The WoW Petition Reaches 100,000 Signatures

SICK AND DISABLED PEOPLE HOLD IAIN DUNCAN SMITH TO ACCOUNT
DISABLED PEOPLE’S PETITION GAINS 100,000 SIGNATURES.

A government e-petition, http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/43154 written by sick and disabled people and carers today gained over 100,000 signatures, meaning it can trigger a Parliamentary debate.

Francesca Martinez, who has been championing the petition, says:
“This is a hugely important issue because many disabled and sick people cannot go out and protest against these devastating policies. It is vital that those of us who can, join together to ensure these basic rights aren’t eroded away. With 83% of disabilities acquired, anyone can find themselves with an impairment, or as a carer, and we must make sure that people are adequately supported when in challenging times. This is what a civilised society does. Instead of demonising those on welfare, we should be proud to create a society that provides for everyone regardless of health or ability. We will never forget the many tragic deaths already caused by this government and we will continue to fight in the hope that we can protect those in need from despair, poverty and death. We’d like to thank everyone who signed and shared the petition, and we look forward to the next phase of Parliamentary debate.”

Rick B one of the originators of the petition says:
“In July 2012 I almost died because of how the government treated me, many have not been as fortunate. Another founder of the campaign, John Dyer, sadly passed away in November before we reached 100,000 signatures. So we are resolute to take this democratic mandate and pursue the cause of making justice for sick and disabled people and carers a reality.”

Michelle Maher another WOW originator says:
“I became involved because of my cousin who had been living with Parkinson's for five years, with osteoarthritis and diabetes. Her claim for DLA took eighteen months to settle and she was in sheltered accommodation when she had to attend a tribunal. She was frightened, stressed and confused by the process. Inhumane.”

The petition was promoted through social media by people directly affected by welfare reform, many housebound or bedbound. Getting signatures was difficult at first, with the public unaware of a growing national scandal.

Recently however, public awareness has grown due to stories like this;

A dying grandmother faced the stress of moving home due to the bedroom tax, http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/bedroom-tax-charges-means-sick-2789221

Macmillan Cancer Care revealed that due to benefit problems, a terminally ill cancer patient was offered a foodbank voucher, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-24785115

Parkinson’s UK revealed that almost half of people with a progressive incurable illness are told they’ll recover, saying ‘A system which tells people who have had to give up work because of a debilitating progressive condition that they'll recover, is farcical and simply defies belief’
‘On top of this, many have their benefit removed after a year as an added 'incentive' to find employment. http://www.parkinsons.org.uk/news/27-august-2013/fit-work-test-tells-people-parkinsons%C2%A0theyll-recover

It is time for the Secretary of State to be held to account.

The petition, (dubbed the WOW petition as it was set up to resist the War On Welfare) calls for

‘A Cumulative Impact Assessment of all cuts and changes affecting sick & disabled people, their families and carers, and a free vote on repeal of the Welfare Reform Act.

An immediate end to the Work Capability Assessment, as voted for by the British Medical Association.’

The Welfare Reform Act 2012   http://services.parliament.uk/bills/2010-1/welfarereform.html
was proclaimed as ‘the biggest shake up in welfare for sixty years’ and Iain Duncan Smith personally described the changes as ‘aggressive’.

So it came as a shock to learn that for the people most affected by these changes, sick and disabled people and carers, no cumulative impact assessment had been carried out. The Secretary of State had no knowledge or understanding of, and apparently no interest in, how their lives were about to be turned upside down.

In a similar show of disregard for the welfare of sick and disabled people, the government has ignored calls from the medical profession to scrap the Work Capability Assessments (WCA) used to decide whether someone can receive Employment Support Allowance (ESA).

At their British Medical Association conference in June 2012, GPs called for the WCA to be scrapped ‘with immediate effect and be replaced with a rigorous and safe system that does not cause unavoidable harm to some of the weakest and vulnerable in society’. http://bma.org.uk/news-views-analysis/news/2012/june/scrap-work-capability-assessment-doctors-demand

The WCA process has been blamed for the deaths and suicides of people caught up in it, many of whom are denied the support they desperately need. According to the DWP’s own figures,

‘between January 2011 and November 2011, some 10,600 claims ended and a date of death was recorded within six weeks of the claim end.’ https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/223050/incap_decd_recips_0712.pdf

More recent figures on the deaths of claimants denied ESA cannot be obtained. The DWP decided to stop publishing them, and a Freedom of Information request was denied. Following this denial a number of people made similar requests, which were then described as ‘vexatious’.

