Call for NGOs and sick and disabled individuals willing to act as "victim" in a UN complaint or inquiry

I need to hear from NGOs and sick and disabled individuals willing to act as "victim" in a UN complaint or inquiry

Please circulate this widely in Britain.

I recently contacted a human rights solicitor at Leigh Day regarding the submission of a United Nations complaint (UNCRPD) or inquiry into Britain's draconian welfare reform policies. The solicitor has expressed interest. I need to hear from NGOs and sick and disabled individuals willing to act as "victim" in the UN complaint or inquiry.

For further information, please see http://www.twitlonger.com/show/lbeqbu http://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1rkmam4 http://mydisabilitystudiesblackboard.blogspot.ca/2013/03/the-jobcentre-sanctions-scandal-in.html

I am especially interested in hearing from individuals (disabled and non-disabled) who have been unjustly sanctioned by Jobcentre and/or the DWP.

Please contact: Samuel Miller at disabilityinliterature@gmail.com

--
Samuel Miller

http://independent.academia.edu/SamuelMiller
http://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/letter-to-the-icc-at-the-hague-re-mistreatment-of-the-disabled-and-sick
http://mikesivier.wordpress.com//?s=Samuel+Miller&search=Go
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VnHBfW0_u5A&feature=youtu.be
E-Mail: disabilityinliterature@gmail.com
Blog: Hephaestus: Disability Studies
http://illnessandcivilization.blogspot.com/
Blog: My Disability Studies Blackboard
http://mydisabilitystudiesblackboard.blogspot.com/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/Hephaestus7
(Montreal, Canada)

Dying Is An Option Thanks To DWP

Reblogged from enoughisenoughdwp:

Nothing left to do but die

It has taken 3 days to type this, I can't concentrate for long and can't be bothered to correct.

I suffer from crippling depression And anxiety. I also have problems walking  and standing unaided  because of a spinal issue. 

I rarely leave my home and spend most of my time in bed or in front of a Telly. I have lost contact with friends as I just want to be  left alone 

I haven't been paid any benefit since mid February when my ESA was stopped.

The reason they stopped it was because I didn't attend my medical assessment at Atos. This was because I never received my notification.

I am no longer at the address it was sent to, but when I lived there, mail could be very sporadic because mine and others on the street, would be sometimes delivered to different flats and houses on the street.

I appealed their decision but was refused twice and later told, they were not appeals, but  reconsideration, even though I filled out a GL24 form.

I have reached the point that some days I feel life is no longer worth living. I was evicted 3 Weeks ago and currently living in a mice infested squat because I didn't want to be parted with my dog.

If it wasn't for my pensioner mother, I don't know how I would have survived. She has helped me out with small amounts of money here and there, but it is not fair on her as she is also in bad health.

After several months I tried to apply for job seekers but was met by a very unhelpful and spiteful bitch called Saba who works at the Dalston Job Centre. I'm sorry, but after that woman did to me, it's the first word that comes to mind.

From the first meeting she showed no interest and didn't even look at me when I was in front of her.

Things came to a head when I attended  Dalston Job centre for my first sign on. Saba was unfriendly, barked at me. I told her I was unable to look for the required 8 jobs and only managed a few, because of my dire state of mind. I was on the verge of being evicted, suffering depression so bad that I spent most of the day with a duvet over my me. Compounded with arthritis and a bulging disc in my back, I was lower than low. Even standing at the kitchen sink was an ordeal. My only relief is when I'm lying down.

Saba reluctantly decided I would be paid, but scolded me like a child and told me to show up with proof of 8 jobs I had sought next sign on

She got me to sign something and when I handed the pen back to her, she claimed I threw it at her. In fact it dropped from my hand as I have problems holding on to things, even a phone because my fingers are numb most of the time  and feel like pins and needles.

She told me my JSA was being stopped because I threw a pen at her. I insisted on seeing her manager (she refused at first but I insisted). Her manager who overheard everything told me he had called her aside and spoke with her even before I requested to speak to him.

After two Weeks on JSA it was decided by my doctor I not try to work.

That is when the nightmare got worse.

How long am I supposed to live like this? I can't handle the stress of calling DWP, I can't handle the abuse from them, I can't handle sleeping on a mattress in a mice infested squat. I don't think I have enough pills left to take my life and not enough on my oyster card to get into my nearest tube station to jump infront of a train. The easiest thing is to walk in front of a bus on Kigslad High Rd nr the job centre What more do they want from me? My doctor has written a letter to them but that is not enough.

To our current government, Dwp, the staff at Hackney and Dalston job centre. My blood will be on your hands when I summon up the courage to leave this world.

I can't just blame them for everything, my problems began long before my dealings with Dwp. It hurts to be awake. I just want to sleep and never wake up.

It has taken 3 days to type this, I can't concentrate for long and can't be bothered to correct.

I rarely leave my home and spend most of my time in bed or infront of a Telly. I have lost contact with friends as I have nothig  to share

I'm out of money, can't pay for my mobile phone bill and can no longer pay for top up for mobile broadband,  basics like  personal hygiene and food

I don't want to be a burden to my mother anymore and cannot bare the thought of asking her for more money.

The following  people helped drive me over the edge

Dalston job centre, Hackney Job Centre, Francine (mare street jc) who was so cold and told me to kill myself if that's what I felt like doing , some woman called Begonia (mare st jc) who spoke very bad English and refused to give me her name yesterday and this morning, Jenny (mare st jct) who was rude some months ago and hung up when all I did was ask her a question.You are employed to help people not degrade them.

Rob on the Ajax Team at Mare St thanks for being very decent. Same goes to Delores at Dalston Job centre for being very patient and taking time out.

‘GPs unaware they can flag up patients at risk’ ~ The Scotsman and Edinburgh Evening News

By John McArdle 

Published on 14/05/2013 12:00

Sick and disabled people are being subjected to enormous and avoidable suffering as a consequence of the UK 
Government’s draconian welfare reforms.

Deputy First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has reportedly written to Iain Duncan Smith and David Cameron informing them that Scottish NHS and GPs surgeries are now facing meltdown dealing with the fallout of their welfare “reforms” that the vast majority of MSPs agree are badly failing Scotland’s people.

Over the last 12 months a succession of full Westminster debates have been held on the matter and last June the British Medical Association voted unanimously to demand that the Work Capability Assessment (WCA) be scrapped with immediate effect “to be replaced by a rigorous and safe system that does not cause avoidable harm to some of the weakest and most vulnerable members of society.”

However, the pleas of our doctors, charities, civil society organisations and politicians from all sides of the political spectrum – including 121 MPs who signed House of Commons Early Day Motion 295 in support of the BMA’s position – have fallen on deaf ears and even harder hearts.

In response to last week’s Evening News report on the issue, a DWP spokeswoman stated that “GPs have said they do not want to be responsible for making decisions on people’s benefit entitlement, which is why we request the appropriate information from GPs to enable us to make those decisions”.

