP quotes the piece and receives even more abuse.

New short film launched with the Daily Mirror on ILF.

The first inkling that the DWP are wrongly asking those in the ESA support group to attend work focused interviews comes to our notice.

DPAC is threatened with legal action for supporting Anthony Kletzander and publicising the abuse of his human rights in Ireland, our response is to publish an interview with Anthony’s parents on the injustice Anthony and his family have endured.

October We reblog the excellent Johnny Void piece on the boss of Maximus https://dpac.uk.net/2014/10/meet-richard-a-montoni-the-five-million-dollar-maximus-boss-here-to-fleece-the-uks-benefits-system/.

We publish an open letter to Freud who declared that disabled people can work for less than minimum wage. DPAC and Occupy pay another visit to the DWP Caxton House building for ‘Freud must go!’ protest

In Secrets and Lies :maximus the new leader of the inhumans we ask why Disability Rights UK have agreed to a) be part of the Maximus testing process on the WCA and b) why they’ve teamed up with Unum and other insurance companies to develop a TV program showing how much better off disabled people will be if they take out private insurance- with user-led disability organisations like these we dont need enemies.

ILF users return to court to challenge the DWP on ILF. A successful #saveilf vigil happens with road blocks, many messages of support and some great pics.

Welfare assistance fund is next under threat of closure. Campaign to save it is launched.

November The Final Litchfield Review shows that the WCA should be scrapped.

One of our favourite reports of the year : IDS is chased around a building to drown out shouts of murderer at Ipswich- congratulations to the local dpac group for that one!

We ask people to come forward to launch a legal challenge on cuts to the disabled student allowance

£86 million goes missing from Pudsley’s children in need account BBC to blame for mislaying -complainants are actually advised to write to Pudsley via his BBC email

DWP increase attacks on disabled benefit recipients with claims they can harress them off benefits. We put out an urgent call-out https://dpac.uk.net/2014/11/urgent-people-awaiting-wca-assessments-particularly-in-birmingham-please-read/

Work Providers A4E are exposed again in relation to ESA and workfare. The Rev Paul Nicolson wins in court against council tax. Class War’s continuing protests against ‘poor doors’ get to the authorities who make arrests- and Boris is burnt. Meanwhile DPAC discovers Motability’s sneaky backdoor changes to individuals needing to be in work to qualify for support https://dpac.uk.net/2014/11/motability-and-the-deserving-and-undeserving-charity-not-rights/

December ILF users lose court case on ILF but its not over.

DPAC launches an Open letter to Ed, Kate and Rachel on ILF– we’re still waiting for a response

Hammersmith and Fulham abolish home ‘care’ charges, showing it can be done. Congratulations for a great campaign to the excellent Kevin Caulfield and Debbie Domb and all at Hammersmith and Fulham Coalition against Cuts

Esther McVey is named scrooge of the year, which we though was a little too kind to the creature

Unsurprisingly the Work and Pensions report slammed the Government ‘mismanagament of Access to Work – the stop the changes to Access to Work campaign continues.

Questions are asked on the Government costs in fighting against disabled peoples’equality

The link between the DWP and the Mail propaganda is finally nailed and exposed as the DWP is caught out https://dpac.uk.net/2014/12/dwp-caught-giving-disability-propaganda-to-daily-mail/

#saveilf Open Letter to Ed Miliband, Rachel Reeves and Kate Green

Action, All Posts, council cuts, Disability Rights, Independent Living, Independent Living Fund ILF, legal challenges, local authority cuts, Mental Health, Social Model, UNCRPD, welfare cuts, Who2Vote4? 5 Responses »

Dec 102014

Please Help Us. Save Our Independent Living Fund

We, disabled people, family, friends, supporters and allies, are asking for your help. We are asking you to pledge to keep the Independent Living Fund open to existing applicants, pending a review of Independent Living for all disabled people.