Misinformation has abounded on these issues. The government, indeed the Prime Minister himself, has frequently and wrongly claimed that disabled people are exempt from the bedroom tax. http://blogs.channel4.com/factcheck/factcheck-cameron-wrong-again-on-bedroom-tax-detail

Grant Shapps claimed that ‘nearly a million people’ dropped their claims before facing a WCA, the implication being that their claims were not legitimate. This was completely untrue and he was rebuked by the UK Statistics Authority. http://disabilitynewsservice.com/2013/05/tory-boss-rebuked-over-partys-latest-misuse-of-benefit-figures/

In its own analysis of welfare reform, think tank Demos calculated that sick and disabled people will lose £28 billion in five years. http://www.demos.co.uk/press_releases/destinationunknownapril2013
This contradicts David Cameron’s promise to disabled people, ‘we will always help you,we will always stand by you’

In April 2013 Amnesty International condemned the government’s attack on the human rights of sick and disabled people. This went largely unreported.  http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/node/18320

In September 2013 the Dean of St Paul’s Rev David Ison presided over a ceremony in Parliament Square to remember the thousands of people who have died due to welfare reform. You can watch a brief video of the event here.
http://vimeo.com/75673397


The petition is still open until the 12th December 2013. http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/43154


Thank you to everyone for signing, supporting and sharing. 

Disability Doesn't Discriminate

How often have I said "Disability doesn't discriminate"?

Some of you know I have been terribly upset and worried this week because my sister has been unwell and in hospital. Thank you for your support through this, frankly it's been awful and without my family, friends and "virtual" friends I don't know how I'd have coped. We've been waiting for the diagnosis, it's come.

Let me start at the beginning.

My sister is healthy, has decided to take early retirement from the DWP (yes, stop booing) because of the tremendous stress she is under. So with just one year to go she decided to bring to an end nearly 30 years of work for the DWP. My sister was really looking forward to finishing because she has a new grandson,her first, just 8 weeks old. My sister already has a swimming session booked in with him, has changed her car to accommodate all the paraphernalia that goes with having a baby these days. My sister was looking forward to the retirement she and her husband have worked hard for. The round Europe in a camper van type holiday. The round the world trip etc etc.

So. My sister was getting ready to board a plane for Vietnam on Wedsnesday. She "fell" - she cracked her head open and has four staples in it. She started to "fit" - she had eight "episodes" in an hour and continued to have episodes every hour or so, she still is. I knew immediately from what she said that it was Epilepsy, however the hospital have done many, many tests - a lumber puncture, taken bloods, monitored her for 24 hours, a CT scan etc etc (thank god for our NHS), all this time she has been losing consciousness, at one time the crash team were called and my brother in law stood by thinking he was about to lose his wife. Finally today at 6pm, the consultant came, finally today the diagnosis came...."you have epilepsy". Let me tell you being at the receiving end of that statement is horrendous. The clock stops. Time stops. Then it hits you. The enormity of that diagnosis.
The enormity for my sister. She won't be able to drive her new car to pick up her new grandson. She won't be able to go swimming with him (on her own), she won't be able to ride her scooter round Europe..... the ramifications are enormous.

So. My oft spoken and written words "disability doesn't discriminate" are proven true again. It didn't discriminate against me, it didn't discriminate against my sister.

What if it doesn't discriminate against you? What if your comfortable lifestyle is all of a sudden hit by disability? Maybe you'll realise then that you should have signed http://wowpetition.com ......

I'm not writing this to make mileage from my sister, or to make a dramatic difference to the signatures, I'm writing this to show you it happens, it really does happen. There are four of us, four siblings. Two have diabetes, two have epilepsy. What are the odds of that happening?

Please protect your future and the futures of those you love, sh*t happens - believe me, it does, and when the sh*t hits the fan wouldn't you like to think the state will be there to provide for you? Think again!!

Please sign & share http://wowpetition.com NOW, TODAY!

There are just 40 days till the petition closes. 40 days for us to make a fairer, better, safer future for all of us.

My sister is aware I am writing this and fully supports me with all I and all the WOW team, followers and supporters are doing to make WOW petition a success. In fact just two weeks ago, to help me in my "traipsing" around the country for WOW, trying to raise awareness and signatures, my sister drove me to Bangor so I could help @TenPercent. Most of my family have met Rick. All my family support WOW petition. All of my family know the urgency to succeed and the need/importance to sign http://wowpetition.com ......because all of my family know DISABILITY DOESN'T DISCRIMINATE.......

Written and reproduced with permission from Jane @WOWpetitionchat

The Perils of Being a "Vulnerable" Benefit Claimant

Today, the Commons Public Accounts Committee published its report into some of the activities of JobCentre Plus (JCP), managed by the Department for Work & Pensions (DWP). Despite being snowed under with other work, I’ve read some of the report with interest, since I know very well that sick & disabled people who are dependent on benefits are often treated very badly indeed by the system that’s supposed to support them.

As an aside, I dislike the word “vulnerable”, as it tends to be used in relation to most or all sick & disabled people, and there’s no automatic reason why people have to be considered vulnerable just because they happen to be disabled. However, I do think  most sick or disabled people who are dependent on benefits are made vulnerable by the benefits system itself, which is steadily becoming less supportive and more punitive. Indeed, in a meeting I attended yesterday, we were reflecting that we really don’t believe punishing people and making their lives more and more stressful is going to “change their behaviour”, which in DWP-speak means “make them get a job”. Quite the reverse; the more punitive the measures taken against sick & disabled people and the more hardship they suffer, the more stressed they will become and the more their health will worsen. It’s not rocket science! If DWP doesn’t understand that, it’s because they don’t want to.