The truth, as the department well knows, is that the DWP almost never requests information from GPs and it remains irrefutably the case that those performing the Atos Work Capability Assessments and DWP Decision Makers continue to make complex medical risk assessments based upon grossly inadequate patient information.

The inevitable result has been the sickening, daily occurrence of Scotland’s chronically sick and/or disabled people’s lives being devastated with individuals, families and carers pushed over the edge. Such a disgraceful state of affairs cannot be permitted to continue for one day longer in a society that deigns to call itself civilised.

ESA Regulations (21013) 25 and 31 deal with flagging up a substantial risk of harm to patients if they were to be found “fit for work” or to have “limited capability for work” and placed in the DWP Work-Related Activity Group (WRAG) where: “the claimant suffers from some specific disease or bodily or mental disablement and, by reasons of such disease or disablement, there would be a 
substantial risk to the mental or physical health of any person if the claimant were found not to have limited 
capability for work.”

Regrettably, it remains the case that only DWP and ATOS staff are aware of these regulations whilst GPs remain ignorant of their existence and those performing the WCA and DWP Decision Makers continue to make complex risk assessments based on grossly inadequate patient information.

Where GPs have applied the law the horrific suffering of the type reported in last week’s News has been avoided.

Contrary to suggestions by the DWP spokeswoman and DWP Minister for Work Mark Hoban, the use of these regulations by GPs is emphatically not about doctors policing the benefit system. They are about doctors discharging their ethical duty to patients. The GMC’s own publication Good Medical Practice states clearly:

“a doctor must (overriding duty or principle) take prompt action if he feels that patient safety is or may be seriously compromised by inadequate . . . policies or systems.”

Failure by the BMA to urgently publicise and make known to every GP in the country the existence and lawful application of these Substantial Risk Regulations 25 and 31 without any further delay would, in the words of the doctors’ letter to the BMA 
leadership, amount to negligence.

John McArdle is a spokesman for the Black Triangle Campaign against the current disability benefit reforms

The Scotsman and Edinburgh Evening News

Pope slams Primark factory as slave labour

[Pope Francis] said unemployment “is a burden on our conscience” because when society is organised in such a way that it cannot offer people an opportunity to work, “there is something wrong with that society: It is not right. It goes against God himself, who wanted our dignity to begin with (work).”

The Pope recalled a recent “tragedy” in Bangladesh, where more than 400 garment workers were killed when the building they were working in collapsed. The workers reportedly earned just $38 a month.

“This is what you call slave labour,” he said. “We can no longer say what St Paul said, ‘Who will not work, should not eat,’ but we have to say, ‘He who does not work has lost his dignity’ because he cannot find any opportunities for work.”

During his general audience the Pope also made a special appeal against slave labour and human trafficking.

“How many people worldwide are victims of this type of slavery, in which the person is at the service of his or her work,” he said. “Work should offer a service to people so they may have dignity.”

Read more...

The Tory Trussel Trust: Food Banks replacing benefits?

The Trussell Trust Food Bank founders, The people behind it:

The Trussel Trust, was introduced to dole offices specifically as an alternative to the ‘crisis fund’ previously run by the state

The Trussell Trust describes itself as “a Christian charity that does not affiliate itself with any political party”. It is controlled by Tory Party Councillor and Mayor of Worthing, Neil Atkins and director Chris Mould, who splits his time between the Trussell Trust and the Shaftesbury Partnership.

The Shaftesbury Partnership is a “practice of professionals committed to large scale 21st Century social reform.”

Co-founder was Nat Wei, who was appointed the Government’s Chief Adviser on Big Society in May 2010, now a life peer.

Other people in the Shaftesbury Partnership :

Dominic Llewellyn(Conservative party candidate in 2010 )who co-authored the government’s Big Society policies.

Shaftesbury’s recently departed head of operations Antony Hawkins states that he “developed conservative unemployment and welfare reform policy (“The Work Programme”). Planned the implementation of Conservative welfare policies in the Get Britain Working manifesto”.

The Shaftesbury Partnership’s aim is to “design our solutions so that they are both scalable and have sustainable business models, maximising the potential for social transformation”.

The Trussel Trust, was introduced to dole offices specifically as an alternative to the ‘crisis fund’ previously run by the state

If the Tories believe that their policies will reduce poverty, why are the instigators and creators of its ‘Big Society’ policies investing in, and directing food banks?

READ MORE

Yesterday's Labour Workfare Masssacre

Reblogged from Diary of a Benefit Scrounger

 

This morning, like the night after Agincourt, lefties like me scan the bloody, burnt out social media #workfare battlefield in the hope of finding twitching Labour corpses. There are none. Like the French 600 years before, a few generals at the top of the pile made the fateful decision to crush the weak and exhausted. Like the French, they were shown exactly why that's often not a very good idea at all. 

In the three years since Labour have been in opposition, nothing has described their fate better than the welfare debate. With minds stuck in an ideology forged around a gleaming new millennium, welfare was a comforting Blairite hawk to offset the freer doves of education, international aid and health. 

Tough on povety, tough on the causes of poverty. It suited Purnell, and Murphy and Cooper as they forged their credentials as "centrists" and who knows? Future leaders? 

So the argument goes : "It's a no brainer. The public think everyone on welfare is scrounging. (Except them) The tougher we are on welfare, the more people in the "Middle" and the "Shires" and the "City" breathe easy at night. (As long as it's not pensioners and it doesn't affect them.) Combining a little social justice elsewhere, with a good dose of judgement and steel in welfare = the chance of a majority. 75% of the public support workfare. Therefore, supporting the government on this is a chance to show we are still tough on poverty, tough on the causes of poverty. The Daily Mail fall gasping at our feet, they raise a glass in the gentleman's clubs, and no-one will listen to the screams of the anguished or weak, well, because they're anguished and weak."

Some around the shadow cabinet now look uncomfortable, shift in their seats. This is at least progress. Some mention the change in the welfare narrative lately. Opinion polls shifting, disability becoming toxic for the Tories, the increased media interest and above all, that behemoth of opinion formers - social media. But the hawks give the doves a little slap about and logic prevails. 75% of everyone or about 1% of the active, gobby probably-gave-up-on-us-anyway-leftie-activist-Face-Tweeps??? 

As has happened so often before, but had been happening less lately, the hawks won the welfare Agincourt, and they took to the commons. 

We on Twitter and Facebook steeled ourselves. Defeat had been heavily trailed on the blogs and had met with the grim opposition of the archer who knows he may be amongst small and ragged numbers, but he has all the arrows and the mighty have none. 

And so it proved. If the Daily Mail or the BBC even noticed Labour's unprincipled stand yesterday, designed to get them picked for the election team, there is little evidence today on a quick dodge of budget fever. 

But on Social Media? 

Oh Agincourt,

"Those few, those happy few those band of brothers. 

