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Sue Marsh Speaking At A Future That Works #oct20

October 21, 2012
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Thanks to @latentexistence.

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from → events, Fellow Bloggers

New Ship Allows Disabled Crew To Sail As Equals With Able Bodied

October 21, 2012
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A tall ship is due to set sail to become the first vessel of its kind to travel around the world with a crew of disabled sailors.

Lord Nelson owned by The Jubilee Sailing Trust has been making final preparations to leave Southampton on Sunday for its 23-month, 50,000-mile (80,467km) journey.

The 180ft (55m) ship is the first tall ship to have been built to enable physically-disabled and able-bodied people to sail side-by-side.

It will visit more than 30 countries on all seven continents and cross the equator four times during the trip.

Rosin Gausin reports.

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from → Fun Stuff, progress

Ten Years Of Brits Dying At Dignitas

October 21, 2012
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Ten years ago a British man with terminal cancer travelled to Switzerland and drank a lethal solution of barbiturates to end his life, with his son and daughter by his side.

He was the first of more than 180 Britons to be assisted to die at Dignitas, a Swiss organisation founded in 1998 which helps people with terminal and incurable illnesses to end their own lives.

While euthanasia and assisted suicide are illegal in the UK, other countries, like Switzerland, do permit assisted suicide in specific circumstances – and Dignitas is the only Swiss facility to accept foreigners.

As a result, Dignitas has seen an average of 18 British citizens coming through its door each year since 2002 and many have chosen to be very open about what compelled them to travel abroad to die.

Having control over the timing of their death and avoiding a painful, lingering end have been the over-riding wishes of people like Dr Anne Turner, Peter Smedley and Jackie Meacock as they made their final journey to Zurich.

For those who travelled with them, there was always the fear of prosecution but, to date, no-one who accompanied any of the 182 Britons has been prosecuted.

Motivations

In the decade since, the debate over the ‘right to die’ has been played out through the high-profile court cases of Diane Pretty, Debbie Purdy and recently Tony Nicklinson – all of whom wanted assistance to die.

In February 2010, the Director of Public Prosecutions issued new guidelines to clarify who could face prosecution for assisting in another person’s suicide.

He said a range of factors should be taken into account including the motivations of the person assisting and the victim’s ability to reach a clear and informed decision about their suicide.

Sarah Wootton, chief executive of Dignity in Dying, which campaigns for a change in the law to allow assisted dying, said the new guidelines “were a watershed moment”.

“At heart, people should not be prosecuted for compassionate assistance. We have to think about what is criminal and what is not.”

Others, including disability campaigners, said the guidelines were dangerous and could lead to disabled people being pressured to end their lives.

But these guidelines did not change UK law in any way. The Suicide Act of 1961 still makes anyone who aids and abets the suicide of another person liable to imprisonment for a maximum of 14 years.

Choice on care

Healthcare professionals will still be prosecuted for offering assistance to patients who want to die, and doctors’ bodies such as the British Medical Association, the Royal College of General Practitioners and the Association for Palliative Medicine want it that way.

A 2006 survey of members of The Royal College of Physicians found that more than 70% were against a change in the law on assisted dying.

The focus, they say, should be on improving care for those approaching the end of life. The government responded in 2008 by publishing an End of Life Care Strategy covering adults in England which aimed to provide people with more choice about where they would like to live and die.

But Wootton says the law is inflexible as it stands.

“Parliament has turned a blind eye for 10 years as Britons travel abroad to die. In line with public opinion the law must change to allow people the choice of a doctor-assisted death at home and within upfront safeguards.

“Politicians have outsourced the problem to Switzerland.”.

However, Dr Peter Saunders, campaign director of Care Not Killing, says out of all deaths in the UK each year the numbers travelling to Switzerland to die “are really a very small trickle”.

“The British media give huge publicity to the cases which do occur and make it seem more prevalent than it is – but in fact the numbers are very small.”

In the last four years, the yearly rate at which UK people travel to Dignitas has not increased – and that is important, he says.

“There will always be a small number of determined individuals who will regard their lives as not worth living. But do you change the law for that small number of people?

“The first duty of the law is to protect its citizens – and that may mean that some determined people may not get what they want.”

Flagbearer

Some want to see a distinction made in law between mercy killing and murder so that people like Jane Nicklinson could have helped her husband Tony, who had locked-in syndrome, to die at home.

Novelist Sir Terry Pratchett, who was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2008 and is a supporter of assisted death, has become a flagbearer for the crusade to change the law.

He took part in a BBC Two documentary film which followed the final days of a 71-year-old British man who travelled to Dignitas in Switzerland to die.

Earlier this year, the Commission on Assisted Dying, an independent body set up with funding from Sir Terry Pratchett among others, looked in detail at the issue of assisted dying.

It concluded that any changes to the law would have to be balanced with giving people access to high quality end of life care and protecting the vulnerable in society. At the same time it said people should be provided with greater choice and control regarding how and when they die.

Next year a bill on assisted dying will be tabled in the House of Lords.

More debate

But is there any real likelihood the law could change?

Dr Saunders says Care Not Killing will continue to oppose a change to the law, alongside the medical profession and disability rights groups.

“The 1961 Suicide Act still fits a purpose. It continues to provide a strong deterrent. It gives discretion in hard cases too. It’s clear and fair.”

Looking ahead, Dignity in Dying predicts that a lot more countries will move to legalise assisted dying. Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands have introduced legislation to allow assisted dying. France and Spain are currently considering a reform of their laws.

The model Wootton prefers is one that has been in place in the US state of Oregon for 15 years, which permits doctor-assisted dying. It gives terminally ill, mentally competent people the option of an assisted death.

A decade on from the first British assisted suicide at the now well-known Swiss organisation on a featureless commercial estate outside Zurich, the law has not changed but the debate rages on.

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from → the law

Egypt’s Blind Female Orchestra

October 21, 2012
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Cairo’s Egyptian Blind Girls Chamber Orchestra has been called “a thing of light and hope”.

For years the musicians have been inspiring and amazing audiences around the world with their ability to play without seeing the conductor or reading the music.

The BBC’s Jon Leyne went to watch the orchestra rehearse.

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from → Fun Stuff, progress

Rebecca Lawes- Paralympic Swimming Star Of The Future?

October 19, 2012
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from → DisAbility Sport

Nick Griffin Says People Have A ‘Right To Discriminate’

October 19, 2012
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I say to Nick Griffin: Sir, that may be true, but if you have a right to discriminate against anyone, then anyone has a right to strongly disagree with your opinions on anything. Including the existence of a ‘right to discriminate. ‘

Whatever will he come out with next!

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from → mainstream madness

Sixty Per Cent Of Young Adult Offenders Have Past Brain Injuries Finds Report

October 19, 2012
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Earlier today, Independent Voices published an article by University of Exeter Associate Professor Huw Williams. The piece describes what its writer calls the ‘silent epidemic’ of head injury in young offenders.

It discusses a new report, written by Professor Williams, on the implications of brain injury for criminal justice. The findings of the report suggest that  a childhood brain injury increases the likelihood of someone committing a violent crime by adulthood. Sixty per cent of young adult offenders reported having suffered brain injuries, between three and six times as many as in the general population.

The article certainly makes interesting reading. However, the report appears only to apply to people who have experienced brain injury later in life- in childhood, adolescence or young adulthood.

I have had Cerebral Palsy since birth. For those who don’t know, Cerebral Palsy is a form of brain damage or brain injury which causes varying degrees of physical disability.

It would be interesting to know whether there are any published statistics revealing the percentage of people brain damaged from birth who have committed criminal offences and ended up in prison.

I have been writing about disability issues and taking an interest in disability news for five years now. I can only think of one such case, though there may have been others before it.

Christopher Killick has Cerebral Palsy. In December 2010, aged 47, he was found guilty of carrying out sex attacks on two men who also had Cerebral Palsy, but who were more severely physically disabled than himself.

Killick said at the time that he carried out the attacks because he knew his victims wouldn’t be able to complain.  He was jailed for three years in January 2011.

There is no doubt that Killick committed terrible crimes, or that prison is the right place for him. However, it would be very difficult to prove whether these crimes were related in any way to  the brain damage he suffered at birth.

Since Killick’s victims were more severely disabled than himself, it is likely that he felt a sense of power over them which could have been a significant factor in his actions.

Similarly, the brain injured adult offenders studied by Professor Williams may have been influenced by factors other than their brain injuries when committing their offences. The brain injuries may have played a part in their actions. However, it would be difficult to prove how significant that part was. Perhaps the level of significance was different for each person.

Just like offenders without brain injuries, there may have been other factors in their actions which the article does not mention. These include poverty and family history of substance abuse or crime.

Professor Williams recognises that with the right interventions, young people with brain injuries can lead full lives as valued members of society.

Personally, brain injury or not, I have no wish at all to intentionally commit any criminal offence, and can’t see myself ever doing so. I would like to think that my many friends with Cerebral Palsy share this view!

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from → Rants

Choosing and Funding A Wheelchair Accessible Vehicle

October 19, 2012
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This is a guest post by Jag Ture.

Wheelchair accessible vehicles are an increasingly common sight on our roads.  There is now a very wide variety of them, all adapted to account for a particular need.  That in itself is causing some difficulty though, as there is almost too much choice – the number of options can be overwhelming.  In this article, we’ll examine some of the considerations, to help you decide what is most important to you.  Later, we’ll look at ways of funding the purchase, including wheelchair accessible vehicle contract hire.

 

Firstly, consider how the vehicle is to be accessed; factors like space limitations when boarding at the location where it is usually parked should be considered here.  For example, it may be that access at the rear of the vehicle is not possible because there isn’t enough room behind to lower a ramp or lift, or if there isn’t much pavement space a side access door may not be suitable.

 

Secondly, consider the needs of passengers or whether cargo space is required.  These will affect the interior layout of the vehicle and therefore the options available for access.  Carrying passengers will mean that seats have to be retained for able bodied passengers, or removed if the passenger is to be seated in a wheelchair.

 

All the above should enable you to narrow down the choices to a handful of suitable vehicles.  Once you have the basics right, further amendments can be made to meet the users own specific requirements.

 

Now you have decided on a vehicle, you need to decide how to pay for it.  A wheelchair ready vehicle will obviously cost more than the equivalent base vehicle; this may influence the way it is paid for. Businesses who require such vehicles have traditionally had the option to buy the vehicle outright (which can leave a hole in their finances), or to take out a credit agreement (which will cost more because of the interest on the loan).

 

Lately, they have also been able to choose wheelchair accessible vehicle contract hire, which allows them to lease a vehicle long term (typically several years).  The lease payments cover the hire of the vehicle and can also be extended to cover servicing and breakdown cover, while at the end of the contract the vehicle is just handed back, meaning no worries about disposal of a depreciated asset.

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from → guest posts

David Weir Voted British Paralympian Of The Year

October 18, 2012
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Congratulations from Same Difference, Sir!

Equally sincere congratulations, of course, to British Olympian of the year, Jessica Ennis.

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from → DisAbility Sport, Famously DisAbled, Paralympics

What The Tasering Of A Blind Man Highlights

October 18, 2012
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Peter Beresford at Comment Is Free on what the Tasering of a blind man whose white stick was mistaken for a sword highlights about the police and disability awareness.

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from → links and plugs, updates

Girl’s Bionic Limb Will Grow With Her

October 18, 2012
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A Shropshire schoolgirl, who contracted a rare form of cancer, has been fitted with a metal leg bone which will “grow with her” as she gets older.

Hannah Baker, 9, from Clee St Margaret, had the femur in her left leg removed after she was diagnosed with an osteosarcoma tumour in April.

Surgeons at the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital in Birmingham, have replaced it with a special titanium rod which is extended by using electromagnetic pulses.

“It will grow with her as she grows up,” said Hannah’s mother, Shim Baker.

“She could potentially have it for up to 20 or 30 years, the only problem will be if Hannah grows too tall for it, then she would need surgery to put a longer one in.”

The titanium implant has motors inside it to allow it to be extended to match the length of Hannah’s healthy leg.

She will have to attend out-patient appointments in the future, where she will place her leg in a special electromagnetic device.

The pulses from that machine moves the motors inside the implant, allowing doctors to extend the length of her leg without performing surgery.

Mrs Baker said: “Before this technology, Hannah would have had to keep going back into hospital for more operations.

“She would’ve had open wounds and the chance of further infection – this means she won’t be spending months in hospital in the future.”

‘Christmas tree’

Hannah discovered she had the tumour after complaining of having an aching leg while doing sports.

The family GP did not know what was wrong with her so sent her for an X-ray at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital.

“I thought it was growing pains to begin with, or maybe a pulled muscle,” said her father Paul Baker.

“We were so lucky to catch it early because the cancer hadn’t spread anywhere else and if we hadn’t, she could’ve lost her whole leg.”

The X-ray showed a 22cm (8in) section of the femur had been infected by the tumour.

Mrs Baker said: “Her own leg bone was actually the tumour because the cells had laid down wrong and the bone just didn’t form properly.

“When we went for the scan, and they used the dye to highlight where the tumour was, Hannah’s leg lit up like a Christmas tree.”

Hannah has had to undergo a course of high dose chemotherapy and blood transfusions at the Birmingham Children’s Hospital.

Mr Baker said that looking after Hannah and her sister Emily, 11, had become a “round-the-clock job”.

He said he had not been to work at the haulage company he owned since April, and was relying on other family members to run it for him.

“We’re up and down the motorway to hospital to make sure we’re there for Hannah.

“I do all the night shifts in the hospital and Shim does the days. We sometimes only see each other for an hour or so a day.”

‘Fun-filled future’

A report by the National Cancer Intelligence Network (NCIN) published in October showed that bone cancer affects 380 people in England each year, with more than half of those people under the age of 24.

It also showed the survival rate of just 42% of people had not changed for 25 years.

Mr Baker said that Hannah wanted to help raise awareness of the condition.

“She said to me, I’ve got it and I didn’t know about it,” he said.

“We’ve met children who’ve lost virtually the whole of their leg, we’ve found people with it on their lungs because they’ve been told by doctors that it was growing pains or whatever.

“She doesn’t want other children to suffer like she did.”

Hannah has also given her cancerous femur to science.

“She thought if it helped someone in the same position as her not have to go through such intense treatment, she would donate it,” said Mrs Baker.

Hannah is currently in the middle of a second course of chemotherapy which will continue until Christmas.

“We know life will be different for her, she won’t be able to run and jump and play on trampolines and things like that but we will find other sports that she can do,” said Mrs Baker.

“It’s about giving her a future filled with fun, rather than telling her what she can’t do.”