Anyway, back to the report. It doesn’t pull its punches, but it’s written dispassionately, of course, as befits a Parliamentary report. One of its principal concerns is that:

The Department [DWP] measures the performance of jobcentres by the number of people that stop claiming benefits.

As a disabled campaigner, this seems to me to encapsulate all that is wrong with the way DWP, JCP and their staff operate, at the behest of their ministerial team. The organisation is driven by the aim of removing support from claimants, rather than a more positive, humane and civilised aim of maximising their well-being – through work if that’s possible or through the support of benefits if it’s not.

I think the report strikes a good balance – it acknowledges that claimants need to do their bit to get a job if they can, but it points out that measuring how many people come off benefits is not the same as measuring how many get into work. Crucially, the Committee says:

The Department does not measure, however, how many people each jobcentre has helped into work or have a complete understanding of why claimants have left the benefit system.

Again, it’s not rocket science, and campaigners have long been especially concerned about what happens to people who are found “fit for work” at their Work Capability Assessment (WCA) but are unable to claim Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA) because they’re actually not well enough to work. In theory, they could end up with no money to live on; this is likely to be an even bigger problem when mandatory reconsideration before appeal is implemented for Employment & Support Allowance (ESA).

The report also points out that the principal performance indicator (how many people stop claiming benefits) increases the risk that sanctions may be used to force people off benefits; the committee says:

The focus on how many people stop claiming benefits… raises the risk that jobcentres may unfairly apply sanctions to encourage claimants off the register.

They report evidence from Citizens Advice, who say they’re supporting increasing numbers of “vulnerable” clients who have been sanctioned – some of whom have little or no understanding of why their benefits have been stopped.

The report also finds that Employment & Support Allowance (ESA) claimants generally receive a worse service than those on JSA – unsurprisingly it seems it’s not only Work Programme providers who “park” sick & disabled claimants. However, the reality behind this finding is that in the real world, regardless of the Equality Act, an employer who receives hundreds of applications for a vacancy is much more likely to give the job to someone who is not sick or disabled. JCP advisers aren’t daft; on the contrary, I imagine they’ll be even more aware of this obvious reality than the rest of us, and when they’re under pressure to perform, will naturally prioritise those claimants who are more attractive to potential employers. In this context, the Government doesn’t appear to understand the basics of supply and demand in the labour market, so perhaps I should spell it out:  when there are many more potential employees than there are positions available, employers can be choosy; in these circumstances, blaming the sick or disabled person for not succeeding in finding employment is, frankly, cruel.

Finally, for this blog at least, there’s another humane conclusion from the committee:

DWP has a responsibility to ensure that more vulnerable individuals are able to claim the benefits to which they are entitled.

DWP managers need to repeat this mantra to themselves every morning and every night, for as long as necessary, and apply it in the way they run their Department and manage Jobcentre Plus. Otherwise, sick & disabled claimants, especially those with mental health needs or learning difficulties, will continue to suffer appallingly in a system that appears to neither know nor care what happens to them and their families.

And before I upload, I’ve just seen that the Telegraph has noticed the effectiveness and influence of the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, Margaret Hodge. More power to her elbow!


This post was written and reproduced courtesy of Jane Young (@theyoungjane)

The Atos Inquisition

Guest post by Henry Benedict Tam @HenryBTam Author of the blog Question the Powerful

There was a time when the Spanish Inquisition hunted down those with the ‘wrong’ beliefs and made them recant their heresy. Now the British Government has rekindled its spirit, but with the aim of confronting the sick and the maimed so as to make them recant their disability.

Imagine you have been struck down by an illness, and according to your doctor, you will no longer be able to carry out work that would earn you a wage in today’s economy. For a time, you draw solace from the fact that you live under a state that maintains a genuine safety net for all, and you will not be left jobless, homeless, or having to beg for charity to keep you alive.

But then a Conservative-led Government comes along and decides that the best way to deflect public attention from its refusal to curb the excessive powers of the corporate elite is to serve up scapegoats. So it tells two and a half million people incapacitated by diverse forms of illness and injury that it will no longer pay any attention to what the doctors who have actually dealt with them have to say. Instead, it brings in the corporation, ATOS, to light the flame of recantation.

ATOS Inquisitors, armed with the mandate to interrogate and declare as many disabled people as undeserving of public support, have plunged countless vulnerable people into the deepest despair.

Examples of ATOS callousness and incompetence abound. Calling themselves ‘assessors’, they ask those summoned to appear before them questions such as “how long have you had Down’s Syndrome?” or “when did you catch autism?” A middle-aged woman, registered blind, was simply told that her benefit would be withdrawn. In another case, a 24-year-old epileptic, who was subject to grand mal seizures, had his benefit cut after he was ‘assessed’ to be fit for work. Just three months later, after living in fear that he could not pay his rent or buy food, he had a major seizure and died. People with debilitating and terminal cancer have also been told they had to surrender their benefits.