For those yesterday who shed their blood may have been a brother. 

Be he ne'er so vile, election day may have gentled his condition and Englishmen abed may have held their front doors wide as any speaks, that canvassed late, upon election day!!!"

For the return of precisely zero centre ground, floating voting, Mail readers, Labour managed to enrage and alienate 10s of 1000s of active, passionate, left of centre, engaged, knowledgeable, informed, opinion formers who are read by journalists and opposition alike - not to mention their own families and friends. 

Life has changed since 2000. Politics has changed. The economy has changed beyond all recognition. Living standards have fallen. Corruption seems to stalk everywhere now that gossamer veneer of "success" has floated away. 

But most of all, "media" has changed. Numbers of papers sold are plummeting, news figures freefall by their side. 

And every day, social media takes over. Sure, not the majority, but the vanguard. And they are the ones who care and think and devise and solve and organise. Just like any world paradigm change, it is the few who lead you to safety not the many. 

Every time Labour remembers that, they are rewarded with just a little touch of Harry in the night - Murdoch and Leveson, Gas giants and Loan sharks their names in our mouths bitterly remembered. 

We appreciate their company, there in the breach. 

But every time they take what they know is the wrong decision on principle, the response is swift and horrific. 

I won't pain myself more by sifting through the "I'll never vote Labour again" tweets or sifting through the debris of torn up membership cards and broken hearts. 

But Labour squandered so much more yesterday on a battle they could never win, and all the while they go on frittering away principles and viable voters on the wind of a cruel popularity it cannot win, our cause be not just.

 

 

The myth of the “welfare scrounger”

A little noticed piece of DWP research shows that four out of five claimants spent at least three quarters of the past four years off unemployment benefit.

BY IAN MULHEIRN PUBLISHED 15 MARCH 2013 14:58

A man stands outside the Jobcentre Plus on January 18, 2012 in Trowbridge, England. Photograph: Getty Images.

In its effort to save money on the working age welfare bill, the government has used some bold imagery. The Chancellor is fond of saying, 

“where is the fairness…for the shift-worker, leaving home in the dark hours of the early morning, who looks up at the closed blinds of their next-door neighbour sleeping off a life on benefits?”

And the Prime Minister has talked of the benefits bill

“sky-rocketing”

while

“generations languish on the dole and dependency”.

The benefit scrounger is the bogeyman of British politics, stalking the corridors of Westminster.

In the real world, it’s pretty hard to find families that have never worked, let alone generations of people on the dole.

But as well as being political cover for the public spending squeeze, this rhetoric reflects an apparent hardening of public attitudes.

The British Social Attitudes survey shows that in 2011 54 per cent of people thought that if benefits were lower people would “learn to stand on their own two feet”, more than double the 26 per cent who felt that way just 20 years earlier. It appears that the idea of dependency is almost synonymous with the dole in many people’s minds. As a result, moves to erode benefits, through things like the 1 per cent up-rating plan, garner widespread public support.

Into this rhetorical maelstrom, was last week released a fascinating – and little noticed -piece of research by the Department for Work and Pensions on the benefit histories of dole recipients.

It’s a precious piece of evidence in an argument that tends to be fuelled by anecdote, prejudice and fear (on all sides). And it rather undermines the picture that our welfare system is awash with people taking advantage of its ‘something for nothing’ deal.

The analysis looks at the benefit claims history, going back four years, of people who made a claim for unemployment benefit in 2010-11.

For a sample group of 32-33 year olds who claimed Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA) in 2010-11, 40 per cent of them had not made a claim before in that period.

Sixty three per cent had spent no more than six months of the previous four years on JSA.

And almost four out of five claimants had spent at least three quarters of the past four years off the dole.

The idea that these claimants are ‘trapped’ in a ‘dependency culture’ is absurd.

What all this implies is that the overwhelming majority of people who claim unemployment benefit each year spend at least three-quarters of their time in work.

And for 40 per cent of claimants, the need to claim JSA clearly comes as quite a shock since they have no recent history of having done so before.
But you would never tell that from the tone of the debate.

Only a small minority of adults – 11 per cent of claimants in 2010-11 – have a history of spending more than half of recent years on the dole.

The government is right to want to take action to help that 11 per cent achieve sustainable employment rather than spending half their time on the dole. But when four out of five claimants draw benefits for an unemployment spell that is obviously an unfortunate aberration, it’s clear that the excoriating rhetoric isn’t based in reality.

If all claimants are to be labelled ‘scroungers’, then today’s striver is tomorrow’s scrounger – and that could be any of us.

It’s worth remembering that the next time we hear a welfare squeeze being justified by a pervasive ‘culture of dependency’.

The New Statesman 

Christian charities face Christian protests over use of workfare labour

Christian organisations including the Salvation Army and the YMCA are participating in “workfare” schemes, using workers who must work without pay or face losing their benefits.

Christianity Uncut is writing to the charities to urge them to withdraw from the schemes as a public witness against forced labour.

The call comes at the start of a week of action against workfare. The action has been called by the group Boycott Workfare for the week of 18-24 March. During the week, Christianity Uncut is planning to write to all Christian organisations using workfare labour.

Christianity Uncut welcome the fact that most churches and Christian organisations are not participating in workfare. We encourage them to sign the pledge promising that they will not do so in future.

Chris Wood, a spokesperson for Christianity Uncut, said:

“Workfare workers are not volunteers – their work is not voluntary but obligatory, and they should be paid a living wage. Instead they are being threatened with losing the benefits on which they live if they refuse to take part in this forced labour scheme.

“We are deeply saddened that charities such as the Salvation Army and YMCA are undermining the good work they do, and their witness to Christ, by participating in workfare schemes. Throughout the economy, workfare is increasing poverty and unemployment by reducing the jobs available for paid staff. Christians need to make a public witness against workfare and proclaim Jesus’ teaching that ‘The worker is worthy of his pay’ (Luke 10,7).”

There are numerous workfare schemes currently in operation. Each requires claimants to work without pay or face possible destitution through sanctions (benefit stoppages), which can last for up to three years. A list of schemes currently in operation can be found at http://www.boycottworkfare.org/?page_id=663.

Protests, creative actions and online pickets against workfare will take place on 18-24 March across the UK in a week of action called by the Boycott Workfare network to escalate the campaign against forced unpaid work. More information and a list of actions can be found at http://www.boycottworkfare.org/?p=1996.

Christianity Uncut

True Face of the Salvation Army – Workfare Protest Marred By False Arrest and Staff Aggression

There were shocking scenes at the South London offices of workfare exploiters the Salvation Army today as employees of the charity manhandled anti-workfare protesters, tried to seize personal property and then physically prevented them from leaving the building.

Astonishingly one person who managed to escape from the premises  before staff blockaded protesters inside was falsely accused of assault and then arrested.