As you may know, on the 8th of December at the High Court, a ruling was given against our challenge to the closure of the ILF [1], and we were not given leave to appeal.

The closure of the ILF effectively signals the end of the right to independent living for disabled people in the UK. Whilst never perfect the ILF represents a model of support that has enabled thousands of disabled people to enjoy meaningfully lives and to contribute to society as equal citizens.

Since the closure of the Fund to new applicants in December 2010 we have seen disabled people left with their most basic needs unmet and unable to seek employment, to volunteer or go into education or simply even to leave the house.

But we have vowed to fight on against the ILF closure, disabled people will not be pushed back into the margins of society, we will not go back into the institutions, our place is in the community alongside our family and friends and neighbours and we are fighting to stay.

We ask you to imagine what it will be like, for people who have been enabled to live a full life, be with friends and family, go out, work, study and enjoy recreation, to have all that taken away, and find themselves trapped inside, all day, every day, with choices over what they do, when and how, removed.

To severely disabled people the Independent Living Fund represents the difference between having an existence, and having a life.

Please Ed, keep our Independent Living Fund open. Keep Our Lives Open. It means the world to us.

References

[1] https://dpac.uk.net/2014/12/disabled-people-vow-to-continue-the-fight-to-save-

to sign as an organisation or individual please go to

https://docs.google.com/document/d/11ZpbvcgSdYeOciEj9NZtnHFaI-3gGzMvRKLX4RblGTs/edit

or email: mail@dpac.uk.net

deadline for all signatures is 12pm Tues 16th Jan

Background: The Government won a case in the Royal Courts of Justice on Monday 8th December, which made their decision to close the ILF – Independent Living Fund – lawful; and this closure will now go ahead on 30th June next year.

Unless, of course the families, friends, supporters and others stand in solidarity with ILF Users campaign to Save the ILF, and together apply the sort of political power which changes minds and policy. You can do that today by signing the Open Letter to Ed Miliband (full text below), asking him, that should he become Prime Minister in May’s General Election, to keep the Fund open while ordering an independent review into the benefits of a model such as the ILF.

We know that many disabled people will lose some or all of their support, isolating people in their homes – at best. For many more, being institutionalised in residential homes is once again a grim reality. To save on average just over £300 per person. Don’t let this happen. Stand in support with ILF Users in this action, and the many more on-going & to come

Government’s Legal Costs for Fighting against Disabled Peoples Equality?

Action, All Posts, Bedroom tax, Disability Rights, ILF, Independent Living, Independent Living Fund ILF, legal challenges, local authority cuts, Politics, UNCRPD, welfare cuts, write to your local councillor, Write to your MP 4 Responses »

Dec 092014

John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab): What legal costs his Department has incurred in legal proceedings involving disabled people relating to the under-occupancy penalty and the closure of the independent living fund. [906481]

The Minister for Disabled People (Mr Mark Harper): The Government have robustly defended their policies in relation to the closure of the independent living fund and the removal of the spare room subsidy. The total known legal costs to date, in respect of both policies where disability formed part of the grounds of the claim, are £415,000: £236,000 for the ILF and £178,000 for the removal of the spare room subsidy.

John Healey: That is a part answer to a very direct question about the cost to the taxpayers of Government lawyers defending the indefensible—axing the ILF and introducing the hated bedroom tax. Will the Minister not recognise that many severely disabled people flourish with the fund but are now frightened of losing their independence when he shuts it down next year? He might have won the legal case this year, but he has lost the moral and policy arguments, so even at this 11th hour will he rethink the protection available to ILF users?

Mr Harper: No, I will not. I have talked to disability organisations about this matter, and they agree with the Government. More than 1 million people get social care through the mainstream social care system. The Government are not making any savings by moving the ILF to local authorities and devolved Administrations, and we are working closely with each local authority to ensure that the amount of money being transferred at the point of closure next year will be exactly what is needed and what is being spent by the ILF, meaning that disabled people will be protected.

Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab): Some £4.3 billion has been taken out of adult social care budgets over the past four years because of the Government’s cuts. If that funding transfers across, as is planned, it will plug only a very small part of the gap. If they will not rethink this policy, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey) just suggested, will Ministers require that the funding be ring-fenced to ensure that 70 people in Salford and 18,000 people across the country with disabilities can look forward to keeping their independence and to this continuing support?

Mr Harper: Of course local government has had to play its part in the savings, but local authorities can make choices. My local authority in Gloucestershire has protected the value of social care because it thinks that protecting older people—[Interruption.] No, my local authority has faced cuts, like all local authorities, but it has chosen to—[Interruption.] If Opposition Members want me to answer their hon. Friend’s question, they should stop yelling. My local authority has prioritised funding for older people and people of working age. Clearly, the hon. Lady’s local authority has made different decisions. If those on her local authority want to ring-fence the money transferred from the ILF, they are absolutely free to do so, so I suggest she take that up with them.

8 Dec 2014 : Column 632

We want to thank John Healey MP for raising these questions

But other questions arise: which disability organisations did Harper speak to and why did they agree with the Government that closing ILF was a good thing for disabled people with high support needs and their employees? Did Harper speak to ILF users?

Watch this space……

Happy (Almost) Birthday DPAC!

All Posts, Atos, BBC, Bedroom tax, Disability Activism, Disability History, Disability Rights, DPAC Reclaiming Our Futures Action, Events, News, Social Model, UNCRPD, welfare cuts No Responses »

Sep 272014

First ever protest at Tory conference Oct 2010 under the name of Disabled Peoples’ Protest, before the name Disabled People against Cuts (DPAC) was chosen.

see links

Disabled People make History

First call out for first protest

The British Library began archiving the DPAC site from 2011 so know that all on this site will stand as an historical testament of this governments actions towards disabled people and what they are doing to the lives of millions-we will not give up fighting!

See Kate Belgrave’s excellent piece on DPAC’s recent Westminster Abbey protest

Browse the DPAC archives and DPAC on Flickr for more DPAC actions over the years

see local DPAC contact and facebook groups HERE

Happy Birthday DPAC and thanks to all who have helped make DPAC what it is

Sign and Share the petition to support #anthonykletzander

Action, All Posts, News, UNCRPD No Responses »

Sep 162014

Sign petition by clicking here

Wording of petition

Enda Kenny and HSE stop the human rights abuse of Anthony Kletzander in Ireland

Anthony was an active member of our local community and well known by the people in Raheny. He was actively involved in his local church, library, and a gym member for years. He attended university, dined in the local universities and public places and enjoyed regular visits from his parents, three younger siblings, grandfather and extended relatives. For 3 years Anthony had independent living with personal assistants to support him living in a home of his own near his family and friends. He was living the life he wanted to live, as any man in his twenties.

In 2013 HSE refused to continue to support him in Independent Living in a home of his own, for reasons that they will not share with us. Anthony was forced into institutional care and residential homes: initially Redwood in Co. Meath Ireland and then being transported by Nua HealthCare in Co Kildare Ireland, over 150 kilometres round trip from the family home to a unit in Nua Health Care. Last week Nua moved Anthony to another Nua unit against our wishes so Anthony has been re homed three times in the past year causing serious damage to Anthony. We his parents only learnt that Anthony had been rehomed in the Nua service when his mother and a friend went to visit him at his original Nua unit or “house”. This human rights abuse is totally unacceptable. He is now socially isolated from his family and local community.

Although Anthony has been institutionalised for almost a year, due to the fact that staff are not trained up in Anthony’s communication Anthony is unable to make any phone contact with us whatsoever and Nua staff do not bother phoning us. We found a company to train staff in Anthony’s communication, but that offer was ignored. So Anthony remains effectively silenced. Because our visit is 150 km round trip we spend every minute of every day worrying about his health and safety.