For those who managed to find help to appeal against ATOS, a third have had their assessments overturned. But many are too stressed or isolated to mount a challenge. Justice can only prevail if the entire inquisition regime is cast aside. The National Audit Office has investigated and found ATOS work to be unsatisfactory. The British Medical Association has asked for the assessment system to be scrapped.

But the Government is not relenting for one moment, even if people are dying from the fear and reality of losing what little money they had hitherto relied on to stay afloat. The Government is bringing in even more stringent inquisitional criteria to cut the provision of life-saving benefits. Meanwhile, they reward ATOS so handsomely that its chief executive is given a £1 million bonus.

If the ATOS Inquisition had featured in a dystopian novel about what a rightwing government might do, it would be decried as irresponsible scaremongering. Sadly it is all too real.

[To learn more about the Employment & Support Allowance (ESA), take the ESA Quiz. Note: the number of people claiming benefit as they are unable to work has not actually risen since 1997]

Open Letter to Liam Byrne - Will Labour Protect Disabled People?

Pat's Petition is going to Westminster on the 6th February to meet with Shadow Work and Pensions Liam Byrne to find out what Labour will do to support sick and disabled people. WOW Petition was created to ensure that the work done by Pat's Petition will continue into the future and we have some points and questions for Labour to answer too.


An Open Letter to the Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary

Dear Rt Hon Liam Byrne MP

The WOW Petition is a crowd-sourced grass roots campaign created and supported by disabled people, people with physical and mental health illness, care workers, carers and family members. We have come together because we are frightened. We have each been affected by the devastating consequences of the Welfare Reform Act and feel we are fighting for our lives.

We are determined to continue and build upon the achievements of Pat’s Petition. We are not satisfied that the government will understand or care about the consequences of the cuts and changes to benefits and services until a comprehensive impact assessment has been completed. We are aware of the Prime Minister’s intention to scrap impact and equality assessments. It is vital therefore, that a cumulative impact assessment is carried out with urgency.

Since the WOW Petition was launched on December 18th 2012, at the time of writing almost 18,000 people have supported us. We expect to reach the 100,000 target as we expand into new initiatives and the campaign grows.

Our petition has been championed by disabled actress and comedian Francesca Martinez. Francesca has spoken out publicly against the arbitrary cuts and the unfairness of disproportionately targeting the benefits sick and disabled people rely on. She has appeared on Newsnight and BBC This Week Programmes to voice her concerns. Baroness Grey-Thompson has also supported our campaign.

Sick and disabled people do not understand why the government wishes to wage a “war on welfare” against them. People who are genuinely too sick to work have been cruelly labelled as “feckless” and “scroungers” by government ministers. Welfare statistics have, we believe, been purposefully misrepresented, and the tabloid media has chosen to wage a campaign of misinformation and misleading stories about the level of welfare fraud. This in turn has altered public perceptions of disabled people and hardened attitudes towards benefit claimants.

Where is the sense in forcing people suffering with long-term and chronic conditions onto a depressed employment market where eight people on average are fighting for every job? People with mental health problems find it especially difficult to overcome employment discrimination and to establish themselves in work even when the economy is buoyant. The greater cruelty is that many of these people will not have access to treatment or therapy.

Sick and disabled people do want to work, but the Work Capability Assessment completely fails to recognise their limitations or how they can realistically function in the workplace. The consequences of forcing people to look for work and mandatory Work Related Activity under threat of losing income could cause illness to deteriorate and place a further burden on stretched NHS and mental health services. Sick and disabled people can and do make huge contributions to society. This does not have to be purely based on their ability to make money. Voluntary work and caring is vital for the economy but isn’t paid. For some “making work pay” will not improve their life chances, opportunities and finances. These people deserve to be better supported.

The third ‘Harrington Report’ revealed that just 9% of people expected to recover within twelve months had found work eighteen months later. The support to get people back to work isn’t working. Less than 1.5% of disabled people referred to the Work Programme had found employment.

We are certain that you are already aware of the failings of the fitness to work test, and the increasing numbers of recorded deaths resulting from the loss of income and stress. The fear of the Atos envelope landing on the doorstep is real. When people know that they are not going to have a fair and honest assessment that takes the opinions of their doctors and consultants into account they feel frustrated, helpless and terrified.

Over 330,000 people have been forced to appeal a decision they believe to be wrong. 40% of these are overturned, rising to 70-80% with specialist advice. The government is removing legal aid to make obtaining legal advice at the tribunal stage even more difficult, and we can only presume that it is a cynical attempt to deter people from appealing rather than fixing a broken system.

Under clause 99 of the Welfare Reform Act sick people could be forced onto Jobseekers Allowance whilst potentially waiting many months for the DWP to reconsider a challenge to a decision. These changes are going to have a huge impact on people’s lives. It is insufficient and dismissive of government ministers to blame Labour for introducing Employment and Support Allowance and to complain that they have inherited a flawed assessment process. This is an unacceptable defence for a serious failure.