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from → progress

Lancashire Police Apologise After Taser Was Used On Blind Man When White Stick Mistaken For Sword

October 17, 2012
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Erm… I’m not saying I’ve seen that many white sticks but do they really look anything like swords? I assume the police officers who made this ‘mistake’ have good eyesight themselves!

A police force has apologised after an officer used a Taser on a blind man whose white stick was mistaken for a sword.

The man was stunned by police following reports of a man walking through Chorley with a samurai sword on Friday.

Ch Supt Stuart Williams, of Lancashire Police, said the force deeply regrets” and had “clearly put this man through a traumatic experience”.

The man was taken to hospital for treatment and later discharged.

The case has been referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission.

‘Extremely sorry’

Mr Williams said police had “received a number of reports that a man was walking through Chorley armed with a samurai sword”.

“A description of the offender was circulated to officers and patrols were sent to look for the man,” he said.

“One of the officers who arrived in Chorley believed he had located the offender.

“Despite asking the man to stop, he failed to do so and the officer discharged his Taser.”

Mr Williams said it “became apparent that this man was not the person we were looking for and officers attended to him straight away”, taking him to Chorley Hospital.

He added that “Lancashire Constabulary deeply regrets what has happened”.

“We have clearly put this man through a traumatic experience and we are extremely sorry for that.

“We have launched an urgent investigation to understand what lessons can be learned.”

A man carrying a samurai sword was later arrested on suspicion of being drunk and disorderly.

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from → mainstream madness

Channel 4 presenter joins fight against muscle-wasting conditions

October 17, 2012
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A press release from the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign:

 

Channel 4 reporter and presenter Katie Razzall has thrown her weight behind the fight against muscle-wasting and weakening conditions, and has become an official ambassador for the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign.

 

Katie won recent acclaim as one of the Channel 4 team covering the Paralympics and has tackled social issues affecting disabled people through the No Go Britain series on Channel 4 News. She first became involved with the charity after interviewing Muscular Dystrophy Campaign supporter and film-maker Dr Jon Hastie about his Life Worth Living documentary on life with Duchenne muscular dystrophy for Channel 4. Katie has already supported the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign as a representative at the recent BGC Charity Day, which raised over £12million for charities worldwide in memory of employees of firm Cantor Fitzgerald who lost their lives in the World Trade Centre attacks.

 

Katie said:
“I’m thrilled to be joining the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign as an ambassador. Meeting Jon Hastie was my way in to learning more about a cruel disease; but it was also my chance to talk to a man who doesn’t let himself be beaten by Duchenne muscular dystrophy. Jon opened my eyes to what is possible.

“In our No Go Britain series at Channel 4 News, we’ve put disability at the centre of our coverage, and tried to shed light on subject matter and individuals often ignored by the media. I hope to continue with that aim with the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign.”

 

Muscular Dystrophy Campaign Trailblazer’s member, Hannah-Lou Blackall, said:

“As a Trailblazer, I am particularly excited that Katie is going to give her time to support the charity. Channel 4’s No Go Britain series, which Katie contributes to, has been an important platform for getting access issues for young people on the agenda. Her input will be of huge benefit to the group.”

 

Robert Meadowcroft, Chief Executive of the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign, said:

“We feel truly privileged to have Katie as an ambassador for the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign. Through her personal connection, Katie has an awareness of the issues facing those affected by muscle-wasting and weakening conditions, and has already shown her commitment by speaking with families and gaining further understanding. Katie has also worked with members of the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign Trailblazers to highlight in the national media social issues that many disabled people face. We know that she will be a fantastic asset to the charity and we are delighted to have her on board.”

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from → publicity

Study Finds 450,000 Disabled People Will Lose Out Under Universal Credit

October 17, 2012
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Nearly half a million disabled people and their families could lose up to £58 a week under the coalition’s flagship welfare policy – cuts so deep that one in 10 disabled households with children fear they might lose their home, a commission led by the Paralympic gold medallist Lady Grey-Thompson has found.

Backed by three charities – Citizens Advice, the Children’s Society and Disability Rights UK – the commission examined the impact on disabled people of the switch from the complex set of means-tested benefits to a single universal credit payment from next October.

The commission’s report, based on surveys of 3,500 disabled people and their families, says about 450,000 disabled people could stand to lose out under universal credit once it is fully implemented. Many are likely to struggle to pay for basic essentials such as food and heating, it says.

Three groups are particularly at risk, according to the report: 100,000 disabled children stand to lose up to £28 a week directly; 230,000 severely disabled people who do not have another adult to assist them are at risk of losing £28-£58 a week; and up to 116,000 disabled people who work could lose about £40 a week as the disability element of working tax credits is subsumed into the new scheme.

The charities and the commission are calling for more cash to be injected into universal benefits for disadvantaged families. “When families who may be affected were asked about losing £30 per week in support for disabled children, they expressed widespread concerns about having to cut back on food or heating, and getting into, or further into, debt,” the report says. “Around one in 10 families expressed fears that they could no longer be able to afford their home.”

The government claims universal credit will “make work pay”, but the commission says it found evidence that the changes could make it harder for disabled people to remain in work.

Grey-Thompson said: “The findings of this report do not make easy reading. The clear message is that many households with disabled people are already struggling to keep their heads above water. Reducing support for families with disabled children, disabled people who are living alone, families with young carers and disabled people in work risk driving many over the edge in future.”

Labour has called on the government to postpone the introduction of universal credit by a year, arguing there are too many unresolved problems.

Liam Byrne, the shadow welfare secretary, said: “This report is another nail in the coffin for David Cameron’s claims we are all in this together. The PM tried to hide it in the Commons, but this report lays bare the truth that he is snatching up to £1,400 from 100,000 disabled children yet offering a huge tax cut to millionaires. Disabled people and their families are being forced to pick up the tab for the government’s shambolic mismanagement of our economy”.

The government reacted sharply to the report, saying it was “highly selective and could result in irresponsible scaremongering”. A spokesman for the Department of Work and Pensions said: “We inherited a system of disability support which is a tangled mess of elements, premiums and add-ons, which is highly prone to error and baffling for disabled people themselves.

“Our reforms will create a simpler and fairer system with aligned levels of support for adults and children. More importantly, there will be no cash losers in the rollout of universal credit. In fact, hundreds of thousands of disabled adults and children will actually receive more support than now, including paying a higher rate of support for all children who are registered blind.”

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from → disability political policies, politics, polls

Virgin Media Says Blind Former Soldier Will Be Charged Up To £30 Extra To Get Her Bill In Braille

October 17, 2012
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Last night, I retweeted a Tweet saying that Virgin Media were charging a blind woman extra money to have her bill written in Braille:

https://twitter.com/nursiedeb/status/258309425314557952

I have since found out that the woman concerned is a former soldier who lost her eyesight while serving in the army.

Dr Eoin Clark asks people to Tweet Richard Branson to tell him exactly what they think. He has written up her case and other examples of negative treatment of customers by Virgin Media.

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from → links and plugs, mainstream madness

Panorama- Winterbourne View: The Hospital That Stopped Caring

October 16, 2012
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I have just read in today’s Society Daily that the BBC will run a follow-up to the Panorama programme on Winterbourne View at 8.30pm on 29 October on BBC1.

BBC Panorama exposed the abuse of vulnerable people at Winterbourne View private hospital in Bristol – and shocked the nation. Tonight, as the last abusers have been sentenced, BBC Panorama can reveal exclusive daily care logs from inside the hospital, never before shown secret footage and evidence of possible mistreatment at another hospital.

It is the untold story of some of the patients who faced the worst abuse at Winterbourne View.

There are allegations a number of patients from Winterbourne View have been assaulted at other hospitals and BBC Panorama follows their troubling journey.

Panorama answers some of the questions which Castlebeck, the owners of Winterbourne View, haven’t answered: including details about the high fees charged for some patients, even while costs were being cut. The film exposes significant failures in the management of the hospital and its training regime that contributed to the culture of abuse.

National and regional enquiries have examined the abuse at Winterbourne View but still, tonight, Panorama asks whether the patients from Winterbourne View are safe now and whether the most vulnerable people in society are really being protected.

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from → mainstream madness, progress, updates

Man, 19, Gets £10M Compensation For Brain Damage Caused During Hospital Treatment At Stepping Hill

October 16, 2012
by

Oh my God. £10M? Health is still priceless though and as I have said many times before, there is no replacement for such things not happening in the first place.

A hospital has agreed to fund lifetime care costing around £10m for a man who was brain damaged after being treated for croup as a baby.

Zach Petrou, 19, was left with the mental capacity of a baby following treatment at Stepping Hill Hospital.

The hospital has not accepted liability but has agreed to settle the family’s medical negligence claim at Manchester High Court.

His parents alleged he was deprived of oxygen during treatment in 1994.

They took him to the hospital suffering from croup, a treatable and common viral infection, but his condition deteriorated and he was placed on an emergency ventilator.

When he was taken off the ventilator he was found to be profoundly brain damaged.

Father Andros, 50, of Tameside, said: “We have been left devastated by what happened to Zach.

“We lost our son in 1994 at seven months of age, his future was taken away from him at that point.

‘Relentless’ care

“Zach went into the hospital a healthy baby boy but was given back to us severely brain damaged.

“The care that Zach needs is relentless. If you can imagine the needs of a baby but in an adult’s body, that is how he will be for the rest of his life.”

Zach has a normal life expectancy and, as he is doubly incontintent, fully mobile and can be unpredictable and violent, he needs at least two carers round the clock.

This means the settlement figure will potentially be one of the largest ever in the UK, solicitor Diane Rostron said.

A team of experts will now look at exactly how much Zach’s care for the rest of his life will cost, before a figure is agreed.

Ms Rostron said: “I hope this settlement will help secure the lifelong care package that Zach needs and at the same time provide a little bit of freedom for Mr and Mrs Petrou.”

Mr Petrou said: “We were forced to go down the legal route just to get justice for our son.

“We still believe that what happened to Zach should never have happened and we hope that it never happens to another family again.”

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from → mainstream madness

Gary McKinnon Extradition Decision

October 16, 2012
by

I am listening live to Theresa May MP’s statement and the result is that Gary McKinnon WILL NOT BE EXTRADITED!!!!! The DPP can now decide whether he will be tried in a UK court.

Regular readers will know that this is the outcome I personally have wanted and supported ever since I heard about the case. Janis Sharp, Gary’s mother, knows, I hope, that my best wishes have always been with them both.

I am absolutely thrilled to be writing this today. I send my sincere congratulations to Janis Sharp and Gary McKinnon and all those who supported them more closely than I did.

The Daily Mail has more details.

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from → progress, updates

David Rose, Author Of “Dave On Wheels”, Revealed As A Fake

October 16, 2012
by

This is a guest post by Matthew Smith. Thanks to Matthew.

Back in August, a blog was set up titled “Dave on Wheels”, purportedly

by a young disabled man called David Rose living in a nursing home in

California. The man was profoundly deaf and had severe cerebral palsy,

communicating through a Tobii speech aid using eye-gaze input. David

Rose had a sister, Nichole Rose, and apparently “David” was so severely

disabled that all his entries were in fact published by her.

 

A couple of weeks ago, “David” purportedly went down with pneumonia and

was taken into hospital. The last entry published, last Thursday (11th

Oct), was one that “David” had written and given to his sister to

publish in the event of his death. The entry told of three friends he

had known who had had that type of pneumonia and died of it, including a

girl he had known when aged 10. The blog built up a substantial

following by people who found Rose’s story and personality inspiring;

however, a website that had taken to him, called The Chive, became

suspicious when attempts to contact Nichole came to nothing and one of

the Chive’s contributors received an email pointing out that the picture

of “David Rose” actually belonged to another disabled man named Hunter

Dunn (and was lifted from the Tobii AAC company’s own website –

http://www.tobii.com/en/assistive-technology/global/user-stories/cerebral-palsy/hunter-and-his-mytobii-p10/ ).

 

The author of that email put up a website presenting her evidence,

titled “Dave on Wheels Exposed”, which has one entry –

http://dave-on-wheels-exposed.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/dave-on-wheels-exposed-twist-you-never.html

(as I write, this uses a theme which crashes some mobile browsers). It

contains some screenshots of the original blog, which has since been

removed (along with the Twitter and Facebook accounts that were used to

support it). It concludes that the author of “Dave on Wheels” was a

paedophile who used it to attract the attention of underage girls, hence

the profusion of underage-looking female friends “Dave” had.

 

The hoaxer is obviously a quite articulate person who justified their

deception on the basis that it moved and inspired people, causing an

“outpouring of positive, emotional energy” and may have prevented a

couple of suicides, and that someone donated $500 to an American

cerebral palsy charity in “David Rose’s” name. Still, the scam was

believable – in hindsight, perhaps it should have aroused suspicion that

a blogger died soon after starting their blog, and that this was not

mentioned in the “sister’s” tribute, and that the disability community

had no knowledge of this person before last week – and the news of his

death caused made a lot of people upset even though they had only

recently, or even only just learned of his “existence”. However

“inspiring” it may have been to non-disabled people, to many people with

disabilities and their friends, it is likely to have been an infuriating

act of emotional manipulation as many of us have lost disabled friends

or relatives at a young age, including from pneumonia which is a fairly

common cause of death among people with spinal cord injuries in

particular. In particular, the well-known autistic blogger Amanda Baggs

was admitted to hospital with it early last month, and I have been

unable to find any more information on her situation.

 

I think the “paedophile” explanation is far-fetched; there have been a

number of hoaxes over the years on the Internet, including several fake

cancer blogs, the “Gay Girl in Damascus” hoax which brought a dramatic

climax with the author’s supposed arrest, after which “she” was revealed

to be neither gay, female nor anywhere near Damascus. This particular

hoax had a similar pattern of a dramatic conclusion followed by fairly

rapid exposure but was much longer in the making, with one anonymous

commenter on the “Dave on Wheels Exposed” blog alleging that they had

been in correspondence with “Dave” since 2008. Whatever good this person

thinks he may have done does not justify the hurt and the emotional

manipulation it involved.

 

Samedifference1 adds: I heard of this case last night from Matthew. As regular readers know, I have Cerebral Palsy. The thought that a person who is not disabled would want to make up having Cerebral Palsy at any level shocks me. The fact that he faked an extremely severe level of Cerebral Palsy- a level that two of my best friends, who are sadly not alive today, lived with in reality- and then tried to fake death just makes the situation worse many times over in my eyes.  


					

	

		
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Court Of Protection Judge Allows Operation On Mentally Ill Woman Who Denies Cancer

		
October 16, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Doctors have been given permission to perform potentially life-saving cancer surgery on a woman who has a “delusional belief” that she does not have the disease.