Anthony is becoming more and more fearful and has been in hospital three times by emergency ambulance times because of treatment at the residential homes/institutions. He tells us to tell the institution to stop giving him the medication ( he was medication free before being institutionalised but is now being forced medication against his and us his parents wishes, Nua are fully aware of our objections) . He asks us constantly to get him out so he can have his own life through independent living again, and be close to the people he loves. We all want him back under the care of our family GP of more than 8 years who genuinely cares about the health and safety of our son Anthony.

An organisation in Dublin has offered to arrange support for Anthony live in a home of his own again, and live independently, but HSE refuse to discuss this option-despite it being what Anthony wants and despite having an organisation ready to offer the support to make this happen.

Hearing Anthony constantly asking that he be returned to Independent Living, to live near to his family, who he does not see often enough-to be released from institutionalisation is heart breaking for us as a family to hear. We have always listened and been led by Anthony and we feel extremely helpless in helping Anthony to live the life he chooses. To be constantly knocked back by the HSE and the institutions is extremely difficult for us.

The petition is for Enda Kenny and HSE to call an open meeting to discuss returning Anthony to the life he wants. The meeting should take place before the end of October 2014. The meeting should be attended by the support organisation offering to support Anthony, by Anthony ( with his communication aid), his family, Anthony’s chosen advocate Joe Whittaker, and the press. The meeting will be to discuss the arrangements to return Anthony to independent living, to his family and his community to allow him to resume his life, as any 26 year old man.

Linda Kletzander (Mother)

Joe Whittaker (Advocate)

HSE and assorted want to shut this whole thing up-dont let them-instead show them that this story will not be buried or silenced. Human rights abuse must always be exposed

Second Court Case on #saveilf : 22nd&23rd October Join the #DPAC Vigil

Action, All Posts, ILF, Independent Living, Independent Living Fund ILF, legal challenges, UNCRPD, welfare cuts 1 Response »

Aug 192014

A second court case against the DWP on the closure of the Independent Living Fund (ILF) will take place at the Royal Courts of Justice on the 22^nd and 23^rd of October. It is expected to last one and half days.

There will be a vigil outside the courts from 12.30 on the 22^nd to support the ILF users taking the case and to support our right to independent living as enshrined in the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities- article 19

Article 19: “Living independently and being included in the community”, states that “disabled people have a right to live in the community; with the support they need and can make choices like other people do”.

Please join with us to show your support!

The closure of the ILF has obvious implications for the UK’s chances of meeting such obligations. Most importantly for those disabled people who will lose this financial support they will lose any independence and choice in their lives. You can listen to how this vicious attack will affect disabled people at these links.

https://www.dpac.uk.net/2013/02/a-nasty-cut-people-affected-by-the-closure-of-the-independent-l5142/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMElPk0pq6I

We will be posting further updates

Is the United Nations Committee on Rights of Persons with Disabilities investigating the UK?

All Posts, News, Politics, UNCRPD 3 Responses »

Jul 192014

This video on youtube seems to suggest that it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nR_sLy_8B-8 (watch from 1hr and 4 minutes in)

This video is taken from a proceedings of a recent conference on the UNCRPD in Galway in June this year

The conference session is entitled:

Monitoring the CRPD — the Work of the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

And the person speaking is Gabor Gombos Adjunct Professor at NALSAR Law University, India and at NUI Galway

We have isolated the relevant clip of the video and posted it below:-

Here is a transcript of the video:

 "The primary mandate of the treaty bodies is this country review, which is mandated by
 the treaty itself. Now under several treaties including the CRPD, there are optional protocols
 which give additional mandates to the treaty body. In the case of the optional protocol
 to the CRPD one of the additional mandates is inquiry procedure."

 "The inquiry procedure is basically about grave and systemic violations of human rights in
 the country. Where the issue has been raised and the government did not really make effective
 actions to fix the situation, it is a very high threshold thing; the violations should
 really be grave and very systemic."