The UK offices of the charity were visited by campaigners today as part of the National Week of Action Against Workfare.  Salvation Army are one of the largest charities left who use forced labour – under threat of benefit sanctions -  to staff their charity shops.  Most decent charities have pulled out in disgust at the exploitative nature of the scheme. The Salvation Army have no such principles and recently appeared to admit that they are even happy to use those on sickness or disability benefits as forced unpaid workers.
Today’s action began at the charity’s plush International Headquarters in the City of London.  A workfare army visited the charity holding a sermon extolling the benefits of forced labour in their reception area.  Meanwhile several people went downstairs to the cafe run by the charity and handed out leaflets.

Many people were shocked at the organisation’s open use of workfare, and thanked the protesters for making them aware of it.  The protest (pictured above) was good-natured and non-violent throughout and eventually a Major from the charity agreed to speak to those present.

The Major claimed that as the international headquarters for the charity, they were not responsible for the actions of the UK section of the Salvation Army.  When it was pointed out that protesters were there to show what was being done in the organisation’s name, he agreed that he was happy for the protest to remain in the building until they closed for the day.

He also suggested that campaigners should visit the UK Headquarters in Elephant & Castle who have the ultimate say of the charity’s use of workfare.  Not wanting to disobey an order from a Major that’s exactly what those present decided to do.

On arrival at the charity’s Elephant & Castle offices it was clear that a very different side of this supposedly Christian organisation would be on display.

At first several staff – who may have been security but never identified themselves as such – refused to allow protesters into the building.  In what appeared to be a change of heart they then relented and opened the doors to allow people inside.

Once inside another workfare sermon began and then some of those present began to sing hymns.  This seemed to particularly annoy the charity’s staff who called the police.  The mood quickly turned ugly as the Salvation Army’s bully boys began shouting at protesters that they were blocking fire exists and would be arrested – a claim which was clearly nonsense as there was easy access in and out of the building.

Despite not only having been told to visit by the organisation’s International Headquarters, and allowed onto the premises, they then began accusing people of trespass and demanding that people should give them their mobile phones and cameras.

Shocked at the aggresive response to a completely peaceful and non threatening action, a decision was made by the protesters to leave.  Sadly only one person made it out of the building as the Salvation Army thugs blocked the door and attempted to grab hold of people to physically prevent anyone from leaving.
As this took place the police arrived and one Salvation Army staff member began insisting the person who had escaped from the building had assaulted him, leading to the individual being arrested.  A stand off ensued as those inside were finally freed – the charity presumably deciding that kidnapping people in full view of the police was a step too far even for their shady operation.

Police were heard discussing amongst themselves that they had witnessed people being trapped inside by Salvation Army employees.  After tense negotiations it appeared even the police didn’t believe the charity’s wild claims and the individual accused of assault was de-arrested and allowed to leave.

After the good-natured protest earlier in the day this shocking sequence of events showed the true nature of this charity’s response to criticism.  Physical force, false allegations and abuse replaced the fake cheery PR front that the charity have attempted to portray when criticised for using workfare.

It seems that the Salvation Army are determined to silence any criticism of their dirty little workfare exploitation.  A day of online action in response to these events has now been called by Boycott Workfare tomorrow (Tues 18th March).

The Salvation Army are on twitter @salvationarmyuk
They can be found on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/salvationarmyuk

Spread the word and let’s tell the Salvation Army exactly what the public thinks of their workfare exploitation and attempted use of force and false allegations to silence criticism.

(watch this space for more contact info)

Follow me on twitter @johnnyvoid

The Void

Welfare Myth Number One - Benefits Are Expensive

This is the first in occasional series on welfare myths - those persuasive facts that everybody knows to be true, but which, on closer examination turn out to be totally false.

Welfare Myth Number One is that the benefit system is expensive. When politicians want to frighten us they add together the cost of all benefits and pensions and get a staggering figure of £180 billion. We are then told that this figure is far too high and no longer affordable. They even imply that the high cost of benefits is the reason why our economy is in such trouble and why the government is cutting benefits by 20%.
However these figures are utterly misleading.

If I give you £10 but immediately take back £9 I have not given you £10 I have really given you £1. In the same way, to calculate the true cost of benefits we must take out the taxes that people pay from their benefits. For example, in 2010-11 the poorest 10% of families received an average of £104 per week in benefits. However they then paid £68 back to the government in taxes, leaving only £36 per week - or £5 per day.

The real cost of benefits is the net cost of benefits. That is, the cost of benefits after people have paid their taxes. We can find this data from the Office of National Statistics. For each household they have calculated both income, including benefits and taxes paid. So we can see how much better off people are, after taxes.

As the graph below shows, the poorest 40% of families are made a little better off because of the benefits system. The real cost of increasing the incomes of the poorest 40% of families is £27 billion. At the same time we can also see that the other 60% of families are worse off by a total of £213 billion.



What this shows is that most of our taxes do not go to fight poverty or redistribute income. £27 billion is less than 3% of GDP and about 6% of government spending. Fighting poverty is clearly a very low priority.

In fact many economists would argue that these benefits should not really be treated as government expenditure. Benefits are actually "transfer payments" - government is not spending money, government is shifting spending power from the rich to the poor. Cutting benefits and reducing the level of transfer payments can be very damaging to the economy because people on low incomes are less likely to:

• Spend their money abroad
• Save their money
• Hide it from the tax man

This is just one more reason why the government's efforts to target cuts on disabled people and people in poverty is economic folly.

Next time a politician tells you benefits and pensions are expensive remember that they are not talking about the real cost of benefits. And remember the wise words of the great American cynic, H L Mencken:

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

I will explore who really benefits from the £213 billion of net taxes in a future welfare myth. If you are interested in these ideas you also might like to look at this more detailed essay on The Centre for Welfare Reform's website or join the Campaign for a Fair Society.

 

Follow Dr Simon Duffy on Twitter: www.twitter.com/simonjduffy

HuffPost

Iain Duncan Smith Bashes the Bishop [the void]

As if we didn’t already know that Iain Duncan Smith is a wanker, the bungling Work and Pensions Secretary has resorted to bashing the bishops in yet another rant defending his vicious social security slashing regime.

His latest outburst comes after 43 Bishops wrote to him warning that

“As a civilised society, we have a duty to support those among us who are vulnerable and in need. When times are hard, that duty should be felt more than ever, not disappear or diminish.

‘It is essential that we have a welfare system that responds to need and recognises the rising costs of food, fuel and housing.”

  This led to yet another tantrum from the Work and Pensions Secretary who claimed: “There is nothing moral or fair about a system that I inherited that trapped people in welfare dependency. Some one in every five households has no work – that’s not the way to end child poverty”.