A judge at the Court of Protection in London ruled that the treatment would be lawful and in the best interests of the 61-year-old, who suffers from chronic schizophrenia.


Announcing his decision, Mr Justice Holman said: “She has cancer of the uterus. She could be cured by a potentially life-saving operation. However, because of other co-morbidities and other factors there is a considerable risk that she could die during the operation or in the post-operative recovery period. She herself lacks the capacity to make an informed decision. She denies that she has cancer at all and opposes, and is resistant to, the operation.”


The judge added: “The lady’s three adult sons all strongly desire that she should have the operation and feel that the potential benefits outweigh the risks. The question for the court is whether balancing all the relevant factors it is in her overall best interests to have the operation or not.”


The judge was ruling on an application brought under the Mental Capacity Act 2005 by an NHS trust in the south of England, which is responsible for the woman’s physical health care, for declarations setting out what treatment would be lawful in her case.


“Everyone in this case is strongly motivated by a desire to prolong and maximise her life,” he said.


The woman, who is referred to as K and cannot be named for legal reasons, “utterly denies that she has cancer” – she has a “delusional belief that she does not have cancer at all”.


As well as her severe mental disorder she is also obese and suffers from diabetes.


The judge granted declarations to the trust, which also cannot be named, that the proposed surgery under general anaesthetic would be lawful “notwithstanding K’s refusal to consent to such treatment”.


Mr Justice Holman concluded: “Assuming the surgery takes place it is of course my fervent hope that it proceeds as smoothly as possible to a good outcome for Mrs K. Like her sons I fully appreciate that it may not. I, like they, have tried to do my very best for her.”

					

	

		
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National Billboard Campaign Against Euthanasia

		
October 16, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Anti-euthanasia campaigners are preparing to mount the first nationwide billboard campaign against euthanasia and assisted suicide.


Members of ALERT, Distant Voices and Not Dead Yet UK are behind a venture to post billboards in nine cities in England and Scotland showing a silhouette of a person with the caption:


WHAT’S THE COST OF EUTHANASIA?


YOU ARE!


Distant Voices are also seeking and working with “envoys” who will place themselves in town and city centre’s on Saturday October 27th – a day of action – to give out accurate information and engage in conversation with members of the public about euthanasia, assisted suicide and the Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP).


The purpose of the billboard campaign is to draw attention to and generate discussion and debate about the issue of euthanasia and assisted suicide. The day of action will also enable ‘envoys’ to demonstrate their opposition to euthanasia, assisted suicide and the LCP. It is anticipated that some ‘envoys ‘ will be drawn from organistions who have had direct personal experience of the LCP and ultimately lost loved ones.


Alert, Distant Voices and NDY oppose the legalisation of euthanasia/assisted suicide and would wish to highlight the dangers of the LCP in the UK and to inform the public of the dangers involved in it’s use.


The billboards will appear for two weeks between October 14th and November 1st in London, Liverpool, Bristol, Birmingham, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Newcastle upon Tyne, Telford and Manchester.


Nikki Kenward of Distant Voices said: “The Government has appointed a new Under-Secretary of State for Health, Anna Soubry, whose first public statement was: ‘It’s ridiculous and appalling that people have to go abroad to end their life instead of being able to end their lives at home.’ 


“She said the laws governing how people could take their lives needed to ‘evolve’.


“We all know what that means to any of us who are vulnerable, or may become vulnerable. I feel the icy wind of the past touching my bones. Euthanasia might not be on your mind today, tomorrow or as you go about your daily life, but if it is legalised it will be in your life, part of your life, or taking your life. So take a moment to ask yourself, ‘Do I want to live in a society which places its most vulnerable citizens in the position of having to ask themselves should I die…..I am I a burden? Do I cost too much? When every sinew of their body is willing them to continue with life whatever the struggle. When every sinew of you is telling you to live since you are now that burden, that person who needs care, someone who asks something different from society!


She said: have the sombuliant British public got the guts, the anger, and the fear, the foresight to wake up and realize the deception. We are well onto the slippery slope now with the wholesale adoption of the LCP into over two thirds of our hospitals. Euthanasia through the back door. 


Part of the two week campaign will involve ‘envoys’ placing themselves inside town and city centre’s to talk to members of public in an attempt to explode some of the myths currently fueling the move towards the acceptance of euthanasia.


Nikki concluded;


 “We will speak out for ourselves and for those who cannot speak and who need us to speak for them. We will talk to people, tell them the truth and offer them the chance to be safe in their old age and in illness or disability. Envoys can stand for a day, an hour, an afternoon, a weekend, as long as they like – two, four, six, or a whole crowd of them, they will be there and be heard before it’s too late.”


TO become an ENVOY please contact NIKKI KENWARD and her team


on 01588 660528 OR EMAIL nikkikenward@gmail.com


For further information


Please contact either Nikki Kenward of Distant Voices


Tel: 01588 660528 or


Elspeth Chowdharay-Best of ALERT


Tel;020 7730 2800.


Website: http://www.alertuk.org

					

	

		
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John Lennon’s Imagine: The Disability Version

		
October 15, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Written by Martyn Sibley. Originally posted here.


Imagine there’s no stairways

It’s easy if you try

No steps below us

Above us only one sky

Imagine all the people

Living in equality…


Imagine there’s no prejudice

It isn’t hard to do

No reason to judge or hate

And no name calling too

Imagine all the people

Living life in peace…


You may say I’m a dreamer

But I’m not the only one

I hope someday you’ll join us

And the world will be as one


Imagine accessible transport

I wonder if you can

No broken lifts or moody drivers

A brotherhood of man

Imagine all the people

Sharing all the world…


You may say I’m a dreamer

But I’m not the only one

I hope someday you’ll join us

And the world will live as one

					

	

		
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Crowd Sourcing A Cure For Cancer Online

		
October 15, 2012

	

	

		

		

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If only finding a cure for cancer was as easy as setting up a website. This is not the way I would choose to deal with a diagnosis- but whatever helps him I guess.


Sharing it here because I smiled and I hope you will too.

					

	

		
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Joseph O’Reggio

		
October 15, 2012

	

	

		

		

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The family of a boy left severely brain damaged by complications at his birth in hospital have accepted £6m in compensation.


Joseph O’Reggio, 11, of Wolverhampton, suffered permanent brain injuries when he was starved of oxygen at New Cross Hospital in the city in April 2001.


His family won the right to claim a seven figure compensation package at the High Court in London in June 2011.


His parents have described it as a “massive relief”.


‘Rest easy’


Joe, who was left with cerebral palsy, has severe learning difficulties and cannot speak or feed himself.


His father Julian O’Reggio, said: “We can rest easy that Joe will be provided for, for the rest of his life.


“All the specialist equipment he may need, we can have carers to help with his daily routines, extra physio, extra occupational therapy, extra speech therapy, all the additional input he’s going to get which will hopefully get the most out of him within his limitations.”


Lawyers for the boy claimed his injuries were caused by medical negligence on the part of staff at the hospital, who they said should have realised he was in distress at an earlier stage.


The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust denied the delays caused the injuries but agreed to compensate Joseph on the basis of 80% of a full valuation of his claim.


In a statement, the trust said it hoped the damages will “secure Joseph’s future and assist him in maximising his potential”.

					

	

		
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Families Of Disabled Children ‘At Breaking Point’ Over Care Gaps Warns Report

		
October 15, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Almost two thirds (62%) of families with disabled children are not getting crucial support and services in their local area, according to a report by the disability charity Scope published on Monday. The figures were released as charities, parenting groups and disability campaigners warned that families with disabled children are at breaking point because of a chronic shortage of local childcare, nursery places, appropriate schools, essential therapies and even healthcare in their local area.


Scope, Sense, 4Children and The Family and Parenting Institute came together as the government prepares “the biggest shakeup of support for disabled children or those with special educational needs for 30 years”: the children and families bill.


The Scope report says 60% of the 600 families spoken to said getting their child the right services was a “battle”. Of the families who couldn’t access services locally, 80% said it caused them stress and anxiety, while 51% said it affected their ability to work and meant they missed out on family activities such as birthdays and playing together.


The draft bill, published in September does not go far enough, charities say. A Department for Education spokesman said: “We’re changing the system so they get this help as quickly as possible, and we’ve already started to test new arrangements in 31 local authorities well before they come into force in 2014.”


Richard Hawkes, chief executive of Scope, said: “The government has a once-in-a generation opportunity to end the daily struggle parents of disabled children face.


“More than 500,000 families have a disabled child. Life is tough for all families at the moment but the pressures and struggles placed on families with disabled children are pushing them to breaking point.


Mark Goldring, chief executive of Mencap, said: “We welcome Scope’s report. We know from our work with people with learning disabilities, and their families, up and down the country that many are struggling to get the right support and specialist services, and that they have real fears about their finances in the future.


“Mencap hopes that the Children and Families Bill will transform the way local authorities work to deliver the services that families, children and young people need and are entitled to.”


Katherine Rake, chief Executive of the Family and Parenting Institute, said: “Families continue to act as the shock absorbers to rises in prices, frozen wages, and cuts in spending and on children’s services.


“There is only so much families can take and future cuts will make it even tougher to ensure fair access to services.


“The Children and Families Bill presents a huge opportunity for the government to realise its ambition of a family friendly UK but the government needs to be bolder in its commitment to families if the Bill is to make a difference to struggling families.”


Gillian Morbey, chief executive of Sense and Sense International, said: “Parents of deafblind children tell us every day that they have to fight to get the right support for their child. Deafblind children are unique and their support needs have to be met to enable them to live as fulfilling lives as possible.


A spokeswoman for children’s charity 4Children added: “4Children welcomed much in the Children and Families Bill, including its positive approach to adoption.


“However, we are concerned by the limited scope of this Bill – at a time when families are facing dwindling incomes against rising prices, growing unemployment and cuts to vital services, this Bill does little to address the real problems families are facing.”



					

	

		
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Disability Organisations In Wales Reveal PIP Fears

		
October 15, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Disability organisations in Wales fear a new benefit being introduced next year will leave some people worse off.


The Disability Living Allowance (DLA) for those of working age is being replaced with the Personal Independence Payment (Pip) in April 2013.


The UK government argues it will be a fairer system that ensures that those most in need get the help they deserve.


Paul Warren from the disability charity Diverse Cymru told BBC Wales it could drive more families into poverty.


Under the change, claimants will face a medical interview and regular benefit reviews.


UK ministers say the new Pip system will help deliver a 20% saving on what the state would have spent on DLA by 2016.


But Paul Warren, director of policy and planning of Diverse Cymru, told the BBC Wales current affairs programme Eye on Wales that he fears many people will suffer.


“The government’s own figures state that 500,000 people will lose entitlement altogether. Others will only qualify for a lower rate,” he said.


“You’ll have families that will be driven even further below the poverty line. People will find themselves a lot worse off than they are and a lot less able to contribute to the economy.”


“Also it will have a major effect on their independence.”


Incentives


The current DLA system was introduced 20 years ago to recognise the extra costs disabled people face in taking an active part in society.


The DLA is not means tested, and includes a mobility and care component that can be worth between £20 and £130 a week.


But the chancellor George Osborne signalled in his first budget in 2010 that reforms to the DLA were a priority.


Primarily, he said it was because the number of DLA claims had risen by almost 40% in the last decade – from just under 2.4m people to 3.3m.


It means the DLA bill stands at around £13bn a year, making it one of the UK government’s largest items of spending.


The chancellor said changes to the DLA would mean the government could “continue to afford paying this important benefit to those with the greatest needs, while significantly improving incentives to work for others”.


Esther McVeigh, minister for disabled people at the Department of Work and Pensions, said: “It’s designed to achieve a fairer system. Lots of people have said: ‘This needs to be looked at’.


“We will continue spending £13bn a year. But it’s to ensure that the people who need the money the most are getting it.”


Medical assessments


Ms McVeigh said the government remained committed to spending £40bn a year on services for the disabled, but cited DLA overpayments of £630m and underpayments of £190m as just one reason for the changes.


She added that the current system meant there were no regular reviews of who was receiving the DLA benefit, and whether they should be.


“Some people are on benefits for life, they’ve never seen anybody, they’ve never had a medical assessment,” she said.


“What we’re saying is let’s have a look at this, let’s make sure that people are getting the right money and let’s give people the best support they can possibly have, so they don’t fill in a 40-page confusing document, they actually meet with somebody and go through a much fairer system.”


The move to Pip will be completed by 2016, when the government expects 1.7m people to be claiming the new benefit.


Without the reforms, officials estimate that 2.2m people would be claiming working-age DLA by the same time.


‘Wider impact’


Welsh think-tank the Bevan Foundation has been conducting research into the possible impact of wider welfare reforms in Wales.


Director Victoria Winckler said she is not convinced that the savings made through the introduction of Pip will not be felt elsewhere.


“A disabled person who is working at the moment who can no longer go to work because they’ve lost their DLA will then end up claiming benefits and actually costing more,” she said.


“At the moment people who are using their DLA to buy their own services, they could well be looking to their local authorities for help.”

					

	

		
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Extracts From Welcome To Biscuit Land

		
October 14, 2012

	

	

		

		

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The Observer today has published extracts from Welcome To Biscuit Land– the new book by Jessica Thom.

					

	

		
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Meet Blaze, The Two Year Old With Arthritis

		
October 14, 2012

	

	

		

		

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“Arthritis isn’t something you think a two-year-old could have.”


But that was the explanation Kelly O’Sullivan was eventually given for her two-year-old daughter Blaze’s unusual symptoms – a rash that covered her body and swollen joints which stopped her wanting to walk.


Kelly, from Bolton, says Blaze had a normal birth and developed normally, walking when she was a year old.


But Blaze became ill in January this year when she was 18 months old.


Kelly says: “At first she got a rash all over her and a high temperature and she didn’t want to walk.


“I took her to the doctor and she was given lots of different medicines, antibiotics.


“Then she started walking with a limp, and it got progressively worse and her knee swelled up to the size of a tennis ball.”


Doctors thought Blaze’s symptoms were caused by a viral infection, but then she began to experience stiffness in her neck and this time was referred to her local hospital.


Kelly said: “They still thought it was a viral infection. She was in there for about four weeks, and given intravenous antibiotics. Lots of doctors from different specialties saw her.”


However there was still no diagnosis – and Blaze was moved to Manchester Children’s Hospital where another raft of tests, including a lymph node biopsy and a bone marrow test, were carried out.


Finally – in March – she was diagnosed with systemic juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA).