 "And it cannot be based on gossip. An inquiry procedure against a country has a very, very
 high profile internationally also, it should be established and the procedure is highly
 confidential until the outcome, the end of the procedure."

 "The committee has not completed an inquiry procedure yet, but the committee started its
 first inquiry procedure against the United Kingdom, I wanted to share this with you,
 this is a public piece of information. Nothing else about the inquiry procedure is public,
 okay?"

 "So we only know that the United Kingdom has the privilege to be made accountable through
 an inquiry procedure by the CRPD committee regarding grave and systemic violations of
 persons with disabilities in the United Kingdom. We'll see, I'm really curious what will happen
 and what this inquiry procedure is about."

 "Again civil society does play an enormous role in this. Typically an inquiry procedure
 is initiated by civil society organisations; it's a highly confidential procedure as I
 told you and it's a very dynamic procedure, the treaty body can delegate some of its members
 to visit the country and meet NGOs, meet governments and enters into a dialogue with them."

So it seems there is a quiet investigation into the violations by the UK government of the rights of disabled people. As said in the video, the inquiry procedure is not triggered by gossip but by very serious human rights violations corroborated by facts and statistics.

If true, this is what disabled people have been waiting for a very long time: a genuine, thorough and independent investigation of the retrogression of disabled people’s rights and of what they had to suffer for the past 4 years .

We sincerely hope that it is true.

‘Professionals’ try to deny our human rights yet again…..

Action, All Posts, Independent Living, Politics, professional oppression, Reclaiming our Futures, Social Model, UNCRPD 2 Responses »

May 182014

Disabled people have long been oppressed by professionals saying they’re acting in our ‘best interests’ as an excuse to maintain their own interests. One of the latest is their ‘take’ on facilitated communication, used by many across the world to express their voice if they do not have speech. FC is the use of a keyboard on which the user types what they want to say see the great piece written by the brilliant Quiet Riot

communication board in hand doing ordinary things like buying an ice cream. This does not require a “transition plan” or “a service delivery audit” Or a specialist training programme to create a team of ” Whippy Therapist”

Some claim FC is incorrect and shouldn’t be used. DPAC fundamentally disagrees and fully supports FC. But, of course keeping people voiceless is much more profitable for ‘professionals’, charities and other groups whose livelihoods and/or donations often depend on our oppression and on keeping us powerless and silent. This has been evident throughout disabled peoples’ history.

Imagine the loss of contracts, work they get to psycho – analyse us. The lesser need for speech therapists, researchers, psychologists, service providers and academics,and the drop in donations to pay top salaries to their charity directors if we develop our own challenging voices-of course its in their interests to deny any method that empowers our voice if it renders them obsolete!

All those denying our voices through which ever means we chose to express them are violating our human rights as set out in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Disabled Persons (UNCRPD) which argues we have a right to use any method we chose for communication including FC and that this should be respected and accepted. But in the so called disability business (i.e those who make money from us and from maintaining our oppression) profit speaks louder than human rights.

Please see below to find out how this can happen when the vested interests of ‘professional power attempts to overturn human rights…….

The ISAAC attack on the Communication used by Increasing numbers of Disabled People.

The International Society of Augmentative and Alternative Communication (ISAAC) released a “Position Statement” on facilitated communication (FC) on 23rd April 2014 to its international membership.

Along with theposition statement on FC, ISAAC finally issued the identities of the ad hoc committee, who were selected to deliver the statement. The majority of the committee had publicly condemned FC prior to joining the committee. Therefore, the condemnation of FC following their deliberations was the expected outcome.

The ISAAC ad hoc committee used flawed methodologies, collected biased data to support an unexplained hypothesis and cited highly selective references to create a spurious position statement on FC.

However, most significantly the committee refused to consult with disabled people who use FC. ISAAC had identified just one disabled person who was a member of this committee but this person did not use FC.