We want a reassurance that the current fitness to work test will be scrapped and replaced with a credible medical assessment carried out by medical professionals who are allowed to apply their discretionary judgement based on their medical expertise. People feel they are being ‘tricked’ by confusing forms, tick box assessments and an impossibly narrow set of descriptors which excludes severe and enduring illness from the support group. Assessment recordings should be made available to all who request them to reassure people that the face to face tests are above-board.

People will and do work when they are well and able and appropriately supported. Battling illness and battling the current benefits system for some, unfortunately, is simply too much to cope with.

Universal Credit is yet an untested system of delivering benefits but the uncertainty surrounding it is causing a great deal of worry and confusion. Contributory ESA is excluded but the means tested component is not. Some people receive an element of both.

Hundreds of thousands of sick people have lost and will lose all of their Employment and Support Allowance after 365 days because they have a working partner, regardless of whether they are recovered or not. This arbitrary cut is penalising working families and proves that the government’s aim was to cut the budget and not to support sick people back to work. Without access to specialist employment advice they will be further excluded and isolated from the workplace.

We learn that in Merseyside alone the cost of the new “bedroom tax” to social tenants will be £16 million annually. What is most disturbing is that three-quarters of the households include a disabled person. Depending on the locality some people will be asked to pay council tax from their disability benefit incomes.

The government promised vulnerable people that “they had nothing to fear” and that “disability benefits are being protected” but Coalition MPs voted to cap the annual benefit rise of Employment and Support Allowance at 1%. This also includes the support group as only the disability premium is excluded from the cap. With food prices expected to rise above 5% this year sick and disabled people will struggle to buy the basic necessities. Many, including households with disabled children, are already having to cancel hospital appointments due to transport costs, take out loans to buy essentials and are choosing whether to heat their homes or buy groceries.

Local authorities are being forced to cut back massively on the care and support services they deliver to vulnerable people. The charity Scope report a funding gap of £1.2billion for adult social care. 40% of disabled people who require care are saying that their basic needs are not being met.

Disability living allowance is being replaced by the personal independence payment and the ‘goalposts’ are being moved so that by 2018, 600,000 fewer disabled people will be entitled to the benefit as would have received DLA. This is another arbitrary cut as changing the eligibility will not change the disability. Just because someone is ‘less disabled’ than another doesn’t mean that they don’t require the additional support to allow them to stay in work, maintain their dignity, be independent and have an equal chance in life as their peers. 100,000 disabled people are expecting to lose their mobility vehicles because they can move a mere 20 metres. Not even the length of the Commons floor. How is this “supporting disabled people”?

The cumulative impact of these cuts and changes, inadequate social care, along with many others such as the cuts to Children’s Disability Premiums under Universal Credit, the scrapping of Independent Living Fund for disabled adults who live alone, closure of day-care centres, degradation of mental health services, NHS services, amongst others, is too much to bear.

• We would like to know how Labour intends to correct the injustices sick and disabled people are currently having to cope with under the policies implemented by the Coalition government?

• What reforms to the welfare system does Labour have planned?

• Will Labour scrap and replace the Work Capability Assessment with an objective and trustworthy medical test?

• How do you plan to support those disabled people who have lost work through the Remploy closures?

We would like to thank you for considering our concerns and we look forward to your response. Our hope is that we can co-operate together for a better and fairer future for all sick and disabled people in the UK.

The WOW petition team

email info@wowpetition.com
website www.wowpetition.com

The Petition

We call for a Cumulative Impact Assessment of Welfare Reform, and a New Deal for sick & disabled people based on their needs, abilities and ambitions

Responsible department: Department for Work and Pensions

We call for:

A Cumulative Impact Assessment of all cuts and changes affecting sick & disabled people, their families and carers, and a free vote on repeal of the Welfare Reform Act.

An immediate end to the Work Capability Assessment, as voted for by the British Medical Association.

Consultation between the Depts of Health & Education to improve support into work for sick & disabled people, and an end to forced work under threat of sanctions for people on disability benefits.

An Independent, Committee-Based Inquiry into Welfare Reform, covering but not limited to: (1) Care home admission rises, daycare centres, access to education for people with learning difficulties, universal mental health treatments, Remploy closures; (2) DWP media links, the ATOS contract, IT implementation of Universal Credit; (3) Human rights abuses against disabled people, excess claimant deaths & the disregard of medical evidence in decision making by ATOS, DWP & the Tribunal Service.

PLEASE SIGN THE PETITION

15,000 People Have Now Supported the WOW Petition

Since it was launched just five weeks ago, the WOW Petition has now exceeded...

 15,000 signatures!

Thank you so much for supporting this vitally important petition. Please sign and share widely with everyone you know.

http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/43154

We need to reach 100,000 signatures urgently to call for a cumulative impact assessment of all the cuts and changes affecting sick and disabled people, their families and carers.

Pat's Petition Taking WOW Signatures To Meeting With Liam Byrne

From CarerWatch:-

Before Christmas we mentioned that Liam Byrne had suggested meeting with him to talk about an Opposition Day debate to request a cumulative impact assessment. Arranging diaries hasn’t been the easiest of tasks, especially with the christmas holidays in the way. But we now have a date.