‘She shouldn’t miss out’


JIA refers to a group of arthritic conditions which affect children. All cause inflammation, but relatively little is known about them and how they will progress.


Any problem usually starts before a child is five, and affects more girls than boys. An estimated 12,000 children in the UK have a form of arthritis.


Some only have a short-term illness, while around a third continue to have symptoms into adulthood – but it is hard to predict how an individual’s illness will progress.


Kelly said she was pleased that Blaze had a diagnosis at last – but surprised.


“I didn’t know a two-year-old could get arthritis. It’s not something you think they can have.”


Blaze now has to have daily and weekly injections and takes steroids to control her symptoms.


Kelly, who also has a two-week-old baby, says the medication is helping but Blaze cannot lead a normal toddler’s life.


“She should be able to run around like any normal toddler. And I can’t get her into a nursery because one of the drugs she takes, methotrexate, affects the immune system and they won’t take her.


“I’m trying to get her a place though, because she shouldn’t have to miss out.”


‘Worth it’


Blaze is one of over 1,300 children taking part in a study overseen by the University of Manchester, and backed by the charity Arthritis Research UK, which aims to find out more about JIA.


Geneticist Prof Wendy Thomson, who is one of the researchers working on the study, said: “There is so little known. Parents often say there’s a lack of information about what might happen to their child.”


Children in the study, which began in 2001, are followed up annually to the age of 16, with subsequent checks at the age of 18 and 21.


Kelly said: “When it was explained they they didn’t know much about the illness and wanted to find out more, I decided to get involved.


“If that helps another family in the future, rather than them having to go through months waiting to find out what it is, it’s worth it.”

					

	

		
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Technology Makes Computer Games Accessible To Kids With Disabilities

		
October 13, 2012

	

	

		

		

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From the Newsround website:




Now you might think the big names in games are there for everyone to enjoy.


But some people find it more difficult than others to play…until now.


The computer games industry is changing to make gaming more accessible for kids with disabilities.


So we sent Joe to meet some kids who’ve been trying out the new technology.



					

	

		
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Could Stoke Mandeville Hospital Be ‘Vicariously Liable’ For Jimmy Savile’s Actions?

		
October 12, 2012

	

	

		

		

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This is worth a listen.




The World at One heard that some of the women who say they were abused by Jimmy Savile are now considering seeking compensation from the BBC and Stoke Mandeville Hospital.


Lawyer Liz Dux explained to the BBC’s Anna Adams that the BBC and hospital had a duty of care to anyone who came into contact with Savile when he was representing them.


It is possible that a court could hold them “vicariously liable” for his actions.


Ms Dux said victims who had contacted her “want some form of recognition as to what has happened to them in the past… they want to be taken seriously, they are not interested in the financial compensation at all.”



					

	

		
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Sue Marsh’s Open Letter To Mark Hoban MP

		
October 12, 2012

	

	

		

		

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In response to this.






					

	

		
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Former Patient At Stoke Mandeville Tells BBC She Was Abused By Jimmy Savile

		
October 11, 2012

	

	

		

		

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A former patient at the hospital has told the BBC she was abused by Savile in 1971 when she was 13.


Caroline Moore, 53, from Clarkston near Glasgow, was in a wheelchair being treated for spinal injuries at the time.


She said: “I was outside a ward or a gym and he came out and just rammed his tongue down my throat… I was 13 and didn’t know anything about that kind of thing.


“I told my family at the time but they didn’t take it seriously because he was so high-profile. I tried to raise it a few years ago when a documentary was being made but they wouldn’t entertain me either.”


Ms Moore said she wished Savile was alive to face the allegations made against him.


“I feel cheated. After 40 years he still upsets me,” she added.

					

	

		
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‘Growing Number Of Allegations’ That Jimmy Savile Targeted Children On Wards At Stoke Mandeville

		
October 11, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Sir Jimmy Savile visited wards at an NHS hospital to find children to abuse, it has been claimed.


There are a growing number of allegations that the former TV presenter groped young patients at Stoke Mandeville Hospital in Buckinghamshire, where he worked as a volunteer fundraiser.


Nurses at the hospital are understood to have dreaded his visits because of his behaviour, and would tell children to stay in bed and pretend to be asleep when he came round.


Rebecca Owen, a former patient at Stoke Mandeville Hospital, told BBC News she overheard nurses talking in a way that suggested he also targeted them, the Daily Telegraph said. Ms Owen told the paper: “It was an air of resignation that you had to put up with. There was some sort of ironic chatter between the nurses about who would be the lucky one to go off to his room. And then, as one of the nurses was leaving or passing by my bed, she leant over and said, ‘the best you can do is stay in bed until he’s gone and pretend to be asleep’.”


Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust, which runs the hospital, said it was shocked to hear the allegations and never received any complaints about Savile. A statement from the trust said: “We are unaware of any record or reports of inappropriate behaviour of this nature during Jimmy’s work with the trust. We can confirm that the police have contacted us this week as part of their assessment exercise and we are co-operating with them fully.”


As the scandal of Savile’s alleged abuse of children in his BBC dressing room, at hospitals and schools continues to grow, calls have been made for the BBC to review its guidelines on child protection.


Lord Patten, the chairman of the BBC Trust, called the allegations against Savile a “cesspit”, and said he wanted to ensure the corporation’s policies were “fit for purpose”. He also pledged that the BBC’s independent inquiry should be launched as swiftly as possible following a police investigation into Savile’s activities.


Lord Patten said he believed it would be a good idea for BBC director-general George Entwistle to make a prominent apology on behalf of the BBC once the claims have been unravelled, possibly on prime-time TV.


His comments came hours after Savile’s headstone was removed from a cemetery in Scarborough and taken away out of “respect to public opinion”. The elaborate tombstone was removed from Woodlands Cemetery shortly after midnight at the request of Savile’s family to be broken up and sent to landfill. The grave, in which Savile was buried at an angle so he could “see” Scarborough Castle and the sea, will remain unmarked for the foreseeable future.


Police said they believe the “predatory sex offender” could have abused up to 25 victims over a period of 40 years.

					

	

		
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Woman Saw Jimmy Savile Abuse Fellow Patient On Neuro Ward At Leeds General Infirmary

		
October 11, 2012

	

	

		

		

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A woman who was treated at a Leeds hospital four decades ago has alleged she saw Sir Jimmy Savile abuse another female patient who was unable to defend herself.


Savile volunteered as a hospital porter at Leeds General Infirmary during the 1960s and 70s.


June Thornton, who was a patient at the hospital in May 1972, said she was unable to intervene as she was too unwell herself.



					

	

		
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Doctors want More Done For MS Diagnosis

		
October 10, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Doctors want more to be done to speed up the diagnosis of multiple sclerosis.


Around 2,500 people are diagnosed with MS every year with about half of those thought to be between 18 and 30.


The MS Society says it has noticed an increase in calls to its help-line from people worried about symptoms of the disease.


The Department of Health says 90% are diagnosed using MRI scans and that they are working on how best to improve diagnosis.


It comes after a report by the Neurological Alliance which says people with neurological conditions are waiting too long for a diagnoses.


Cliona is 28 and says she started feeling ill when she was 19.


She said: “I went blind in the one eye, my legs were bad as well, so heavy and numb. I used to get tired all the time.”


It took more than two years for her to get diagnosed.


“I remember when I was diagnosed I was surprised. I thought it’s what old people got.”


Hard to diagnose


Doctor Colin Mumford is a consultant Neurologist in Edinburgh.


He said: “Often the symptoms are very vague and very imprecise.


“A lot of symptoms are the sort of things we all get anyway.


“For some people they are slow to spot the potential significance so they’re slow to sort medical assistance.”


Dr Mumford says sometimes GPs can take a long time to refer people on to specialists.


“Some family doctors may have a tendency to play down vague symptoms,” he said.


“They may have quite a high threshold to send people on to a specialist.”


He says having more MRI scanners, a machine which takes a detailed picture of the brain, would help.


“We don’t have enough MRI scanners in the UK,” he said.


“They would certainly help in the diagnoses of multiple sclerosis because they would spot inflammation of the brain.”


No cure


Neil Robertson is a professor of neurology at Cardiff University and says treatment for MS has improved over the last 20 years.


He agrees more MRI scanners would help.


“I don’t think there’s any doubt that for most NHS hospitals there’s a waiting list for MRI scanning,” he said.


“I think greater availability would reduce the delay to diagnoses to patients.”


MS is not a terminal illness, although there is no cure.


Cliona now takes daily injections to stop her from getting ill but says she still manages to live a normal life.


“It’s a chronic condition,” she said. “Every day symptoms can come and go.


“It varies from person to person. It’s definitely not terminal.


“It’s not a life sentence either. People have to remember that.

					

	

		
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Disability References In David Cameron’s #cpc12 Speech

		
October 10, 2012

	

	

		

		

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He also thanked the 2012 Paralympians for all they have done, because when he used to push Ivan in his wheelchair, he felt that too many people saw the wheelchair and not the boy. Now, he says, he feels like more people would see the boy and not the wheelchair.


Is he for real? Doesn’t he remember being booed when he went to present Ellie Simmonds’ medal?


He may not see wheelchairs when he looks at disabled people, but he and his Government look at us and see scroungers and statistics. To them, cutting the benefits we need to survive is the most obvious way to save money. 


That, in my eyes, makes him one of those who see disabilities before seeing people.


And he has mentioned his father’s disability. His father, he says, was a ‘glass half full’ person- usually with something alcoholic in it.


Well Sir, disabled people today want you to know that  our glasses are half empty. We can’t afford alcohol. Why? Because of your government’s policies of disability benefit cuts.  

					

	

		
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Police ‘In Dialogue’ With Stoke Mandeville Hospital Over Jimmy Savile Investigation

		
October 10, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Late last week, I watched Exposure: The Other Side of Jimmy Savile. Like the rest of the UK, I felt sad, shocked and sick listening to the women making the allegations of abuse against Jimmy Savile.


I’m too young to have watched Jim’ll Fix It, but when Savile passed away late last year, I did read with interest about his long association with Stoke Mandeville Hospital, and the charity work he did to support the birthplace of the Paralympic Games. I’m now ashamed to admit that when I learnt about this charity work, my first thought was what a nice person Savile must have been, to have used his fame and fortune to support disabled people.


Last week, my opinion of Savile changed in the space of a 45 minute documentary, as it emerged that in actual fact, he had been using his fame and fortune to sexually abuse innocent young girls. Girls who looked up to him as a celebrity, but more importantly, as an adult. An adult who was meant to make their dreams come true was, behind the scenes, giving them nightmares.


I wasn’t going to write about Jimmy Savile here. Last night, however, I learnt something that, very sadly, does not surprise me, considering everything else I have heard about Savile over the last few days.


The police are ‘in dialogue’ with Stoke Mandeville Hospital over their investigation into the allegations against Savile.


Yesterday’s Guardian reports that Savile had his own room at Stoke Mandeville Hospital, and that he stayed there ‘frequently.’


There appears to be a strong possibility that Savile abused disabled women and young girls at Stoke Mandeville Hospital. 


No one came forward to make allegations against Savile in his lifetime. He was so famous, so loved, and so respected that had anyone come forward, it is doubtful that anything they said would have been taken seriously.


Had any disabled women or girls come forward to make such allegations, considering the way disabled people were thought about at that time, they are even less likely to have been believed or taken seriously than anyone else.

					

	

		
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Emily Clark Needs To Know Her Future #Emilyneedstoknow

		
October 9, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Readers, I’ve just been to Twitter and read something that has made me unhappy.


Emily Clark, teenage daughter of disability rights campaigner Nicky Clark, is currently waiting for Shropshire Council to make a decision about a placement for her at a residential school.


Emily’s severe autism means the wait is confusing her and causing her distress.


I asked Nicky for full details and have just received the following email from her:


 


Emily began accessing respite care when she was seven. They provde  vital service which saves lives and keeps families together. In January 2010 after a year of violent outburst Emil accessed emergency care and we truly felt she couldn’t return home. However she did and by May 2011 she began refusing to attend school. The school did everything they could to enable Emily to be educated but Emily was beyond the stage of being picked up and taken where she did not wish to go. That summer in sainsburys Emily began to go into a meltdown I tried to get to the front of the store to get a phone signal nd Emily frightened and confused picked me up and threw me resulting in breaking my coccyx. Later that summer she refused to access respite and remained at home all day refusing to go anywhere.


 


In December my mum died of Alzheimers and in the weeks preceding this she had refused all personal care. We knew it wasn’t possible for  Emmy to attend my Mum’s funeral so we asked a friend and former key worker to sit with Emmy and this kind lady began visiting once a week so that Emily could at least have a bath and brush her teeth.


 


Two months ago in another of Emily’s frequent bouts of violence she broke my finger when i put my hand up to protect myself. Subsequent to this we realised that we could no longer continue to put the whole family at risk. Lizzy loves her sister but she became very anxious through her Asperger’s syndrome and because life at home is so stressful and the preceding October dropped out of doing her A levels in the second year.




Lizzy is expected to stay in her room all the time because Emily is too challenged by Lizzy’s presence even though Lizzy tries not to interact with her sister unless invited to do so.


 


The whole house is run to Emily’s needs and as she has made her world smaller those needs include us not speaking unless she needs us to not watching telelvision not occupying rooms she does not wish us too and not laughing or crying or causing her anxieties to become worse.


 


We did not see a social worker for many months during this time. Education were in touch to see whether Emily still required a place at the specialist school. Obviously I was attempting to take her in but again Emily’s anxieties spilled over into violence when challenged. So I agreed to try and educated Emily myself which was difficult due to her refusing.


 


We had several meetings following my finger being broken and it was agreed by everyone present that residential school was most likely the best option for everyone especially Emily who needs to access the world.


 


All the paperwork was begun and Emily happily began attending respite again when the staff visited us and asked her to go. Then on Friday 28th September Emily hit a full meltdown. She wanted to go back to her mainstream junior school. I’d tried repeatedly to distract her from this idea because Education did not feel this was a possibility at all. She became violent again and I was seriously concerned that she was out of control. She grabbed the phone and smashed it and smashed the door and punched kicked and pushed me over.


 


I managed to phone the social worker from the garden on my mobile she arrived and respite provision was organised . The key workers came out and Emily left on the bus in her nightie and dressing gown and slippers.


 


Since then I’ve been fighting to get Shropshire Council to make a decision. Since then staff have been trying to calm Emily’s fears and distress. Some days are better thn others but she is regularly crying and distressed and the staff can’t tell her what is happening because the Council won’ make up their minds.


