Monday, 6 February 2012

Links for Disability stuff...

Theres too many tabs open on my browser of good stories, so I thought would start to collate stories again.. http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/2012/02/06/ministers-condmened-for-sending-letters-to-thousands-of-dying-people-urging-them-to-consider-getting-a-job-115875-23737802/#.Ty_ArFp0caE.twitter
The Department of Work and Pensions stood by the letters. A spokeswoman said: “There are no conditions attached to the financial support you receive if you have a terminal illness.
“However, it would be wrong not to give those with a terminal illness the same opportunities as others. All our customers are told about the extra support their benefit entitles them to.”

'I never qualified for disability benefit, yet I'm still called a faker'
Holy Ferrie, 24, blames government drive to cut disability benefit for a rising tide of hostility

The problem with the truth is that it’s complicated. Lies are simple, they can be altered to fit any audience, they can be sensational without any boring honest bits to dilute the story. Honesty doesn’t make headlines. That’s the problem with the Welfare Reform Bill; not the only problem, obviously, but the reason that there won’t be a huge public outcry until its too late.

Maria Miller blames unemployment on people's unwillingness to apply for work

Rising public resentment blamed on government focus on alleged 'scrounger' fraud and inflammatory media coverage


http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/video/2012/feb/06/tanni-grey-thompson-video Tanni Grey-Thompson: 'A lot of disabled people are terrified of the changes to disability living allowance' – video
Lady Grey-Thompson, one of the UK's most successful elite sportswomen and Crossbench peer in the House of Lords, discusses her reservations about the government's welfare reform bill, how society's attitudes to disabled people have hardened, and why Paralympians should join the disability rights campaign

http://www.leftfootforward.org/2012/02/dwp-scrounger-rhetoric-causing-real-harm/
Six leading disability charities have spoken out against the government’s ‘scrounger’ rhetoric on welfare cuts, saying it fuels abuse of disabled people.

http://lostheskald.wordpress.com/2012/02/06/work-the-social-model-and-the-welfare-reform-bill/
The question of work for disabled people has been artfully reduced to a simple ‘fit for work’ binary by the rhetoric of successive governments, and this has become even more entrenched in discussions about the Welfare Reform Bill (WRB) currently passing (or being forced) through Parliament.

http://diaryofabenefitscrounger.blogspot.com/2012/02/brilliant-sam-barnett-cormack-has-been.html
Campaigners have argued strongly that we should not be expected to pass law for a new disability benefit until we knew exactly who would qualify and under what circumstances. Despite this, the Government only released the PIP criteria the day before the vote in the Lords on PIP.


Both major political parties are generally agreed that at least a million people live on state sickness benefits when they are not actually sick or disabled.
This mass abuse of the welfare state began in the 1980s when the decline of heavy industry left large numbers of middle-aged men without jobs and without much enthusiasm for finding new ones. Since then there has been no shortage of new volunteers who prefer not to work and who find it convenient to live on sickness benefits.

Government focus on alleged fraud and over-claiming to justify cuts in benefits is fuelling abuse against disabled people, charities have warned.

even though there are no plans whatsoever to target the genuinely disabled. incapacity and disability allowances are paid only to those genuinely unfit for work.

You all know how important it is to feel you have a say in things that concern you, especially in these difficult times.  It’s not surprising you feel powerless when the government seems to have the upper hand in making changes that affect disabled and sick peoples’ lives. This is YOUR chance to have your say on one of the most important issues facing disabled people today – the change from Disability Living Allowance (DLA) to the Personal Independence Payment, or PIP.

I'm 25, naturally blonde, the hardness of my fingernails is such that they never break and I have an unhealthy captivation with EastEnders. I'm also a wheelchair user who has been severely disabled since birth. However, that's not important and I don't want to talk about it, OK?

Yesterday, the minister for disabled people, Maria Miller, said there are no shortage of jobs and blamed unemployment on people’s unwillingness to apply for work.

http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/stuart-white/liberty-is-at-stake-commons-lords-and-welfare-reform-bill Last month, in the context of the innovative ‘Spartacus campaign’ by disabled people, the second chamber of the UK Parliament, the House of Lords, passed a series of amendments – seven in all – to the Welfare Reform Bill.

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-24033624-disabled-are-at-the-mercy-of-ministers-and-media.do What would you think if you heard the Home Office was colluding with newspapers to fuel hatred against gay people? Or if affable Ken Clarke at the Ministry of Justice fed propaganda to broadcasters designed to disparage ethnic minorities? There would, quite rightly, be an outcry.

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/iain-duncan-smith-fairness-for-the-taxpayer--and-for-the-claimant-6792183.html
My message is clear: we must restore fairness to the claimant through making work pay and fairness to the taxpayer by ensuring money isn't wasted on trapping people on benefits.

Last week Warwickshire group Disabled People Against Cuts protested against the Welfare Reform Bill outside the office of Warwick and Leamington MP Chris White, who nonetheless voted in favour of the Bill.


A lottery winner claiming benefits just does not feel rightOur sense of fairness is being tested in all sorts of ways, and next month's budget will test it even further


http://www.thisisleicestershire.co.uk/pound-26k-benefit-cap-affect-1-000-families/story-15214078-detail/story.html Almost 1,000 households in Leicester receive more than £26,000 a year in state benefits, new figures reveal.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2012/feb/11/disabled-housing-wheelchair-user?newsfeed=true

Five years in a budget hotel because my husband uses a wheelchair

A long battle with a housing association about repairs to their home left a family facing eviction and £67k in debt
http://www.newstoday.co.uk/5180/2012/02/golfer-claims-disability-allowence/ ASUALLY enjoying a leisurely round a golf, this is the damning footage that landed a cheating pensioner in court after he claimed nearly £30,000 in benefits on the basis he was so disabled he could not even feed himself.

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