Five of us will be heading for Westminster on 6th February to meet with Liam Byrne 

We can feel the start of a change of mood as people awaken to the individual impacts of the changes. More groups are protesting, more people are using social media sites to air their fears and concerns. There has been an unanticipated emphasis on Welfare Reform as tbe Benefits Uprating Bill makes its way through Parliament.

The Bedroom Tax is beginning to worry tenants as their landlords get in touch with them.

People are more familiar with terms like ‘Personal Independence Payment’ and ‘Universal Credit’ if not with ‘Employment Support Allowance’ and its two groups. Their sponsorship of the Paralympics means that everyone has now heard of Atos. Local authorities are making public decisions and we are hearing about the difficult decisions to cut vital services.

We are seeing language change to include ‘strivers’ as well as ‘scroungers’ but we’re still not convinced that the media gets the full picture for disabled people, their carers and families. This is why we need a Cumulative Impact Assessment, and it is what we will take to our talk with Liam: issues that are important to you, the 62,703 people who signed Pat’s Petition and all the people who have since said they would have signed it if they’d understood.
 

Please keep contacting your MPs, details here. Send them details of how the changes are impacting on you now.

Sign the new WoW petition by Francesca Martinez. You can read more about the WoW group here

We must all keep on keeping on.

Pat

x

Pat has also said she will be taking WOW petition's signatures with them to the meeting along with those of Pat's Petition. Showing how the strength of feeling is increasing.

WOW To Save a Life

With our thanks to @kennyblong

Government Broke Its Promise to Protect Disability Benefits

You could be misled into believing that disabled people are protected from benefit cuts when Iain Duncan Smith said that "they had nothing to fear" and the Chancellor claimed that "we will support the vulnerable." However, today in Parliament MPs voted to cap Employment and Support Allowance which will be limited to a rise of just 1% for the next three years. In real terms this is a cut as the rise falls well below inflation.

This income based benefit is given to people who have been through the ordeal of the flawed Atos work capability assessment and have been found unfit to work. They are too ill to "make work pay". Around 500,000 sick and disabled people depend upon this essential benefit to pay for their most basic necessities. The work related activity group includes people with progressive and chronic physical and mental illnesses, diseases and disabilities. Their benefit will not rise above 1%. The government claims to have protected disabled people in the ESA support group. This higher premium benefit is more difficult to receive because of a restrictive and narrow set of criteria which excludes all but the most severely disabled and terminally ill with short life expectancies. On closer analysis however, this too is subject to the real terms cut. It is made up of a basic allowance of £71.00 which is now capped at 1% and the support group component of £34.05 which is exempt and will rise with inflation. Essentially a benefit cap of 1.4%. This brings the total number of sick and disabled people effected by the cut to just under one million. Let's be clear. The government are not protecting disabled people.

A rise of one per cent equates to approximately £1 per week. Or one loaf of bread. This week the managing director of Waitrose has warned that the price of basic food items could rise as much as five per cent in 2013, or even higher across the whole market. The cost of utilities is also set to rocket further. For someone already battling with illness, at home needing to heat the house throughout the day these costs are simply not affordable. Disabled people are being forced to choose between food and heat, some are cancelling hospital appointments because of transport costs. This, at the same time as the very richest people in the UK who are earning over £150,000 receive a 5% tax cut.

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has calculated that the minimum amount a single working age person needs to participate in society is £16,400 a year, or an hourly pay of £8.38. The average wage in 2012 was £26,000. "A disabled person in the support group will receive £5,486 a year, or £15 per day. Less still for those who have work related conditions attached to the benefit who receive a daily amount of £14.12. Barely enough to survive yet alone participate equally in society. To suggest that it's unfair that benefits have risen with inflation when working incomes have not risen at the same rate misses the point entirely. There is no fair comparison to be made. Disabled people are twice as likely to live in poverty and only a small loss of income can tip people with a sickness and disability into greater dependence on health and social care services.

This is yet another cut that disabled people were not anticipating. Since writing the WOW petition the government has attacked us yet again. This is why we ask for a cumulative impact assessment of ALL of the cuts that effect sick and disabled people. I urge you in your good conscience to please sign our petition so that the consequences of the cuts to benefits and the services they rely on can be fully recognised and hopefully, some of the damage may be undone.

SIGN THE PETITION TO STOP THE WAR ON WELFARE

The Benefits Uprating Bill. See how your MP voted. (scroll to the bottom of the link to find the list)

The WOW Petition Reaches 12,000 Signatures!

We have now exceeded 12,250 signatures!

Thank you!  

1250 more people have supported the WOW Petition in just three days. Please keep signing and sharing this important petition everywhere.

http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/43154 

Liam Byrne Calls for A Cumulative Impact Assessment

Disability living allowance: why Labour’s safeguards are crucial

 

The government will set out its plans to change disability living allowance, while Labour will set out the safeguards we’re determined to see put in place.