 


We had already identified the residential school Emily needs. They have a place at the moment and feel they can provide everything Emily needs to have a happy life and access education. They visited us and met her. It’s a lovely family run school with a small number of pupils and great facilities. When I visited I was struck with how happy the young people were. Thats all anyone wants for their child.


 


This is the worst thing I’ve ever had to do. I feel broken hearted and everytime I hear that Emily is upset I am further  broken by it. We need to know, staff need to know but more importantly Emily needs to know because with every day that passes she is getting more anxious and confused. None of us can move on with out lives but we can all rationalise this. Emily can’t all she knows is that she hurt mummy and then went away. She needs help and I’m appealing to you to help me get this.


Shropshire council can make this easier and quicker and better for Emily but they won’t. they’re looking for cheaper not better their looking for process not speed and their going home to their own familiies everyday whilst not understanding that we are a family of equal value brought to crisis and then broken by the system.


 


 Emily is one of the kindest people ever made. She is just going through a tunnel of adolescent pain and needs our support. If she wasn’t disabled she stomp off to meet her friends and moan about her parents. She’s get a tattoo or rebel in some other way but Emily has no friends she only has us and I’m fighting to make sure she gets a decent quality of life whilst doing something no mother wants to do, give her up.








There is more information on Nicky’s Twitter feed. If you would like to help, please Tweet Shropshire Council on @ShropCouncil  about the case, including the hashtag #Emilyneedstoknow.

					

	

		
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from → council craziness, special parents

	


					


	

		
Buzz Aldrin’s Efforts To Help Disabled People Fly

		
October 9, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Buzz Aldrin has arrived in Britain to help people with disabilities become pilots.


The Apollo 11 Astronaut signed up to fly virtual journeys in a round-the-world flight-simulator challenge.


He is one of 100 pilots who are attempting to fly 22,000 nautical miles over 10 days for the charity Aerobility and set a new Guinness world record for the longest duration simulator flight.


Other pilots taking part include ex-England international and former RAF pilot Rory Underwood, chief executive of BA’s parent company Willie Wals; Iron Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson; RAF chief Sir Stephen Dalton and explorer David Hempleman-Adams.


They hope to raise £100,000 to buy a new flight simulator adapted to help people with physical disabilities, sensory disabilities and learning difficulties fly a plane.


Flying to freedom


Buzz Aldrin, whose ‘journey’ involved ‘flying’ over Indonesia, told BBC Radio 4’s programme You and Yours he was delighted he could fit it into his schedule: “I’m so happy that I am able to see what good work is being done here by the charity.


“The simulator can be a very useful tool in building the confidence and the sense of well-being and sense of achievement of disabled people.


“And it’s not just a dexterity test – it’s actually leading towards flying an aeroplane, which gives a sense of freedom to people.”


People like ex-soldier Dave Rawlins who, until 18 months ago, had never flown a plane. He was injured in 2008 while working in Afghanistan.


After lengthy rehabilitation and recovery he decided to take up flying in April 2011. His first lesson was with the disabled flying charity Aerobility in a flight simulator.


Dave says without the simulator he would not have dared to try: “The simulator is a fantastic bit of kit, it helps us go through all our emergency procedures – stuff that you don’t want to do in the air like turning off the engine, you can do in the simulator and that’s what it is all about!”


It allows trainee pilots to practise safely before leaving the ground, and is a fraction of the cost of taking a plane up.


“You can adjust the weather to how you want it, you can make failures happen – instrument failures, engine failures, fires – and you can go through all your procedures.”


Buzz Aldrin said a flight simulator is crucial for any type of flight – including the Apollo 11 Moon landing in 1969.


“I spent a lot of time with my crew mates in the lunar module simulator in Houston, and then in a very advanced high-fidelity replica of the actual lunar module, for the last month of training, before the Apollo 11 mission.


“The command module simulator was used primarily for Mike Collins, who was the command module pilot, and we would get together, the three of us, [Buzz Aldrin, Neil Armstrong and Mike Collins] if we were simulating a part of the mission – going to the Moon, or coming back from the Moon – where we were making critical manoeuvres to come back to Earth.”


‘Confidence-building’


The 82-year-old said the simulator flights ironed out potential problems that could have arisen during the historic Moon landing: “There would have been a lot of on-the-spot changes and maybe mistakes made, but you learn how to deal with the emergency situations.


“I’m sure that as part of the confidence-building for Aerobility, occasionally there are little surprises put in there, to see if the alert trainee or operator can identify and come up with what the fix is, because that could also happen actually during a flight.”


Dave Rawlins achieved the 45 hours single-engine flying time needed to win a private pilots licence at the beginning of 2012.


Then he heard Paralympic organisers were searching for a disabled pilot to conduct the flypast at the Paralympic Games opening ceremony for London 2012. He applied, took a navigational test, and won.


With co-pilot Tim Orchardas – a former Concorde pilot – he flew low over the packed stadium.


“We were 800ft above the Olympic Stadium, at night, heading towards it, with flash photography going off – it was just this unbelievable picture in front of me. I am very lucky.”


Dave recently left the Army, and his hobby has now turned into the day job – he has just been offered a position with an aviation company.


Fresh perspective


Mike Miller-Smith, the chief executive of Aerobility said: “To have the support of aerospace hero Buzz Aldrin is incredible. Mr Aldrin has truly seen the world from a different perspective, from the Moon.


“For disabled people, life is often about exploring capabilities and facing new challenges – and in a small way this perspective is the same.”


Last year nearly 400 people flew in Aerobility’s specially adapted aircraft or in a flight simulator from the charity’s headquarters at Blackbushe Airport in Camberley, Surrey.


The simulator is made from a genuine fuselage of a Piper Warrior aeroplane, identical to the training aircraft used by the charity. Surrounding screens show accurate, projected videos of the passing scenery and engine noises are designed to emulate the real thing.


Mike is confident anyone who wants to fly can fly: “Everyone gets the chance to participate, so the aircraft (and the simulator) are adapted for people with different physical disabilities to fly. We also work with people who have learning difficulties as well.


“The aircraft have a hand control to allow someone with a learning disability for example, to operate the rudder and the simulator is adapted in exactly the same way.


“We’ll get someone in the air or in the simulator – it’s great fun.”

					

	

		
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from → Fun Stuff, progress

	


					


	

		
Cuts To The ILF Will Limit Disabled People’s Independence

		
October 9, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Media discussion of the crisis in social care focuses on the effects on older people and their families, who bear the brunt of caring when public services let them down. Yes, more older people than disabled people are affected by the social care funding difficulties, but many people don’t realise that the life chances of younger disabled people also depend in large part on those same stretched local authority social care budgets.


The government is planning to close the independent living fund (ILF) – which supplements the funding of independent living support for 19,000 of the most severely disabled people – and transfer the money to local authorities, where the needs of older people are already putting services under increasing strain. This combination of challenges to social care services is set to have a catastrophic effect on the ability of severely disabled people to fulfil their potential and use their talents to contribute personally and economically to society.


There are many examples of severely disabled people whose care packages enable them to employ personal assistants of their choosing to maximise their independence, and their ability to participate and make a contribution. To take just a few examples: without extensive support packages, Lady (Jane) Campbell of Surbiton would be unable to fulfil her role in the Lords; Alice Maynard would be unable to run her own consultancy and undertake her duties as chair of Scope; Katherine Araniello would be unable to produce work as an artist and film-maker, and Dr Ian Basnett would be unable to fulfil his role as director of public health for east London and the City.


With the closure of the ILF, and the acute lack of funding for adult social care, the tragedy is that today’s severely disabled young people are unlikely to achieve what Campbell, Maynard, Araniello, Basnett and many others have achieved. Local authorities now require huge financial contributions from service users for the provision of basic packages that can achieve little more than feeding, dressing and toileting.


It seems disabled people have had, for a few years around the turn of this century, the best opportunities they’re likely to have; equality and independence are now being rolled back, with a major loss of talent to our society. What should the government say to a bright young disabled graduate unable to save more than £23,000 towards a home of her own because anything more will be taken to pay for the “privilege” of getting up, having breakfast and answering emails? Or to a rising star in the academic world forced to turn down a prestigious university appointment because she cannot take her care package with her?


Disabled people can’t be economically productive if the support that enables them to live independently is missing or unaffordable. We all lose from this situation – we will all gain when social care is properly funded and provided on an equal basis whether you live in Maidstone or Manchester, Penzance or Preston. The government needs to get a grip – and quickly – or the life chances of disabled people will be destroyed for a generation.



					

	

		
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from → disability political policies, mainstream madness, politics

	


					


	

		
Audio Aquarium Being Planned For Visually Impaired Visitors

		
October 9, 2012

	

	

		

		

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A visit to an aquarium can be a highly visual experience, but for blind or partially sighted visitors, it can sometimes be hard to fully appreciate.


Visually impaired pupils from a North London school have started work to try and establish the UK’s first audio aquarium.


Tim Muffett reports.



					

	

		
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Has The Paralympic Flame Spluttered Out?

		
October 9, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Asks Will Norman, 5-a-side footballer, at Comment Is Free.

					

	

		
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Conservative Conference: Kaliya Franklin Tells Lord Freud “Stop Bullying Us”

		
October 8, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Kaliya Franklin is one of my favourite people in the World Wide Web. I’ll see if I can get hold of a video of this incident. Until then here is the BBC’s take on it.


A disability rights campaigner has told a minister at the Conservative conference to “stop bullying us”.


Kaliya Franklin, 36, spoke out at a fringe event examining the government’s welfare to work programme.


Ms Franklin, who suffers from Ehlers Danlos Syndrome and uses a mobility scooter, confronted the welfare reform minister Lord Freud.


She told him “you are driving us away” by introducing more sanctions on those deemed able to work by government.


After having a one-on-one chat with Ms Franklin, 36, after the meeting Lord Freud said he “heard what she had to say” and would reflect on it.


Job prospects


The Work Programme is the government’s main scheme for helping people who are unemployed back into work.


Under the terms of the programme, contractors from the public, private and voluntary sectors are paid a fee, usually £400, when the job centre refers an unemployed person to them, typically someone who has been looking for work for a year.


Further, larger payment can then be made when a person has been in sustainable employment for up to two years. The harder the company has to work to find and keep someone in a job, the more money they get.


At the core of the scheme is the idea of payment by results, so there is a financial incentive for providers to do their best to get the long-term unemployed back into the job market.


Lord Freud said his overall perspective was that “for most people it would be pretty damned good for them to have a job”.


Most of the speakers at the fringe event were broadly supportive of the government’s scheme and its motivations but said there were still practical problems that needed resolving.


‘Adversarial’


But Tom Pollard, policy and campaigns officer from the mental health charity Mind, said the “adversarial tone” of parts of the Work Programme “makes it hard for some people to engage with it”.


And Kirsty McHugh, the chief executive of the Employment Related Services Association, the trade association for welfare to work providers, added that: “It is tough out there. When the Work Programme was set up the growth predictions for the economy were much more optimistic.”


Sean Williams, the managing director for Welfare to Work at security firm G4S, which is a Work Programme provider across England, also raised concerns about the number of people being referred to his company.


“The number of referrals has halved in recent months. If we get sent half as many people, we will do half as much good in society, and cut the benefits bill by half as much as we could. Ultimately, it could undermine the viability of the system,” he said.


A spokesman for the Department for Work said: “More people have joined the Work Programme than was predicted when contracts were signed, and the number of referrals was always projected to fall after the first year.


“We are taking a number of steps to address the lower than anticipated flow of Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) claimants.”

					

	

		
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from → disability political policies, Fellow Bloggers, politics

	


					


	

		
Oritse Williams From JLS Was A Young Carer

		
October 8, 2012

	

	

		

		

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JLS star Oritse Williams says it was hard caring for his mother, who has MS, when he was a teenager.


The singer says he cared for her and his younger brothers and sister from the age of 11.


Oritse, who is now 25, says he also finds it hard not being in constant contact with his mum now he is a celebrity.


Radio 1 Stories: Keeping Mum is on Radio 1 tonight (8 October) at 9pm. Tweet @BBCR1 #keepingmum

					

	

		
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from → disability on air

	


					


	

		
Right To Life Case: Family Of Mr L Lose

		
October 8, 2012

	

	

		

		

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A judge has agreed to a hospital trust’s request to withhold life-saving treatment from a severely brain-damaged man, despite his family’s objections.


Doctors said it would be unfair to resuscitate the patient, known as Mr L, if his condition worsened.


His family argued that was against their Muslim faith.


Mr Justice Moylan said it would be lawful to withhold treatment as it would not prolong his life “in any meaningful way”.


The Court of Protection case was adjourned part-way through while doctors reassessed Mr L’s condition, after new video evidence appeared to show he was no longer in a persistent vegetative state.


Doctors for the Penine Acute Hospitals Trust agreed there had been a slight improvement but said it would still be unfair to prolong his life.


Mr L, 55, from Greater Manchester, suffered severe brain damage in July following a third cardiac arrest.

					

	

		
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from → the law, updates

	


					


	

		
Should Abu Hamza Keep His Prosthetic Hook?

		
October 8, 2012

	

	

		

		

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The Muslim cleric Abu Hamza made his first court appearance in New York on Sunday.


He was extradited from the UK last week to face terrorism charges.


The US authorities confiscated his hook, despite his lawyer saying he needed it to “function in a civilised manner”.


Rob Hannion uses a similar prosthetic to Mr Hamza and told Radio 5 live‘s Stephen Nolan that he was shocked that he was not allowed to wear it.


Abu Hamza is charged with very serious crimes. However, I agree with Rob Hannion’s view. The ‘hook’ may look sharp and dangerous- maybe that is why it has been confiscated. 


But it is being used as an ‘aid’ by a physically disabled person, a prosthetic. For Abu Hamza, it is as necessary as food and drink. Confiscating it was unnecessary, and just plain wrong.


It would be interesting to know whether prison authorities would have confiscated a prosthetic hand which looked more ‘normal.’

					

	

		
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from → DisAbility in the News

	


					


	

		
Walsall To Honour Ellie Simmonds

		
October 8, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Gold medal winning Paralympian Ellie Simmonds will be honoured in her home town of Walsall later.


She will visit the postbox in Aldridge that has been painted gold in her honour.


A swimming pool at Cooper and Jordan C of E School, where she was a pupil, will then be officially named after her during a special presentation.


After this she will take an open top bus tour, which is due to arrive at Walsall town hall at 13:00 BST.


In the afternoon Simmonds will take part in a question and answer session at the town hall with pupils from local schools.


The 17-year-old said: “I’m looking forward to everything, to going to my old school and seeing the pool.”


Simmonds won two golds, in the 200m SM6 individual medley and S6 400m freestyle, a silver in the S6 100m freestyle and a bronze in the S6 100m freestyle.