And the thing is, for once in his life he’s right.  There is nothing moral about a system that condemns millions to lives of unemployment and poverty whilst people like Iain Duncan Smith live in luxury (in his case scrounging off his wife’s inheritance).  There is nothing moral about a society that excludes disabled people or those with mental health conditions from fully participating.  There is nothing moral about the shocking fact that people who often do some of the hardest physical work are not even paid enough to keep them fed, housed and warm.  There is nothing moral about capitalism at all.

Yet Iain Duncan Smith’s answer is not full employment and neither is it greater workplace access for disabled people – which has fallen by over a third since this Government weren’t elected.  His answer is not to demand a living wage or rent caps or more council housing – nothing must trouble the landlord class after all.  His answer is not even quality training and free education to at least provide an illusion of social mobility.
His answer is certainly not to question the system under which an arms dealer or loan shark becomes rich beyond belief whilst being a parent or carer is no longer even judged to be legitimate work because it doesn’t make a profit for the rich.  Jesus Christ would weep if only he weren’t a largely fictional character from an archaic Middle Eastern soap opera.

Iain Duncan Smith’s answer is to punish the poor for their own predicament.  His idea of a moral society is one where those with least are forced to claw each other’s eyes out in the scramble for the few scraps the rich toss down from above.  And for those who don’t make it into insecure low paid work, let them die in the gutter.  Let their children starve.  Let them lose their homes and be forcibly relocated hundreds of miles away from school, family and friends. Force them to work without pay or let them beg in the street as a lesson to the rest of us.

Honest capitalists will admit that unemployment is vital for the system to function.  That otherwise workers, not bosses, might have the power.  No capitalist country anywhere in the world has achieved real full employment and almost all, including the UK, have given up trying.  There are hundreds of people chasing every vacancy in some parts of the country.

Iain Duncan Smith is either all too aware that unemployment is here to stay and doesn’t care what happens to those unable to find work.  Or he is arrogant enough to believe his tinkering with social security contains the magic button that will somehow fix the problems created by capitalism.  Problems that no-one else, anywhere in the world, has come close to solving.  And his cure is forced unpaid work, benefit cuts and homelessness.

In other words he is either stupid or a genuinely nasty human being whose true agenda is merely to brutalise the very poorest.  Every crisis needs a scapegoat, and Iain Duncan Smith has chosen low income families, disabled and unemployed people as the human sacrifice to atone for the sins of the rich.
Follow me on twitter @johnnyvoid

the void

Liam Byrne : “Sanctions are vital to give back-to-work programmes their bite”

Yesterday in parliament Liam Byrne said to Iain Duncan-Smith “Sanctions are vital to give back-to-work programmes their bite”. Not only does Byrne believe in forced labour he thinks it should be enforced by withdrawal of benefits. Byrne has also used the strivers v shirkers rhetoric that sought to divide the poorest sectors of society and have them fighting one another.

Byrne is Labour’s  Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, their very own Iain Duncan-Smith.  Byrne “worked for the multi-national consulting firm, Accenture and merchant bankers, N M Rothschild & Sons, before co-founding a venture backed technology company, e-Government Solutions Group, in 2000 before entering parliament.”

It’s not clear what qualification and life experiences Byrne has that makes  him suitable to be head of Labours welfare department.  Baron Freud who is head of the present governments welfare reform also has an investment banking background. I wrote elsewhere that this was like putting the fox in charge of the chicken shack.

Neither Freud or Byrne have any idea at all of what they are doing to ordinary people: Money people who survey the wasteland they are creating from the ivory towers of ignorance  and ideology. Byrne likes to be interviewed beside photographs of Tony Blair. Maybe this indicates the share a common set of values and work within the same moral universe that turns black into white and deception becomes just another word for truth.

That the Labour Party has such a person in charge of its welfare policies shows that it is bust completely. In some way I dislike Iain Duncan-Smith less than Byrne because he is doing what you would expect from a party that represents money. Byrne is just another name to add the list that is headed “Blair” – the list of those who have betrayed ordinary people for mere money or power.

Welfare Sorrows

Cameron's Bullingdon Club 'burn £50 notes in front of beggars'

Bullingdon Club initiation ceremony claim: New members of David Cameron's old club 'burn £50 note in front of beggar'

 

 

A friend of one of the exclusive club’s super-wealthy members revealed the sick prank to an Oxford student newspaper

 

Ex-member: David Cameron



New members of David Cameron’s old Bullingdon Club have to burn a £50 note in front of a beggar as part of an “initiation ceremony”, it has been claimed.

A friend of one of the exclusive club’s super-wealthy members revealed the sick prank to an Oxford student newspaper.

It was immediately condemned last night by Labour MP Ian Mearns.

He said: “This kind of thing takes us back to the loads-of-money days under the last Tory government.

“Then it wasn’t just about having cash – you had to rub it in the faces of those who didn’t. It’s distasteful and disgusting.”

The Bullingdon revelations came as figures showed a rise in those sleeping rough.

One night in autumn last year councils found 2,309 out on the streets compared to 2,181 in 2011.

The boozy Bullingdon club is infamous for trashing Oxford restaurants and its other former members include Chancellor George Osborne and London Mayor Boris Johnson.

Earlier this month a Bullingdon member is alleged to have set off fireworks in a club.

MIRROR

Letter from Iain Duncan Smith:ATOS/DWP are doing a great job

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05 March 2013, 23:17:26

Letter from Iain Duncan Smith:ATOS/DWP are doing a great job

05 March 2013, 23:17:26 | admin2

We’ve been passed a letter from Iain Duncan Smith (IDS) to an individual’s local MP.  That individual has asked us to publish the letter because surprise, surprise IDS  is defending Atos and says they are doing a great job- we know that the reality is very different. We know the misery and distress that Atos is causing and we know that [...]

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Work When You’re Sick Say New DWP Guidelines

New advice issued to doctors, patients and employers on sick pay shows just how far the Government intend to push the brutal regime for people on disability or sickness benefits into the workplace.

The DWP recently renamed ‘sick notes’ as ‘fit notes’ which in the new guidance has led to some genuinely Orwellian gobbledygook in the guidance such as:  “if your employee’s doctor thinks they are fit for work, they will not be issued with a fit note.”

Just like the despised Atos run Work Capability Assessment, doctors can now declare a patient ‘fit for work’, unfit for work, or capable of some work but not necessarily the job they usually do.  This means that if an employer makes some changes to a staff member’s working conditions then they may be forced back to work.

The new rules, which were devised in consultation with the Confederation of British Industry, seem little more than an attempt to bully people into work when they aren’t really well enough.  The document is littered with bold claims that work is good for your health such as “People can often come back to work before they are 100% fit – in fact work can even help their recovery”.

Nowhere in the documents does it warn that people’s conditions may also be made far worse by going back to work before they are ready.

Bosses have welcomed the chance to force their sick employees back to work with one quoted as calling the new system ‘a joy’:

“The joy of the fit note is that it’s flexible enough for us to interpret and fit the GP’s recommendation within the context of our business.”