Right now disabled people are being hit from all sides. Ministers had to be summoned to the House of Commons to explain why they were shutting Remploy factories without any serious plan to get sacked workers into jobs. The Work Programme has proved a catastrophe for disabled people wanting work. It found jobs for just a thousand workers. Scope’s Richard Hawkes wasn’t wrong when he said: “These shocking figures indicate a system that is not working for disabled people.”

But there’s worse. The government’s new bedroom tax is threatening disabled people with big cuts in vital housing benefit. And a loophole in the law means a family caring for an adult child on DLA will be hit by the benefit cap. The government’s management of Atos is so inept that a quarter of Atos assessment centres don’t even have disability access. It’s enough to make you think this government cares very little for the livelihoods of our disabled neighbours.

That’s why we’ve got to be ultra-cautious about DLA reform, and it’s why we’ll absolutely insist vital safeguards are in place.

Read Liam Byrne's article at liambyrne.co.uk

Trapped in a Cycle of Work Capability Assessments and Appeals

Disability claimants pushed to the brink by 'faceless' benefits system

Charities express anger at near-continuous work assessments that patients with incurable conditions are forced to endure

Fourteen years ago, Christian Dalley sustained serious brain damage in a motorbike accident and had to undergo two emergency lobotomies in the days after the crash. Although in some ways his recovery has been remarkable, the injuries to his brain have left him barely able to read and struggling to organise his life.

His neurosurgeon's assessment is that he will find it "very difficult to return to any form of paid employment", a conclusion that Dalley, with some regret, views as accurate.

However, shortly before Christmas, Dalley had his third Atos work capability assessment in as many years. He points out that since 2009, he has been caught up in a near-continuous process of persuading benefits staff that he cannot work. He was twice ruled fit for work and he twice appealed against the decision at a tribunal, where judges on both occasions found him not capable of working and reinstated sickness benefits.

Charities have expressed anger at the number of people with long-term, incurable conditions who are caught in a similar cycle, being forced on repeated occasions to prove that they are not able to work, despite supplying medical evidence that indicates that their condition is permanent and will not improve.

Read the full article in The Guardian

How and Why The WOW Petition Started

We are an ever increasing group of ordinary people who are sick, disabled, carers, and the parents of disabled children, who all feel driven to act against the extraordinary pressure placed upon us by the UK coalition government's ideologically driven Welfare Reform Act.

The petition was the result of a democratic process. It did not come from one person, rather it evolved from the desperation of many. Together we asked anyone who was concerned about the impact of welfare reform to share ideas and suggestions. Some of them created draft petitions and together we worked on and amended them until they satisfied the needs and wants of the majority as best we could within the limitations of the e-petitions website. There was a vote and a winner was chosen. Actress and comedian Francesca Martinez supported our campaign and submitted the petition on behalf of all UK sick and disabled people.

Another petition, called Pat's Petition after Pat Onions who is blind, and a carer, attempted to reach the 100,000 signatures required to potentially trigger a debate in the House of Commons. It was hugely successful and achieved just under 63,000 signatures with no funding or publicity. The deadline was drawing near and on social media an increasing sense of excitement. The target was in reach, but there was also a fear, that the pressing concerns of sick and disabled people would be fobbed off or flippantly dismissed. If Pat's Petition didn't succeed we had to do something to help ourselves and within our limited means. It mattered that ordinary members of the public cared and took notice. In fact the success of Pat's Petition has lead to an upcoming Opposition Day Debate and MPs will have to discuss the impact some the cuts to benefits and services are having on disabled people's daily lives.

We feel threatened by further welfare cuts since Pat's Petition ended. We dread the latest hate mongering headlines towards welfare claimants in the tabloid press, which invariably means the government is attempting to convince the public that it can target welfare claimants yet again for further cuts, conditions and sanctions to their essential social security. We again call for a Cumulative Impact Assessment of all of the changes and cuts to benefits and services before it is too late.

We are sharing our stories with other sick and disabled people who are finding their quality of life is being severely degraded. Sick and disabled people do want to work but the truth of the matter is, there is a woeful lack of real opportunity to fulfil our potential. People with illness and mental health problems are stigmatised and discriminated against by employers. When they do seek work that they feel they can cope with they discover the reality is that no one wants to employ them. Even during periods of economic growth employment opportunties are in short supply. To force these people into an overcrowded job market with the intention of 'helping them' is an ideological idea doomed to failure. The work programme is not a viable solution for sick and disabled people. It begs the question, if the government are prepared to pay private companies to find placements for disabled people, why are they shutting the Remploy factories down where disabled people had permanent jobs? Only recently, a law was introduced which allows jobcentre staff with no medical training to force sick people to sign up for the work programme under the threat of losing their benefits. These people have already undergone the harsh work capability assessment. Even Atos has determined that they are not fit to work. Can the government be so certain that their health will not deteriorate even further as a result of being made to work? Is this fair treatment for a sickness benefit? We are afraid that ESA is becoming too much like jobseekers allowance. We are sick, battling pain, exhaustion, chronic illness and mental distress on a daily basis. We feel we are now being vilified and punished too. We are not too lazy to work.

