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)

UK Has Exceptionally High Degree of Inequality

UK most unequal country in the West

Huge gap between rich and poor in Britain is the same as Nigeria and worse than Ethiopia, UN report reveals

 

Britain is now the most unequal country in the Western world, an authoritative new United Nations report reveals. The gap between rich and poor is as great as in Nigeria.

 

Detailed statistics in the Human Development Report published last week also demonstrate that inequality has grown sharply during Conservative rule and that the poor in Britain now have to live on much the same incomes as their equivalents in Hungary and Korea.

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The report shows that the poorest 40 per cent of Britons share a lower proportion of the national wealth - 14.6 per cent - than in any other Western country. 

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The richest fifth of Britons enjoy, on average, incomes 10 times as high as the poorest fifth.

Read the full article in The Independent

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

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