She relocated with her mother to Swansea at the age of 11 so she could train in an Olympic size 50-metre pool.

					

	

		
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Study Shows How BSL Speakers Mind Their Language

		
October 7, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Political correctness has caught up with Britain’s deaf community. It is no longer acceptable to sign a slanted eye when talking about the Chinese or to mime a hook nose when referring to Jews. The flick of a limp wrist is now an offensive signal for homosexuals. A finger pointing to an imaginary spot in the middle of a forehead is no longer appropriate as the sign for India.


The first ever UK-wide survey into how British sign language (BSL) is used by deaf people of different ages has found a seismic shift has taken place in the signs used by different generations.


For deaf people aged between 16 to 30 years old, no matter where they live in the UK, the only culturally sensitive way to indicate China is to draw the right hand from the signer’s heart horizontally across their chest, then down towards the hip, indicating the shape of a Mao jacket.


Their sign for a Jew – male or female – is a hand resting against the chin and making a short movement down, in the shape of a beard. A gay person is indicated with an upright thumb on one hand in the palm of the other, wobbling from side to side. India is now a mime of the triangular shape of the subcontinent.


Only older British signers still refer to France by mimicking the twirling of a moustache. Younger users of BSL use the French gesture, mimicking a cockerel’s comb – the symbol of France.


Other signs have changed despite there being no offensive connotations. The new sign for Ireland mimics the plucking of a harp, for example, while the traditional sign, opening one’s fingers from an O shape to a U, was said to derive from the shape of a bunch of shamrocks.


Other signs have not changed: all generations of British signers put their fist to their forehead with a finger pointing straight up, mimicking the shape of a Prussian spiked helmet, to refer to Germans.


The three-year BSL Corpus project filmed almost 250 deaf people from eight cities across the UK to find how changes in society had affected the signs they used for 102 key concepts. The findings have been presented at a series of peer-previewed conferences both in the UK and internationally. But the discovery that BSL has become more culturally sensitive, with signs for countries changing more quickly than signs for any other group, has caused the deaf community concern.


“We are nervous about this being seen as another example of political correctness because the changes are more about evolution rather than dictat of some body that approves language,” said Gwilym Morris, from the Deafness Cognition and Language Research Centre (DCal) at University College London


Funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, the research is the first national web-based and publicly accessible BSL corpus. It is one of very few large sign language projects ever undertaken and only the second, after the Netherlands, to have video data available online.


Work is now under way to use the research to create the first online dictionary and reference source for BSL grammar.


Dr Kearsy Cormier led the three-and-a-half year project. She hopes the research will improve the education of deaf children. “It will also help us to better understand regional variation, such as different signs for ‘green’ or for the number six and the change in vocabulary and grammar of BSL, such as new signs for ‘sleep’ or China,” she writes on the project’s website.


“It will help relate those changes to social factors, such as a signer’s regional background, age or social class – a topic of some debate in the British deaf community!”


Professor Bencie Woll, director of DCal, said the project was the first time it had been possible to document changes in BSL. “The changes are exactly like the changes to spoken English,” she said. “There are all sorts of words we used to refer to people 30 years ago that we’ve stopped using. The difference is that the change in BSL has been very rapid because it wasn’t until deaf people were able to see each other over the internet, that they were able to communicate with anyone who wasn’t standing in front of them and see how foreign signers referred to themselves.


“The younger deaf community doesn’t use these old signs because of a clear process of political correctness, in the same way that the hearing community no longer calls gay people ‘pansies’ or ‘queer’,” she said. “But what the hearing community doesn’t understand about sign language, is that even though the traditional signs are now considered offensive, they are not producing a real-life insult when they are used because they are not just visual representations of a concept.”


But, said Woll, just as with spoken words, some deaf sub-communities are reclaiming signs that would be considered offensive for anyone outside their immediate group to use. “Gay deaf people use the old sign for gay, and disabled deaf people use the traditional sign for disabled, even though no one from outside that group who was socially sensitive, would use those signs any more,” said Woll.


But the most significant sign that has been reclaimed, said Woll, is the sign for deaf. “Deaf people don’t call themselves ‘hearing impaired’ or ‘hard of hearing’,” she said. “They have reclaimed the word because for them, it doesn’t mean they can’t hear: it means they’re part of a community, with its own identity and culture.”



					

	

		
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from → polls, progress

	


					


	

		
Can Prosthetics Be Considered Art?

		
October 7, 2012

	

	

		

		

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The rock musician, actor and performance artist Mat Fraser looks at how prosthetics have been used to improve, adapt and augment human performance.


The recent Paralympics highlighted how they can give some people near superhuman powers. But can they be considered art?

					

	

		
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from → Famously DisAbled, Fun Stuff

	


					


	

		
Mark Ormrod Revisited

		
October 7, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Triple amputee Mark Ormrod has returned to his home city of Plymouth after a 3,000-mile cycle ride around the British coastline.


The former Royal Marine is part of the Tour De Forces team which left the city on 1 September.


The team has been raising money for several military charities.



					

	

		
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from → DisAbled Challengers

	


					


	

		
Ruth Anim And Liam Barker- Different Disabilities, Very Similar Situations

		
October 6, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Exactly two weeks ago today, I heard and wrote about the case of Liam Barker. Eighteen years old, paralysed since birth, he breathes through a ventilator. His parents had just received a letter informing them that in order to receive Employment Support Allowance, he might have to prove he is unable to work by attending a Work Capability Assessment.


Exactly two weeks ago today, I first started wondering how many more Liam Barkers there will be.


I am sad to say that on Thursday, I heard of a case very similar to that of Liam Barker.


Ruth Anim, 27, has epilepsy, heart problems, curvature of the spine, severe autism and a mental age of 10. She has no sense of danger.


Ruth recently attended a WCA. She was found fit for work and told to prepare to find a job within a year.


Like Liam Barker, Ruth Anim has a loving mother, who immediately appealed the findings of her WCA. Ruth Anim is lucky. Unlike Michelle Barker, Cecelia Anim is the deputy president of the Royal College of Nursing.


This has meant that over the last two days, Ruth Anim’s case has received greater media coverage than Liam Barker’s case did. The Guardian and BBC websites have both covered the story in articles. Today’s Guardian letters section is dedicated to the issue of disability benefits, hooked on her story. Yesterday, BBC London News ran a TV piece about her.


ATOS yesterday apologised to the Anims for the ‘error’ they made in finding Ruth fit for work. It is to be hoped that the Barkers have received a similar apology for the distress caused to them by the DWP’s recent letter. However, if such an apology has been received, Same Difference has no knowledge of it.


So there is a strong possibility that the Anims would not have received an apology if Cecelia Anim did not have a high profile.


Like the Barkers, Cecelia Anim realises that other disabled people may not have the support her daughter has. She wants to challenge the current system.


Cecelia and Ruth Anim may have won their appeal for now, but Ruth will be assessed again in two years.


Ruth Anim and Liam Barker may have very different disabilities, but sadly, benefit assessments have placed them in very similar situations. Both are severely disabled. It is clear to anyone who hears their stories that neither will be any more fit for work in two years’ time than they are today.


That’s why assessing either of them again will be a greater waste of government time and taxpayers’ money than simply providing both of them with the benefits they are so clearly genuinely entitled to.


When I was trying hard to publicise the case of Liam Barker online two weeks ago, someone suggested that a database should be kept of people who are too severely disabled to ever be fit for work. This is an idea that should be given serious consideration by all relevant Government departments.


Because the next severely disabled person who is threatened with, or sent to, a WCA may not have supportive, high profile parents. They may not have the ability to appeal if they are wrongly found fit for work. They may not be able to do anything but- possibly literally- suffer in silence.


Two weeks ago I hoped that we would never have to hear of another Liam Barker. Exactly two weeks later, filled with sadness and fear, I am wondering when we will hear of the next Ruth Anim.

					

	

		
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from → mainstream madness

	


					


	

		
ATOS Apologise To Ruth And Cecelia Anim

		
October 5, 2012

	

	

		

		

			by  		

	

	

				
The mother of a severely disabled woman who was wrongly told she was fit to work is calling for changes to the way people with disabilities are treated when claiming benefits.


A medical report described Ruth Anim as a man and said she could find a job within a year.


Her family successfully appealed, but her mother Cecilia Anim is angry they were put through the ordeal.


Atos, which carried out the assessment, has apologised for the error.


The private firm carried out nearly three quarters of a million face-to-face assessments last year on people claiming the new sickness benefit, Employment and Support Allowance.


Ruth Anim, 27, has epilepsy and autism and cannot cross a road unaided.


Her mother, who is deputy president of the Royal College of Nursing, said: “I work, that is challenging enough, looking after Ruth is equally challenging because you have to meet her basic needs, support her when you take her out and everywhere.


“To have these unnecessary stand out pressures is what we don’t need.


“We should be left alone to look after her.”


‘Want to work’


Learning disability charity Mencap supported the family in their appeal.


Emma Harrison, its campaigns director, said the case was “not a surprise” to the charity.


She said: “We get many cases of people who have failed – or passed depending on your perspective – their work capability assessment who are not actually capable of working.


“The appeals at the moment are rocketing – 40% of people who are failed, or passed depending again on your perspective, are then told their appeal is upheld and are not classified fit for work.


“It’s a flawed system and it really does need to change.”


She said it was shocking that just 7% of people with a learning disability were employed.


“They actually really want to work,” she said.


“But unfortunately employers are just not giving people with learning disabilities a chance. But those people who aren’t capable of working need to be given benefits so that they can still lead a full life.”


The Department for Work and Pensions said it was constantly reviewing the system to ensure it was fair.


The spokesman said everyone had the right to ask the department for a reconsideration of a decision, or appeal to an independent tribunal.


He added: “We are committed to help thousands of people move from benefits and back into work while giving unconditional support to those who are most in need.”

					

	

		
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Mr L’s Right To Life Court Battle Resumes

		
October 5, 2012

	

	

		

		

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An update I missed on Monday:


A Muslim man’s right-to-live court battle has resumed after new video evidence showed he was no longer in a persistent vegetative state.


The family of “Mr L” from Greater Manchester is disputing his doctors’ decision not to resuscitate him if his condition worsens.


The case was adjourned in August while doctors reassessed Mr L’s condition.


They told the High Court there had been a slight improvement but it would still be unfair to prolong his life.


Mr L, 55, suffered severe brain damage in July following a third cardiac arrest.


Filmed ‘grimacing’


His family disputed the Penine Acute Hospitals Trust policy to withhold treatment if his condition deteriorates because their faith states that “life is sacred” and must be prolonged until “God takes it away”.


The family had argued Mr L was not in a vegetative state and said he is showing increased awareness of his environment, responding to family and going quiet when listening to the Koran.


Doctors viewing the new footage, which showed Mr L “grimacing” when his eyes were cleaned, have now concluded he has improved slightly and is now in a “minimally conscious state”.


But they told Mr Justice Moylan the quality of life he could expect if he survived the pain and distress of a resuscitation and other forms of intensive care meant it would still not be in his best interests.


Dr V told the court: “All we would be doing is prolonging the dying process and causing pain and distress for the patient and almost certainly increasing his brain damage.”


The case continues.

					

	

		
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Megan Smith, 17, Will Take Her Chances With Huntington’s Disease

		
October 5, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Like most 17-year-olds, Megan Smith has no idea what the future holds. But unlike her peers, she has more than just A-level exams and university choices on her mind.


Her father, Gary, has Huntington’s disease – a neurodegenerative disorder – which is hereditary and has no cure.


Megan and her brother Ben have a 50% chance of inheriting the faulty gene which will one day trigger the disabling disease – but they have chosen not to find out.


“We both want to live our lives to the full. If we get it then we will – if we don’t then it will be a lovely surprise,” Megan says.


She knows that a simple blood test, which is available to those aged over 18, would confirm the presence of an expanded gene which causes Huntington’s disease.


However, she has already decided not to live in the shadow of the illness.


Huntington’s disease affects the cells in the brain, stopping the body and brain from working as well as they used to. It leads to problems with movement, thinking and behaviour and in most cases leads to a long, slow decline over a period of 15 to 20 years.


Big decision


It can start with twitchy movements and memory loss, lead to a gradual decline in the ability to manage day-to-day activities and often leave people needing care for all aspects of daily life.


Most people with the gene develop the disease in their early 40s. The Huntington’s Disease Association estimates there are between 6,500 and 8,000 people in the UK with it.


Dr Elizabeth Howard, a specialist in genetic medicine at St Mary’s Hospital, Manchester, says Megan’s decision not to have the predictive test is not unusual.


“I would say around one in five come forward and choose to know. Most people carry on regardless.”


Dr Howard runs weekly clinics for individuals affected by Huntington’s disease and their at-risk relatives, and she says most want to talk about the genetic test.


Her job is to prepare them for all eventualities.


“We try to make sure people understand the implications of getting bad news. It’s better to do that before the test, because it can have devastating consequences.”


Genetic testing has also led to fears that those with a family history of the condition will have financial problems, such as getting insurance and mortgages.


Having children is often a big dilemma for Huntington’s families too, knowing that they could pass on the faulty gene. Yet there is also the possibility of many years of normal life before offspring develop the disease – or get it at all.


A test called a pre-implantation genetic diagnosis is available to couples who have received a positive pre-symptomatic Huntington’s disease result and want the chance of pregnancy that is unaffected by the disease.


The embryos are tested before they are implanted in the woman’s womb.


But Dr Howard’s experience is that few people take this route either, perhaps because they are unaware of their family history or because they are just prepared to take the chance.


Megan’s family knew very little about the illness before Gary was diagnosed 10 years ago. Although Megan’s grandfather also had Huntington’s, they had no idea it could be passed down through the family.


‘So guilty’


Megan’s mother Carol wonders constantly what they would have done had they known.


“We might seriously have thought about whether to have children or not. We wouldn’t have wanted to intentionally put them in danger.


“But they may not get it or pass it on.”


Carol and Gary cling to the hope that their children will not have to suffer the same fate as their father and grandfather.


“I know he [Gary] feels so guilty that he could have passed it on to them. We hope every day they don’t have it.”


They told the children about Huntington’s at the dinner table one evening when Gary had started to become unwell.


There were lots of tears and unanswered questions – but they do not regret being open about it.


Carol says: “Megan and Ben are so brave about it and they are such a great support to us. They’re really good.”


Watching her father’s health deteriorate, seeing him change before her eyes, has been very difficult but Megan finds that a good way of coping is to raise funds and awareness about the disease, and to be bright and optimistic about the future.


Her father would expect nothing less.