The majority of cuts have not yet been implemented. Sick and disabled people who cannot work to increase their incomes will not longer see their ESA rise with inflation when food and fuel costs will rise disproportionately higher than their benefits. The average wage according to the Daily Mail is £441 per week. That is quadruple the amount that sick and disabled people receive in benefit income. We are not "scroungers". No one would choose a life of poverty and illness if the choice was theirs to make.

Some people are now saying they have letters from their local councils. That they are having to pay council tax from their benefit income and they may also be hit by the charge for having an additional room. They cannot afford this extra payment but there is nowhere suitable for them to move to, and that to do so would move them away from family and carers and support networks.

The fitness to work test is not fit for purpose. The British Medical Association which represents GPs voted unanimously for it's immediate end because it is so detrimental to the health and well being of their patients. Those people who have worked and paid National Insurance contributions are having all of their benefits stopped after just 365 days because they have small savings or a partner who may only work part time. Many who have been through the flawed assessment process have long-term or debilitating conditions that will deteriorate and cannot be cured. They are being left high and dry without a penny in financial support and with no support to help them back to work. It's clear that the government has no intention of supporting those people towards re-employment. The result is that they are yet further isolated and removed from the work place. People are saying they feel like a burden on their families, that it's unfair when they've worked and paid their insurance contributions to support them in times of hardship, in some cases, for many decades.

People with mental health conditions find it especially difficult to endure the fitness to work test and many are being refused the benefit. We understand that three quarters of them will not have access to any form of treatment, and it's unsuccessful in three quarters of cases. To have to endure this harsh assessment year after year after year, only to be repeatedly found fit to work and go through the back logged appeals process cycle, is too stressful for some. People have committed suicide. There is a sense of fear from everyone. In April legal aid will be stopped. Even now it's exceedingly difficult to find a specialist welfare adviser. We know that professional advice helps people overturn wrongful decisions. This all coincides with the implementation of the new benefit Universal Credit and the change over from Disability Living Allowance to the new Personal Independence Payments. 500,000 are expected to lose their disability benefit, and with it their independence and dignity. People are saying that they will lose their mobility cars if they can move just 20 metres. Without their specially adapted cars they won't be able to leave their homes, attend hospital appointments and contribute to society at all. 

Too many cuts and changes are happening at once. Those mentioned are but a few of the better known benefit cuts. It is quite overwhelming and everybody is terrified. People on twitter are actually reporting deaths and suicides. It's heartbreaking. Some, that close members of their families are having to go into care homes because their care is said to be too expensive. These are people with wives and husbands, and children. 

Who will listen? Who will help us?

If we can reach a hundred thousand signatures it would signify powerful public dissent which the media should pay attention to and ask the government why they won't. We will continue to correspond with backbench committee MPs and media and hope to make it general knowledge that government policy was forced through and not based on evidence, not supported by sick and disabled people and is causing immense suffering. This is a moral and human rights issue at heart.

Anyone can become sick or disabled without a moment's notice, and they do. Turn away and one day, you may find that these cuts are falling not only on us, but on you and your family.

I've never felt so worried about my future or so completely insecure as I currently do. That's why I supported the petition. Will you?

Stop the War on Welfare

On Tuesday the 18th December 2012 UK disabled and sick people, people with learning and mental health difficulties, their families and carers launched a petition calling for an end to the "war on welfare" being waged by their own government.

The welfare budget, and particularly benefits going to sick and disabled people, has been heavily and unfairly targeted for cuts. It is said we can no longer afford the current welfare state. In reality however, as a percentage of GDP, the welfare budget is now lower than it was at any time during the eighties. While at the same time the combined wealth of Britain's 1,000 richest people increased by almost 5% to over £414bn.

In order to resist the government's cruel and failing welfare policies, sick and disabled people, together with their carers, families and friends, have combined using social media to produce the #WOWpetition. This calls for an end to the War on Welfare. Spearheaded by actress and comedian Francesca Martinez the WOW petition aims to get 100,000 signatures to end this War On Welfare by the government. We will be calling for a Cumulative Impact Assessment, an independent inquiry and if necessary, the repeal of the Welfare Reform Act of 2012.

We believe that every single person in the country has a reason to resist the War on Welfare. Some of us may be fortunate enough not to need the safety net our Welfare State provides, but this could all change for any one of us, tomorrow. It only takes an accident or a shock diagnosis to render us ill or disabled, and dependent on a system of benefits and services which is currently being dismantled.

The ‘Greatest Generation’ fought WWII believing they had secured this safety net for themselves, their children and generations to come. Don't let it go without a fight! We owe it to them. We owe it to ourselves to ensure a decent and dignified life for all who are sick and disabled, and to provide security for all our futures. The deaths of disabled people linked to the Welfare Reform Act and the Work Capability Assessment administered on behalf of the Government by the private corporation Atos are reported in the press with alarming regularity. We believe that in any humane society the Government would want to know if one of their flagship policies was in any way responsible for a ‘slow genocide’ of the sick and disabled. Please join Francesca and the WOW campaign in resisting the deaths and unnecessary suffering being caused.

SIGN THE WOW PETITION