The remainder of the committee were Speech Therapists, Researchers, Psychologists, and Academics. There was no representation of people using the communication they were writing a “position statement” on. Such oppressive practice has no place in an organisation established supposedly to support a persons right to communication.

Rosemary Crossley (the founder of FC) alongside many disabled people using FC, had made many, well received presentations to large audiences at ISAAC events. Now following the work of the ad hoc committee FC, as a method of communication for increasing numbers of disabled people, has been dismissed as invalid.

This outcome appears to have been contrived to protect the power of professionals and academics whilst ignoring the rights of communication for disabled people using FC .

ISAAC have not established committees to create position statements on other alternative means of communication accepted within ISAAC ; Picture Exchange Communication System.(PECS), Rapid Prompt Method (RPM). This is another indication of the deliberate attempt to isolate and devalue FC by a group of professionals and academics whose status and “expertise” is seriously challenged by the authentic voice of disabled people.

Such an approach by ISAAC management requires the subjugation and acquiescence of disabled people and is an abuse of professional power.

This abuse of power and from professionals is being seriously challenged by large numbers of disabled people and their allies. Similar resistance to protect academic vested interests was used to stop the introduction of sign language and Braille and it took major struggle from Deaf and Blind people with their allies to overcome such oppressive practice.

ISAAC and it’s associated chapters state that:

“The International Society for Augmentative and Alternative Communication (ISAAC) works to improve the lives of children and adults who use AAC. (Augmentative and Alternative Communication). ISAAC’s vision is that AAC will be ! recognized, valued and used throughout the world. ISAAC’s mission is to promote the best possible communication for people with complex communication needs.”

By dismissing a valued means of communication ISAAC management are devaluing hundreds of their members and in doing so fundamentally undermine the ISAAC mission statement.

This position statement has given a licence to “hate speech” about FC which cannot go unchallenged. The ISAAC committee have excluded a section of their own membership because they use FC. I invite members of ISAAC to demonstrate their protest at such an abuse of power and an abuse of thousands of disabled people around the world.

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men (and women) to do nothing” Edmund Burke.

Adam Barrett

BA (Hons), PGCE, MEd, FC Trainer.

DPAC

Disability News Service December 11th

Contents

McFadden brags about cutting disability benefits, just as his own strategy warns of ‘deep material poverty’

Minister misleads MPs as mystery deepens over new £2 billion cuts to disability benefits

Duty to disabled passengers in railways bill is ‘too vague’ and must be strengthened, MPs are told

Peers urged to ‘err on the side of caution’ and raise minimum age limit in assisted suicide bill

Scottish and UK governments are failing to uphold disability rights, says watchdog

Thousands of disabled people in one county should benefit from care charging legal case victory

Other disability-related stories covered by mainstream media this week

Please sign this letter to EHRC

DPAC

UN Committee slams government failure to address disability rights violations

Deaf and Disabled People to witness United Nations scrutiny of UK Government’s human rights record

End Torture of Disabled People – meeting in Parliament Monday 11 December – please ask your MP to attend

UK Under the United Nations Spotlight – webinar 18 July

United Nations Disability Event – 20 October – Watch live or on demand

ODI live streaming of Periodic examination of the UK by UN Disability Committee

More on UN report -200 interviewees and 3,000 pages of evidence were all wrong.

TFL consultation: fewer Buses in Central London because we can all use the inaccessible tube

Important UN inquiry into care and support provision – respond by October 21st

Questionnaire on the “provision of support to persons with disabilities” – Call for submissions

So DPAC triggered the UNCRPD inquiry but what does it really mean?

The battle for independent living and political hypocrisy

DPAC 2014 Review &Tory#roadtoruin

Government’s Legal Costs for Fighting against Disabled Peoples Equality?

Sign and Share the petition to support #anthonykletzander

Second Court Case on #saveilf : 22nd&23rd October Join the #DPAC Vigil

Is the United Nations Committee on Rights of Persons with Disabilities investigating the UK?