The truth is that the DWP are playing a dangerous game and could tempt employers into a legal minefield.  One stark warning says:  “You may need to carry out a risk assessment to accommodate the clinical judgment in the fit note (eg if it states that your employee should avoid lifting, you are liable if you give them work that involves manual handling).”

In a further complication, according to guidance from Citizen’s Advice, if employers refuse to make changes to an employee’s working conditions to accommodate doctor’s recommendations, then they are still liable to pay Statutory Sick Pay.  The confusion doesn’t even end there.  ‘Fit Notes’ are advice only and bosses are not legally obliged to follow that advice.  They can sack you even if a doctor claims you are too ill to work.  They could however then be taken to court.  Employment tribunal lawyers will be rubbing their hands in glee at the DWP’s meddling with an already complex  legal situation.

The DWP have already shown they are happy to play fast and loose with the Courts.  Bosses who act the same way may be in for an expensive shock.

The guidance can be read at: http://www.dwp.gov.uk/fitnote/

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The Void

Open Letter to Salvation Army by former Member

An Open Letter to the Salvation Army

July 8, 2012 by Liz Ely

Dear Salvation Army

My name is Liz, I grew up in the Salvation Army – so did my dad and his dad, and my mum and her mum. I became a Junior Solider at 7, and a band member at 8. You taught me how to play the trombone, and to speak out about what I believe in.

Although the Salvation Army is no longer part of my weekly life (we part ways over a few issues and reconciliation seems unlikely for me), I still feel a connection to the organization. Despite condemning your homophobic actions around Section 28, I have always felt proud to have a link to the Salvation Army. The Salvation Army is my single biggest connection to my wider family history; I have an uncle who is a minister, and frankly there are more Salvationists than non-Salvationists in my family by a long way.

I felt proud to be part of a church that takes Christianity seriously and actively through service – I also felt proud to be part of an organisation in which women have always had a more equal footing than in other churches. Most of all I felt proud to be part of an organisation which worked to help the poor, and indeed was set up for that very purpose.

It is in that spirit that I am writing this open letter, to share my disappointment in your continued involvement in the government’s work programme. I am asking you to reconsider and withdraw your support for this government scheme, which degrades workers and the unemployed alike.

The work programme promises ‘work experience’ for those out of work for long periods, which seems like offering a helping hand. The reality is that if people do not wish to comply with the programme they can lose the meagre amount of money that they have to live on. There is very little evidence that the scheme helps people into work – in fact it is likely that the work experience positions are replacing paid jobs in the retail sector. I understand that Salvation Army charity shops are run by volunteers, so any work experience placements you accept are unlikely to replace paid work; however, by supporting the scheme you give it credibility. By supporting this scheme you support a government who would make someone homeless for their refusal to work for free, a government threatening to withdraw housing support for young adults. In my view this goes fundamentally against the mission of The Salvation Army.

My experience of this scheme is also personal, my partner is unemployed and has been for a long time. He has in the past been forced to volunteer in a different charity shop, an experience that was profoundly negative, damaging his self-esteem and addressing none of the barriers he faces to get into work. He is not a ‘job snob’, he is applying for hotel porter jobs despite being educated to degree level. The fact of the matter is that in some areas there are up to 35 people for each job vacancy.

I have always respected the Salvation Army as having a practical approach, but if there are no jobs, then why place the blame on the unemployed? Why spend time giving them skills in retail, when there is a scarcity of full time retail jobs? My partner is now in the unfortunate position of being forced into more of this ‘work experience’, with Salvation Army Charity shops as one of the possible places he could end up working against his will. I am not against work experience, or offering support to the jobless – but all work experience should be voluntary, supported and properly remunerated.

I am asking you to consider the work programme from a Christian perspective, and ask your self what Jesus’ approach might be in this situation. Would Jesus support people like Emma Harrison, founder of A4E, an organisation that forces the unemployed to volunteer in your shops? Would he be happy that she earns millions of pounds from forcing others to work for free?

Would Jesus support a government of millionaires who bail out bankers whilst blaming the unemployed for a crisis created by the greed of the wealthy?

I grew up learning that Jesus evicted market sellers from the temple, and went against the leaders and profiteers of his day. Through your involvement in this scheme you are propping up the market sellers, and supporting the profiteers who Jesus forcefully removed.

I am calling on you to follow the lead of other charities like Oxfam and withdraw from this scheme.
I would ask that others, in particular Christians and Salvation Army members consider the issue and write their own letters.

Yours faithfully.

Liz Ely

Former Junior Solider, Singing Company and YP band member Castleford Corps – 1986 -2002ish

Bright Green

Bedroom Tax really is David Cameron's Poll Tax moment

An ICM poll in May 1990 showed that 22% of voters backed the Poll Tax (here). This weekend, a poll from ComRes showed that 28% of voters want David Cameron to push on with the Bedroom Tax (here). It is also worth noting that Tory strength in the opinion polls was 32% in mid 1990, and is in and around the same figure today. 

Those most opposed to the Bedroom Tax are Scottish voters, and voters from the North of England. This echoes the Poll Tax period that saw Scotland lead the resistance. Voters most opposed the Bedroom Tax are Plaid Cymru voters, SNP voters and Labour Party voters in that order. But it is worth noting that not even a majority of Tory voters want Cameron to push ahead with the Bedroom Tax. More than 80% of Tory voters think it is wrong that households that have soldiers fighting for their country in Afghanistan should be lumbered with the £1,300 tax. 

There are some differences between the two periods needless to say. Opinion was more firmly set against the Poll Tax with a lower percentage of "don't knows". The unfairness of the Poll Tax was felt by many more people than will lose out under the Bedroom Tax. For the Bedroom Tax protests to remain containable, David Cameron will be hoping that those unaffected by the Bedroom Tax, stand by the sidelines while their neighbour suffers. If ever there was a time that the Tory Party desperately needed the saying "There is no such thing as society" to be true, then that time is surely now.

We in Labour Left will be holding more than 30 Bedroom Tax Protests nationwide on the 16 March. Further demonstrations are earmarked for the 30 March by the Anti-Bedroom Tax campaign. We are calling on David Cameron to delay this Bedroom Tax by at least 1 year, so that its impact on the disabled, single parents, non-resident parents, pensioners, soldiers and carers can be properly thought through. 

The Green Benches

PCS Union: Workfare a stain on welfare state

Standing up for the poor and vulnerable: Day Four at TUC Congress

A vigorous defence of the welfare state was spearheaded by PCS to open the final day of proceedings at the 2012 TUC Congress.

Since the coalition government came into power in May 2010 there has been a clear rise in the levels of deprivation. New inequalities are having a destructive impact upon the lives of vulnerable people and services are becoming ever more fragmented, leading to wide variations in access across the UK.

Around £30billion of welfare cuts have been announced by the government, coupled with a sinister vilification by this government and right-wing tabloids to denigrate the welfare state and to demonise those without work, or unable to work, and young people, migrants and the disabled.

