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Brian Davies
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BRIAN DAVIES has battled disease and prejudice to lead a normal life, hold down a job and raise a family.
He has brought up three boys on his own, won gold medals as a forerunner to the Paralympics and been awarded an MBE by the Queen.
Now Brian, 53, says he has “nothing to live for” after the Remploy factory he worked at closed and if it was not for his triplets he would “give up”.
His comments lay bare the impact of Remploy factory closures on its workforce of 1,700 disabled men and women.
Brian Davies says he has nothing to live for after the Remploy factory where he worked closed
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They raise questions about whether the Government is doing enough to address the mental toll on disabled workers left on the dole after it withdrew funding for Remploy’s 54 factories. Brian, who has Brittle Bone Disease, has been on antidepressants since the factory in his home town of Wigan closed last August.
Despite suffering hundreds of injuries, Brian held down a job at Remploy for 33 years. He said: “I was at home or in hospital for the first 20 years of my life and told I would never get a job. Remploy gave me a chance. It meant everything to me to work, pay taxes and feel a part of society. I want a proper job.”
Brian worked as a convenor for the GMB union and was presented with an MBE in 2000 for supporting disabled people in his factory. He has a short contract to tie up loose ends but he fears by March his working life will be over.
He said: “The first thing employers see is my wheelchair. They ask, ‘What’s your disability?’ I tell them I break bones on a regular basis. It’s too much for them. I’ve had a broken back, broken legs, broken arms, been in comas.
“That was nothing, it was just physical. This has been mental torture. I feel so sad, I have never felt as sad.”
The Department for Work and Pensions has set up an £8million fund to help Remploy workers find jobs in mainstream employment. A spokesman said it could pay for counselling if depression was a barrier to getting back into work.
The Wigan factory has reopened along with others in Chesterfield, Barrow and Bolton but with just half the staff. Two of Brian’s triplets, Jamie and Peter, 22, who inherited his disability, have been unable to find work.
Brian, who won four gold medals at Les Autres games in Norway in 1981, said: “I’m still trying to help people. I go to visit them and I am seeing grown men and women in tears.”