					

	

		
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Six Per Cent Of GPs Have Disabled Patients Who Attempted Or Committed Suicide Out Of Fear Of Fit To Work Tests

		
October 4, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Six per cent of doctors have experienced a disabled patient who has attempted – or committed – suicide as a result of “undergoing, or fear of undergoing” the Government’s fitness to work test.




A survey of over of 1,000 GPs across the UK by ICM also found that one in five had at least one disabled patient who had thought about suicide because of the test, which is aimed at assessing whether people claiming incapacity benefit are fit to work.


The survey, highlighted by Exaro, the investigative website, also found 14 per cent had patients who had self-harmed as a result of the test.


The charity, Rethink Mental Illness, which commissioned the poll, said it showed that the work-capability assessments were pushing some of the most unwell and vulnerable people in  society “to the edge”.


Paul Jenkins, the charity’s chief executive said: “Many people who have a severe mental illness such as schizophrenia or bi-polar disorder say that their condition has been exacerbated as a result of the stress caused by the test.”


After the Coalition took office in 2010, George Osborne, the chancellor, set out plans for £18 billion in welfare savings by 2014-15.


Ministers argue that the welfare bill can be cut because many people claiming incapacity benefit are well enough to work.


The previous Labour government introduced the test for incapacity benefit – but for new claimants only – in 2008.


In 2011 the Government ordered that everyone on the benefit, some two million people, should be assessed.


But the survey of GPs reveals disturbing evidence of the psychological damage that can be inflicted on those targeted.


The survey found eight out of ten GPs have patients who have developed mental-health problems since the tests were rolled out to everyone claiming incapacity benefit. 


They included people who were already suffering from depression, but whose condition was made worse by the prospect of tests, and those with a physical handicap but no history of mental illness.


Claimants feared that their benefits would be cut, and that they would not be well enough to withstand employment.


If they found themselves out of work, they would still be eligible for the job seekers allowance. But this is worth less than employment and support allowance (ESA), which is replacing incapacity benefit.


For new claimants, ESA was introduced in 2008 and will eventually replace incapacity benefit following the re-assessment programme.


The survey cites the case of Ursula Sinclair, 42, from Gloucester. She suffers from depression. Just days after going through the assessment, she attempted to take her own life.


Sinclair said: “I was devastated when I was initially told that I did not qualify for ESA because I know that I am not fit for work at all. I became extremely distressed.”               


Tom Greatrex, a frontbench Labour MP who campaigns in Parliament on mental-health issues, told Exaro: “There is clearly a problem when an assessment that is designed to help people back into work ends up having the opposite effect.


“Ministers need to reform the test urgently so that those who can work are supported to do so, but those not healthy enough to work are helped, not hounded.”


The Department for Work and Pensions said that it constantly reviewed the scheme to seek improvements.





					

	

		
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Video Of Ruth Anim

		
October 4, 2012

	

	

		

		

			by  		

	

	

				
From the Guardian.


Watch that and tell me she’s fit for work. Go on, I dare you.

					

	

		
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Woman With No Sense Of Danger Found Fit For Work

		
October 4, 2012

	

	

		

		

			by  		

	

	

				
Her learning disabilities are clearly too severe for her to be in the workplace. Please share this wherever you can.




Ruth Anim needs constant one-to-one care, has no concept of danger and attends life skills classes to learn practical things like how to make a sandwich or a cup of tea. So it came as a considerable surprise to her mother, Cecilia, that an official assessment of her daughter’s abilities classified her as someone who would be capable of finding work in the near future.


The report contained a number of factual errors, perhaps most remarkably the assessor’s description of the 27-year-old as a “male client”, but more disturbing for Anim was the conclusion of the doctor who carried out the test: “I advise that a return to work could be considered within 12 months.”


Anim says: “For Ruth to go to work is actually totally unimaginable. She can’t even cross the road without someone going with her; she doesn’t know that if a car hits you it will kill you; she has no concept of danger.” Her daughter was born with complex medical needs, learning disabilities, a heart problem and epilepsy. “She is somebody who has a one-to-one carer – is she meant to go to work with her carer?”


As a result of the assessment, Ruth was assigned to a category known as the work related activity group, and required to attend the jobcentre regularly to begin mandatory preparations for going to work.


Cecilia Anim’s amazement at the written report, describing her daughter’s work capability assessment (WCA), the test to determine fitness for work, echoes the shock felt by hundreds of thousands of former claimants of incapacity benefit over the last three years, after undergoing the stringent new computerised test to check their continued eligibility for benefit payments.


Since the test was introduced in 2008 more than 600,000 people have appealed against the assessments; the cost to the state of those appeals has risen from £25m in 2009-10 to £60m in 2011-12. About 38% of those who appeal against an initial fit-for-work finding see that decision overturned on appeal and benefits granted. Welfare rights organisations and charities have voiced consistent unease about the test and the way doctors employed by the private IT firm Atos, which is paid £100m a year by the government to carry out the test, have implemented it.


Last week Labour called for a “fast and radical” overhaul of the system, admitting the policy it introduced when in government was not working.


As deputy president of the Royal College of Nursing, Anim can project her fury about the experience her daughter endured far more powerfully than most individuals going through the system. This awareness has heightened her desire to talk about the “injustice of the process”, to educate people about how inaccurate the assessments can be.


“I am able to fight back, but what about the people who are not able to fight back? It’s causing a lot of problems for a lot of people,” she says. “My daughter’s consultant neurologist was beside himself with fury when I told him. The first question he asked was, ‘Have they done a risk assessment?’ “


Ruth’s case is by no means exceptional. Mencap, the charity which supports people with a learning disability, says it has seen countless similarly surprising cases of misclassification of vulnerable clients, many of whom are told they are not eligible for any sickness or disability benefit and must seek work immediately.


The principle underlying the WCA is that a health condition or disability should not automatically be regarded as a barrier to work, and in theory the policy is designed to ensure that support is available to help people find work. Anim says there is nothing she would like more than for her daughter to find a job, just as she would like her to get married and have the kind of life her contemporaries have, but she argues that, given the severity of her daughter’s condition, this approach is not realistic.


The 45-minute examination was chaotic from start to finish, Anim says. Her daughter was extremely anxious and kept asking the doctor if he was going to take a blood test. She refused to sit down and hopped on and off the medical examining couch when the doctor was talking to her. Anim points to a line in the partly computer-generated report which notes “client was able to sit on a chair with a back for 45 minutes”.


“The whole examination was very chaotic and bizarre because she was not co-operating. But in his report he has put that Ruthie sat for 45 minutes. She never sat down for more than three minutes. She was all over the place,” she says. “At one point she went to the tap and washed her hands and started spraying the water everywhere. He raised his voice and said ‘Stop doing that!’ I said no, no, don’t speak to her like that. She’s got learning difficulties; she doesn’t understand.”


A few questions the doctor asked, about her daughter’s condition and her schooling, made Anim doubt his familiarity with the British care system. He noted in his report that her daughter’s speech was normal, although Anim had done most of the speaking. The few questions Ruth managed to respond to were answered inaccurately. “He asked her how old she was and she said 18, despite the fact that she is 27,” she says.


A few months after the medical assessment Ruth was called to an interview at the jobcentre to discuss finding work. She went with her mother, who was aghast when she understood why they had been called in. “I said ‘Are you having a laugh?'” The jobcentre adviser realised very quickly that a mistake had been made. “We sat down, and every question she asked her, Ruth raised her palms as if she didn’t know the answer. She asked ‘What day is it?’; Ruthie said Thursday, but it was Tuesday. She asked ‘What time is it?’. She said 5.30pm, but it was 2.30pm,” she recalls. “Ruth was rummaging through the tray on her desk and being disruptive. She kept saying, ‘What’s your name?'”


“They said she must come every three weeks to show that she is actively seeking work,” Anim says; but the adviser also told her that she could appeal against the decision. “It only took her 10 minutes to realise that the decision was wrong.”


Anim spent her summer holiday trying to sort out the problem, marshalling the support of her local MP, Glenda Jackson, and a welfare rights organisation, Brent Association of Disabled People, as well as contacting Atos and the DWP.


The decision caused immense stress to the whole family, she says. “As a nurse I know what effect this has on families. You have to constantly struggle to get the support to meet her basic needs. After all we have gone through, then to be told she needs to look for work. She was totally oblivious to what was going on, as usual, but we felt disbelief, frustration, stress and shock.


“It was a barmy decision. People with learning disabilities need all the support they can get. [They should] not be put in this situation where there is total ignorance about their ability to work, safety and wellbeing.”


Although the Royal College of Nursing has no official position on the WCA, Anim is clear that the policy needs urgent reform. “The system needs to be overhauled and reviewed.”


The DWP says that it has introduced numerous improvements to the testing process, but charities state that serious problems continue. A report published by Citizens Advice earlier this year found a “worryingly low” level of accuracy in the assessments. The charity, which supports many people who feel they have been wrongly denied benefits through the appeals process, has seen a 71% increase in workload relating to the employment and support allowance (the replacement to incapacity benefit) over the past two years.


Campaigners blame both the design of the policy and the way it has been implemented for the problems. The headquarters of Atos have been repeatedly targeted by disabled protesters, angry at the company’s involvement in the assessments, and the company’s sponsorship of the Paralympics caused widespread controversy.


The National Audit Office criticised the Department for Work and Pensions in August for not having “sought financial redress for contractor underperformance” and recommended that it “tighten performance requirements with Atos in relation to the quality of medical assessments”.


Earlier this year delegates at the BMA conference passed a motion stating that the “inadequate computer-based assessment” performed by Atos had “little regard for the nature or complexity of the needs of long-term sick and disabled persons”, and proposed that the WCA should be halted “with immediate effect”.


Jane Alltimes, senior policy officer at Mencap, said Ruth’s case was not particularly extreme. Mencap has submitted recommendations for improvement to the system to the DWP, and is arguing for greater recognition of employers’ unwillingness to employ people with learning disabilities. Just 7% of people who receive state support for their learning disabilities are in work.


“The evidence we’ve seen suggests an assessment process that isn’t working for lots of people with a learning disability. An assessment designed to determine a person’s ‘fitness for work’ needs to take into account the realities of the barriers experienced by disabled people in getting a job – things like job availability, the prejudices of employers, the support people need to overcome the barriers they face. The assessment in its current form just doesn’t do that.”


An Atos Healthcare spokesperson said: “We apologise for any discrepancy in our report and any distress this may have caused. We carry out around 15,000 assessments each week and work hard to provide the DWP with as much detailed information as we can to contribute to them making an accurate decision on benefits.”


A DWP spokesperson said: “The work capability assessment is under constant review to ensure it is both fair and effective, and it is in everyone’s interest to get the system right. We are committed to help thousands of people move from benefits and back into work while giving unconditional support to those who are most in need.”



					

	

		
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Missing Five Year Old Girl April Jones Has Cerebral Palsy

		
October 3, 2012

	

	

		

		

			by  		

	

	

				
Abducting anyone is awful. Abducting any child is terrible. But abducting a disabled child? I have no words to describe the actions of the person responsible.


All I can say is that I have shared the shock of the whole UK at this case. I have shared the wish of the whole UK to find out exactly what has happened to April Jones. I share the hope of the whole UK that she will return, alive and well, to her family very soon.


I have Cerebral Palsy myself, as regular readers know.  The discovery that April shares my disability only adds to the hope I have had since she went missing for her safe return.


I can’t help thinking back to what I was like as a 5 year old. How much I needed regular physiotherapy at that stage in my life. April’s godmother is absolutely right- she will be in great pain- and serious danger- if she is kept away from appropriate medication for too long. From one CP ‘child’ to another, my heart goes out to April.

					

	

		
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from → DisAbility in the News, mainstream madness

	


					


	

		
Cancer Scam Mother Faces Jail For DLA And Carers Allowance Fraud

		
October 3, 2012

	

	

		

		

			by  		

	

	

				
This is shocking. A very close family member of mine is currently seriously ill with cancer so just the thought of someone making up cancer makes me even more sick right now than it usually would.


A mother from Gloucestershire who pretended her son had cancer in order to claim benefits has been warned she faces jail.


The Stroud woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, kept up the pretence for three years while the boy was aged between four and seven, a court heard.


She shaved his hair and eyebrows to look like the effects of chemotherapy and claimed about £50,000 in benefits.


The case at Gloucester Crown Court was adjourned for a pre-sentence report.


Jail ‘almost certain’


The woman was released on bail until 2 November when she will be sentenced.


Judge Jamie Tabor told the woman she faces “almost certain imprisonment”.


Benefits the woman claimed included disability living allowance and carers’ allowance, as well as child tax credits, by falsely saying her children were living with her.


She admitted one count of child cruelty, eight counts of fraud and one of forgery by faking doctors’ letters, relating to the period between June 2008 and May 2010.

					

	

		
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Woman In Wheelchair May Lose Internship- Because Of Lack Of Accessible Property In London

		
October 3, 2012

	

	

		

		

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This really doesn’t seem fair to me. I wish I could help Judith Merry. Can you help her?




A woman faces losing a dream internship at the Department of Health after spending almost two months struggling to find wheelchair accessible rental accommodation in London.


Judith Merry, who suffers from congenital muscular dystrophy and lives with her parents in Aylesbury, was thrilled when she was offered the placement in August. “It would be a great opportunity to gain experience, and really stretch myself,” she says. “It meant moving to London, which I was very willing to do.”


However, her search for somewhere to move to has so far led only to frustration. “My mum and I are both making calls and we must have spoken to more that 50 agents so far – we spend the whole time either on the phone or waiting to hear back from people,” she says.


Merry’s plight highlights the dearth of suitable rental property in the capital and the difficulty many disabled people have in identifying those homes that are appropriate for their needs.


A report published by the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign in the summer showed that seven out of 10 young disabled people had found it difficult to identify property that might be accessible because lettings agents had poor knowledge of adapted homes in their area.


Four out of 10 said they had been told a property they were about to view was accessible, only to discover otherwise on arrival, while a quarter said a landlord had refused to carry out minor disability-related adjustments and adaptations, or refused to let them make their own.


Council or housing association property is only available to people who have lived in London for at least six months, so Merry’s search, like other newcomers, is focused on the private rental market.


An accessible property portal designed to cater for people in her position proved unhelpful, with very few agents using it to list suitable homes.


The biggest problem is the lack of information from lettings agents, says Merry: “I use websites like Zoopla and Findaproperty to find places, then go through to the agents’ sites, then call to ask about the property. I need to know if it has level access, if there is a lift, what the bathroom is like. Often the agent doesn’t know, so you end up chasing lots of people.