Proposing composite Motion 8 - which includes reiterating the principles of fair and equal pay, condemns ‘workfare’ policies and re-instating services necessary to support vulnerable groups – PCS president Janice Godrich said: “We face a government firmly in the interests of the richest 1% of society. It tells us that the welfare state is unaffordable but has already found the money to cut the top rate of income tax from 50% to 45% and to cut corporation tax from 28% to 24%.

“Cameron and Osborne are taking money from the disabled, the unemployed, lone parents and those struggling to pay rent to give to the super rich. But it’s not just this perverse re-distribution we should be concerned about, what we see is the see is the vilification and bullying of anyone on benefits. We see this with the work capability assessments carried out by Atos, the private I.T. company paid £100million a year to carry out these tests formerly performed by public sector workers. We know these tests are deeply flawed because disabled people tell us they are and the British Medical Association has called for them to be scrapped.

“Unemployed people are being bullied as well. The workfare schemes are a disgraceful stain on the welfare state our movement created. A society which refuses to support its most vulnerable has lost the right to call itself a civilised society.”

The motion was unanimously carried.

12 September 2012
Public and Commercial Services Union

Find out more about the PCS alternative to the cuts

Suicide training in Job Centres? Cancer patients scrubbing floors? Welcome to Cameron’s Brave New World

By Sonia Poulton
UPDATED: 17:19, 6 March 2012

So, the Welfare Reform Bill - the part that refers to sick and disabled people - limped bruised and bloodied over the finishing line in Parliament last week. The various acts of treachery and betrayal it contained making its final journey into law once it has been granted the Queen's royal assent.

 
It was inevitable, really, and disability campaigners who, for the past two years, have fought feverishly, and quite literally at times from their sickbeds, to oppose it, resigned themselves to the fact that nothing short of a Biblical-type miracle would reverse their fate.

 
However, it is only now that the full implications of what these reforms - or brutal acts of savagery as I prefer to call them - will actually mean to millions of seriously vulnerable people in our country. And it is an ugly realisation.

 
This is how I see it. In the life of most every politician there is one, or several, events that mark out their ‘D’Oh moment. This is not based on severity but on a feeling it should not have happened at all.

Brave New World? David and Samantha Cameron themselves claimed Disability Living Allowance for their child

For examples: Nixon - Watergate. Kennedy - Marilyn. Major - Edwina Currie. Tony Blair - Iraq. You get my point?

 
Well here’s my ‘D’oh moment prediction for David Cameron. He will be remembered as the Prime Minister - without a mandate, remember - who attacked the sick and disabled of our country with a vehemence beyond human comprehension. And when you think that he had a disabled son who tragically passed two years ago, well, then, it beggars belief even more so.
So, to bring the story up to speed.

 
Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair’s Governments set the blueprint of the welfare reforms that David Cameron has just forced through Parliament. And when I say forced I mean the type that requires extraordinary levels of subterfuge and manipulation to shoehorn into place.

 
He ignored panels and focus groups, charities and campaigners and he overturned the Lords' by invoking an archaic law of “financial privilege”, which allows the Commons the last say on money matters.

Such was his unstoppable zeal to push through reforms - contrary to all advice, personal and professional - that you had to wonder if it was a psychological issue driving him on.

Talk to any disabled or sick person right now and there is a word that crops up more than any other, a running thread central to what they are feeling. It is this: fear

Perhaps denied grief at the death of his disabled son. Bereavement affects us on an individual basis and there is no guarantee that it will manifest in logical ways.

 
So these cuts will now become law and, as a nation weeps, the details are sorrowful when applied to reality.

 
Here's an example. Any disabled or sick person who has been given more than six months to live - and is unable to financially support themselves - will be sent out to work. If they refuse, or back out of a scheme, then they will be subject to benefit sanctions.

 
This, it must be noted, is extraordinarily punishing towards disabled people when we consider how DWP boss, Chris Grayling, treats others involved in 'Workfare' type arrangements.

 
Consider, if you will, how he was forced to back-track last week following pressure from campaigners and businesses.  After a summit designed to get more businesses on board the Workfare bus, he announced that he would remove the threat of benefit sanctions for unemployed young people on job seeker allowance who drop out of the scheme.

 
Wow. In what world can young, fit people be given protection that we deny our most vulnerable? That's more suited to an Aldous Huxley script than real life.

 

Next up in the reforms will be an increase in multiple testing of patients, including those with Alzheimer's and Multiple Sclerosis, to see if they are fit for work. They will be tested repeatedly. It will cost a great deal of money to administer and it will wear already sick people to a pulp.

And as for children who dare to be born disabled, well that assistance previously available to them has been wiped out in Cameron's Armageddon on the poor. 

 
Sue Marsh, one of the co-authors of 'Responsible Reform - The Spartacus Report' - which launched a worthy counter-attack to the Coalition's WRB measures said: "We begged for £11 Million to protect profoundly disabled children into adulthood, but nuh-huh."

 
And yet we, as a nation, manage to find millions of pounds to pay Cameron's army of advisers and assessors including the allegedly fraudulent activities of back-to-work company A4E which was set up by the Coalition's 'families czar' Emma Harrison.

 
Could we consider this? If this is really a cost-cutting exercise to fill the billion pound deficit, when is the Coalition going to start from within? The DWP spend over 25 thousand pounds per month on travel, hotels and stationery - surely there is something that could be curbed there rather than taking 20% from disability which, according to their own figures, only has 0.5% of fraud.

 
I'm writing this and I'm struggling to believe it at the same time, which is quite a conflict.

 
With all this insistence of paid employment for the terminally ill (despite the fact that we have almost 3million unemployed) it is no wonder that job centres, up and down the land, have been issued with details on how to handle suicides in their establishments. Something, apparently, they are anticipating rather more of since the WRB was voted in.

 
I think the expression ‘you couldn’t make this up’ is appropriate here.

 
Perhaps the aim is to finish off the sick and disabled sooner rather than later. Well that way, at least, you get to save on the medical bills of our increasingly privatised National Health Service.

 
After all, what use are such people to our society?

There is a notion, false obviously, that disabled and sick people make no contribution and only ‘drain’ the system. What short-sightedness. Such a statement assumes that only paid work has social value.

Legacy: Will Cameron be remembered as the PM who attacked the sick and disabled of our country with a vehemence?

What about other contributions including volunteer work - from charity shops to hospitals and schools? These roles are frequently staffed by disabled people, too.

 
Ironically, a number of disabled people will now be removed from such vital community roles and placed in a Workfare scheme - free labour to private businesses - so that they may mop floors, wash dishes or clean toilets. Ain't life grand?

 
Disabled people, like the majority of people, want to work but they also have to take account of how their illness or disability will affect their working life. Unlike the able-bodied and healthy, they do not know which turn their well-being will take when they wake in the morning. Whether they will be able to physically climb out of bed much less make it to the factory floor.

 
People on disability benefit are not living it up. If only. According to the group Family Action, some families survive on less than two pounds per day. Quite a contrast when you compare it to the Peers in the Lords who receive 300 a day just to show up and then get to enjoy smoked salmon in the tax-payer subsidised cafeteria (cost to the taxpayer is a mere 1.44million a year. bargain). Oh how the other half live.

 
So where will disabled and sick have to turn to now in their greatest hour of need? Well they can forget the Social Fund because that was viciously axed in these reforms, too.

 
For millions of people, a Social Fund loan - yes it was repayable, it wasn't a gift - was the difference between sleeping on a bed or a floor. The MP's who voted to banish this have no understanding of such destitution and poverty. Not while they are able to subsidise the purchase of their country mansions with their parliamentary expenses.

 

There are those who openly mock the disabled: Ricky Gervais's 'mong' comment says more about him than anything else

People are already impoverished and it is certain to get worse. I read one online disability forum where a woman with breast cancer and liver disease didn't know where she was going to get the ten pound needed for travel to hospital for an appointment.

 
Unlike David and Samantha Cameron, who claimed Disability Living Allowance for their child - and absolutely did not need to - many disabled now must adjust to seriously reduced circumstances since Cameron attacked DLA in the reforms and will replace with the patently detrimental Personal Independence Payment (PIP).

 
The transfer from DLA to PIP will remove help from 25% of those in receipt of the benefit now, despite the fact that this is a benefit that helps some disabled people to stay in work.
And therein lies much of the problem with these reforms. They lack joined-up thinking. They don't appear to have been thought through to a satisfactory end.

 
Take for example the perception within the Coalition, the DWP and the care services that everyone has a spouse and family to fall back on but that is not the reality for many people.
As a consequence of these cuts, more disabled people will find themselves in bedsits, or hostels or on the streets. There is a significant proportion of people with mental health issues and learning difficulties who find themselves in this situation already and it is certain to increase.

 
Well then perhaps it's time to resurrect another part of our history - seeing as David Cameron is clearly following a Dickensian blueprint for our poor - the workhouse.  Yes, that testament to our proud, class-conscious society.

 
Talk to any disabled or sick person right now and there is a word that crops up more than any other, a running thread central to what they are feeling. It is this: fear.

 
Fear of losing their homes when they no longer have DLA to top up their Housing Benefit shortfall where, thanks to the previous Conservative Government, private rents are uncapped and extortionate. Fear of losing their carer because there will be no allowance for them. Fear of being bed-ridden for the lack of anyone to lend support. Fear of losing ramps and assistance to get in and out of the house. Cold fear that this feeling of being unwanted and excluded from society is how it is going to be for the rest of their days.

With all this insistence of paid employment for the terminally ill it is no wonder that job centers, up and down the land, have been issued with details on how to handle suicides in their establishments.

In internet circles, where many disabled campaigners congregate, names are bandied around of those who have committed suicide through fear of going cold and hungry and feeling that they are increasingly a burden to society.

 
At the last count there were some 103 names linked to such suicides and I have actually heard people say that they would consider suicide as a way out of this constant state of anxiety and despair.

 
What alarms me is how this dispassion towards people with disabilities appears to be spreading from the Coalition down.

 
There are commentators who openly deride disabled people (Rod Liddle's ill-informed and hate-inciting rhetoric - a type of drunk-sick on paper - in a tabloid was one, but he's not alone). There are also comedians who mock disability. Ricky Gervais' 'mong' impersonation surely says more about him than it does about anyone else (although to be fair, Ricky has since claimed this to be naivety and that he was unaware that the term was still used to describe disability).

 
There is also, according to recent figures, a 40 per cent increase in disabled attacks in the past year alone.  Hardly wonder when the general public are constantly being goaded with the idea that we are 'mugs for supporting scroungers'. Talk like that tends to breed resentment.
And then there's this. An occurrence that should serve to alarm us all.

 
The British Medical Journal published a paper from Oxford University don Francesca Minerva, a philosopher and medical ethicist, who argued that doctors should have the right to kill newborn babies including those born with disabilities because, according to Minerva, a young baby is not a real person and so killing it in the first days after birth is little different to aborting it in the womb.

But here's what gives me hope. Ever since last week's rubber stamping of the Welfare Reform Bill, disability campaigners have begun a serious fightback and are preparing, like an army, to overcome this wickedness that has been wrought on them.  Information is being compiled and exchanged, despite ill-health and disability I have never witnessed such a bank of people determined to overcome the odds piled on them.

 
Let us not forget, and despite the mainstream media's best efforts to convince us otherwise, this is not about the neighbor with the apparent bad back who plays golf at weekends (who can also be genuinely disabled but even disabilities allow for better days when activity can increase), but about some of the most horrendous acts against truly vulnerable people.

 
This may not affect you. Perhaps your parents, or yourself even, have a sufficient financial cushion not to worry about that. What an enviable position to be in.

 
But what about those less fortunate?

 
I believe - and I’ve 47 years of a colourful life to base this judgement on - that the UK is comprised of essentially decent people. Citizens who care enough to see beyond their own selfish existence.

 
The people I know don’t want to be - and neither are they - the type of people who turn their backs when the going gets tough. They actually seek a more compassionate life on earth where we are prepared to support and contribute to each others lives.

 
In is unconscionable that these disability reforms have been allowed to happen. To be fair, we all knew it was a Conservative agenda, but a Liberal one as well? Goodness how Nick Clegg can ever recover from this I do not know. My imagination is not that good.

 
So the Welfare Reform Bill, after decades in the making, has finally come to pass. Oh, how proud are we as a nation? We did it. Gave those sick and crippled unfortunates a good old kicking. Let’s give ourselves a collective pat on the back for allowing this to proceed. Makes you proud to be British, doesn't it?

More from Sonia Poulton...

•   The Paralympics celebrate the strength of disabled people – as do all the protests that accompany them 30/08/12
•   Empathise with 'outsider' Julian Assange if you want, Mr Galloway, but don’t diminish sexual assault while doing it 22/08/12
•   So much is wrong about London 2012, but I would never criticise the stars of the show 09/08/12
•   Will Ed Miliband stand up for the disabled against distressing and unreliable work capability tests? 02/08/12
•   Clare's Law is designed to protect men and women from violent exes – but it wouldn't have saved me 17/07/12
•   Yes, Prime Minister, London 2012 will generate billions in profit. But for business, not people 12/07/12
•   With supermarkets donating food to poor families and soup kitchens, has Britain returned to the 1930s? 03/07/12
•   Is the BMA misguided to vote in favour of neutral counselling for women considering abortion? 28/06/12
•   Fathers worried about their daughters' future should take more responsibility for raising them in the first place 15/06/12
•   VIEW FULL ARCHIVE

Sonia Poulton