“There was one place I went to look at because the bedroom was on the ground floor, but when I arrived there were steps up to the front door. I had to view the rooms from outside while my mum went in and took photos.”


Even properties that are advertised as having wheelchair access have proved inappropriate. Merry’s search for flat shares on the website Spareroom yielded several results for properties that had been marked as accessible but had stairs to the doors, or bathrooms that were too small for her to use.


Her original budget of £500 a month for a room was optimistic in London’s booming rental market, but even trebling that has not helped her search, which is focused on areas close to the wheelchair-friendly Jubilee line on the underground, the Docklands Light Railway and other overground stations she knows to be accessible.


“The internship was meant to start in October, with the date dependent on when I could find accommodation, but I’m not sure what will happen if I cannot find somewhere,” she said. “I rely on people to drive me so I cannot commute in from Aylesbury.”


Bobby Ancil, project manager of Trailblazers, a 400-strong group of young disabled campaigners who tackle social issues affecting disabled people, said the “sad truth” was that Merry’s case was not unusual.


There was a lack of information about which properties were accessible, he said, which was “adding to the burden of an acute lack of step-free housing stock and inconsistent quotas for new properties built to be suitable for disabled tenants”.


He added: “Ironically, London is actually leading the way in terms of accessible homes: all new housing in London must be built to Lifetime Homes standard and 10% built to wheelchair accessible standard.


“We need the rest of the UK to follow London’s example. The key is for estate and letting agents to gain understanding of accessible property,and their disabled customer base, to make sure these homes reach the people who need them.”



					

	

		
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BBC Ouch Interview Liz Carr On Her Silent Witness Role

		
October 3, 2012

	

	

		

		

			by  		

	

	

				
BBC Ouch have interviewed their regular writer and presenter on her upcoming role in BBC drama Silent Witness.


Disabled actress and comedian Liz Carr is to become a regular fixture on our TV screens in the popular BBC One science-based crime drama. Damon Rose caught up with her to find out more about the new character she’ll be playing.


Regular visitors to these pages will know her as presenter of Ouch’s podcast, others may have seen her in her one woman show It Hasn’t Happened Yet or doing a comedy set somewhere round the UK. From early in the new year, however, Liz Carr will be playing forensic lab scientist Clarissa Mullery in Silent Witness, the long-running BBC One crime series.


So, who is this new, disabled, scientist on the block?


Liz says: “Clarissa is a clever no nonsense sarcastic woman who has incredible confidence and, despite having a sharp tongue, is very likeable. She’s really funny – that’s what attracted me to the role. She’s also smart and perceptive.


“If I’m going to put a disability slant on it, she’s someone who doesn’t bang on about being disabled but, equally, has no problem with who she is.”


Clarissa (pictured above) is the assistant of another new character, Jack Hodgson, played by David Caves. Jack insists that she joins him at the Lyell Centre after he gets the post. He is one of the youngest forensic scientists in the country and Clarissa has been crucial to his career progression in a very successful working relationship at his previous place of work.


The new stars, Caves and Carr, will join regulars Emilia Fox (Nikki) and William Gaminara (Leo). The duo bring their expertise to the Lyell Centre now that Harry, a pathologist played by Tom Ward, has departed. Silent Witness is in its 16th series. 

 and this is the first time they’ve added a fourth continuing character.


It’s widely appreciated that television still struggles with portraying disabled people in the mainstream so it grabs the attention when somebody Like Liz lands a significant role.


Her difference goes beyond just being a wheelchair user because she is smaller than average and has a non-standard appearance. She acknowledges this: “I don’t look like a normal person who’s just sitting down, I look like I’ve been ill, I’m frail, I’m little, I’ve got thin arms; they’re all the things that make me who I am. After the audition, I thought they wouldn’t be brave enough to cast a disabled person who looks like I do. I was wrong.”


In Silent Witness, the character Clarissa has a look which sets her apart from the curly-haired comedian we have come to know.


The forensic scientist is quite funky, Liz says, and dresses in a very contemporary way: “She doesn’t look like mutton dressed as lamb and also isn’t a dowdy disability stereotype with pleated skirts. They were originally thinking Girl with Dragon Tattoo in terms of styling.


“In the very rare shots where you see her feet, you’ll see her wearing killer high heels or platforms. This is being a bit playful because, when you’re sitting down all the time like me, you can wear high heels as you don’t have to try and walk in them if you’re a wheelchair user.” She adds: “There aren’t many forensic scientists wearing four inch heels round the lab.”


Liz is very pleased with the progression of the character and excited to be working on such a well-established prime time drama.


Though we might now be used to seeing disabled people running, skipping and jumping after this summer’s Paralympic Games, Clarissa Mullery is the very opposite of that active image. Perhaps due to the fact she can’t move too well, she is more cerebral and therefore in the mould of a Hawking rather than a Weir.


When looking at her theatre background, Liz Carr has focused on stories about disability, exploring the humour and minutiae of a disabled life. So, will we hear Clarissa talking about those differences in the way she lives and works? Her answer shows she’s very mindful of what her community might want from a prominent disabled character but says it could be that visibility, rather than words, may just be the most powerful message.


“I remember saying to one of the writers ‘shouldn’t we talk about disability?’, and he said the biggest thing we can do, the most political acct is just her being there. She’s a forensic scientist, she’s married, confident, self-assured, she’s got the measure of the other characters and all of that is what’s political about her.


“You don’t have to go on about whether she filled in an Access to Work form when she started at the Lyell Centre – who cares? Just her place in the show is important.”


• The new series of Silent Witness will be on BBC One early in the new year; watch the channel for further details.


• Liz Carr co-presents the 90th podcast from Ouch! available to download or stream at the end of this week.

					

	

		
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Ben, 13, From Hull Found!

		
October 3, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Good news readers. I’ve just seen on Twitter that Ben, the 13 year old boy with Aspergers who went missing on Monday, has been found.


https://twitter.com/missmiddy/status/253216209254875136

					

	

		
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Cycling Fits Almost Any Impairment

		
October 3, 2012

	

	

		

		

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As a disabled child, I used to ride an adapted bike. With me, it was used for exercise. Paralympic sport was unthought of. But this article brought back the memory, so I thought I would share both with you.

					

	

		
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from → DisAbility Sport

	


					


	

		
Paralympic Boom Still Echoes Around British Disability Sport

		
October 3, 2012

	

	

		

		

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From yesterday’s Guardian:




The Paralympics inspired thousands of Britons to decide that having a disability was no barrier to sport as they cheered on David Weir, Ellie Simmonds and other stars of the Games. Now almost every pursuit connected to the Paralympics has reported a surge in interest.


The Parasport website, run by the British Paralympic Association, which gives information about disability sports, reported a 2,000% increase in web traffic during the Paralympics compared with the same period a year before. A significant majority of the near 4,000 visitors a day, Parasport said, went to the site’s “find a club” section. This, in turn, has seen clubs inundated with new participants.


Sue Blaycock started the Wythenshawe Wheelers cycling club eight years ago, gradually building up to 50 people at Saturday morning try-out sessions at a local park.


One recent Saturday, shortly after the Paralympics, 130 people arrived. “We’ve seen a huge increase in interest, especially in children and young people,” Blaycock said. “We’re getting lots of people who didn’t think they could even ride a bike before they saw the Paralympics.”


The club has 120 different adapted bikes, trikes and four-wheeled quads, as well as side-by-side tandems and those that can carry a wheelchair user, but is still struggling to cope. Blayford said: “Sometimes people have to wait. You might get six people in wheelchairs coming and we only have three of the bikes that can carry them.”


Ian Tierney, from the charity Cycling Projects, which runs similar “Wheels for all” sessions around the country, said his organisation has had a similar post-Games boom, describing it as part of a general increase in the confidence of some people with disabilities.


He said: “It seemed to light a spark with people. A lot of disabled people believe they’re perhaps being shown more respect now, and their lap around the athletics track on a hand cycle has been shown to be more meaningful to more people. We realise not everyone is going to perform to a competition standard but a lot of people will be able to go out and enjoy it, and have cycling as part of their daily life.”


Such a surge is perhaps understandable for a sport Britain dominated at the Paralympics, with 22 cycling medals, eight of them gold – including four golds won by Sarah Storey.


But a similar effect has been seen in pursuits where the home athletes found the going tougher. There were no British medals at all in wheelchair basketball or wheelchair rugby, but the governing organisations of both report a huge Paralympic boost.


David Pond, chief executive of Great Britain Wheelchair Rugby, says the body is getting about 30 calls a day from people wanting to play the fast and brutal sport sometimes known as murderball or take part in another way. He said: “We always expected there to be a surge in interest because of the Games but this has been more even than we expected. It’s partly because of all the great media coverage we had, but I think people also realised what a great sport it is. Our main problem is making sure we capitalise on all this momentum, particularly given uncertainty about funding.”


The Great Britain Wheelchair Basketball Association says it has seen almost 7,000 visitors to its “find a club” web page. Many of these take it a step further: David Kingstone from the Blackhawk Mallards club in Woking said there had been a “definite spike in interest”. He said: “We’ve had a number of emails, both during and after the Games. One of them was from someone who tried the sport at one of the sponsors’ stands at the Paralympics and immediately decided he wanted to try a local club.” The short-term boost, Kingstone says, follows a long-term gradual increase in interest, dating back to the Beijing Paralympics. Before the 2008 Games, he said, the club was down to just seven registered players. Now it has 28 and fields four teams, two in the men’s national league.


The London 2012 effect has particularly assisted sports with previously low profiles, for example sitting volleyball. Neither British side got beyond the quarter-finals, but there was huge interest in the sport, especially the participation of Martine Wright, who lost her legs in the London bombings of 2005. Volleyball England said it has seen “overwhelming” interest, with three new clubs planned and the modern day popularity barometer of Facebook page “likes” for the sport rising from 850 to 7,000-plus.


It is a similar story for the Paralympic-specific pursuit of boccia, a bowls-like sport with various formats catering to a great range of impairments, where British athletes won two medals. “There’s definitely been an increase in general interest and the number of people wanting to play boccia since the Paralympics,” said Rachel Crack from Boccia England. “The success we got with a couple of medals has seems to have really put Boccia on people’s radar.”


And whether its boccia or one of the other disciplines, surely more than one of the British stars of the Rio 2016 Paralaympics will have been inspired to take up sport by London’s triumphant summer.



					

	

		
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from → DisAbility Sport, london 2012, Paralympics

	


					


	

		
Jessica Thom Was On Woman’s Hour Today

		
October 2, 2012

	

	

		

		

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The link in the Tweet will take you to her interview. I’m about to listen to it now.

					

	

		
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from → disability on air, updates

	


					


	

		
‘Martin’ And Jane Nicklinson Refused Court Of Appeal Hearing

		
October 2, 2012

	

	

		

		

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High Court judges have refused permission for the case of a man who fought for the right to die to go to the Court of Appeal.


Tony Nicklinson, 58, who suffered from locked-in syndrome, died from pneumonia after refusing food in August.


Mr Nicklinson was paralysed from the neck down after a stroke in 2005.


His wife, Jane, had pledged in September to continue with her husband’s fight but judges refused to make her party to the proceedings.


The judges said they were “deeply conscious of her suffering” since Mr Nicklinson’s stroke, but said they did “not consider that the proposed appeal has any real prospect of success”.


The second sufferer, who cannot be named for legal reasons, but is known as AM or Martin, suffered a stroke in August 2008.


He was given the go-ahead for action against the Director of Public Prosecutions to be heard by appeal judges.


He is unable to speak, is virtually unable to move and describes his life as “undignified, distressing and intolerable” – he wants to be allowed a “dignified suicide”.


His lawyers said the High Court ruling deprived 47-year-old Martin of “the opportunity to take the necessary steps to end his own life”.


The parties were informed of the appeal decisions made by Lord Justice Toulson, Mr Justice Royce and Mrs Justice Macur, in a written ruling sent to them on Tuesday.

					

	

		
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13 Year Old Boy With Aspergers Syndrome Missing From Hull Since Last Night

		
October 2, 2012

	

	

		

		

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https://twitter.com/missmiddy/status/253080798536818689

					

	

		
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from → publicity

	


					


	

		
Southend Borough Council Campaign Against Blue Badge Bay Abuse

		
October 2, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Southend Borough Council is asking people to report drivers illegally using disabled parking spaces.


The council has started a campaign against those using the bays without displaying a blue badge.


As a Blue Badge holder, I sincerely thank them!



					

	

		
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Mike Swainger- The First Man To Get A Bionic Hand On The NHS

		
October 2, 2012

	

	

		

		

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A man from Hull has become the first in the country to be fitted with a bionic hand on the NHS.


Mike Swainger lost an arm and one leg after he was hit by a train when he was 13 years old.


Twenty years on and he says he has been given a new chance to enjoy life with his battery powered hand.


Vicky Johnson reports.



					

	

		
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Jeremy Clarkson’s ‘Elephant Man’ Comments On Top Gear Breached Disability Guidelines

		
October 1, 2012

	

	

		

		

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The BBC Trust has ruled that comments on Top Gear which likened the design of a camper van to people with facial disfigurements, did breach guidelines.


An appeal has found presenter Jeremy Clarkson, who called facial growths “really ugly things”, had played on a “stereotypically negative reaction”.


It ruled that remarks about not wanting to talk to the camper van at a party were “not editorially justified”.


The episode of the hit BBC Two motoring show was broadcast on 5 February.


The comments in question were made during an exchange between presenters Clarkson and Richard Hammond, while reviewing a Prius camper van.


The BBC Trust’s Editorial Standards Committee reviewed the remarks following an appeal from a member of the public, who had complained they were “offensive, prejudicial and unacceptable”.


Previous investigations found the show had not breached guidelines, and the BBC said it felt it was clear the joke was on Clarkson or the camper van itself.


At the time the BBC apologised, saying it was “genuinely sorry” for causing upset, but hoped “it would be clear from the absurdity of the context that no offence was intended”.


‘Offensive stereotype’


The committee’s report said the show’s audience enjoyed the presenters’ “sometimes controversial and forthright views”.


It found Clarkson’s slurred speech while referencing Joseph Merrick, played by John Hurt in The Elephant Man, was “on the margins of acceptability”.


However it upheld the original complaint, ruling that comments near the end of the exchange, suggesting not being able to look at a person with facial disfigurement, “strayed into an offensive stereotypical assumption”.


Clarkson had said on the show: “That is not a car that you could talk to at a party unless you were looking at something else is it?”


The show’s executive producer had previously acknowledged that the segment was scripted, rather than ad libbed by presenters, and had been through the BBC’s compliance system.


But finding the programme in breach of guidelines on harm and offence, the committee said the comments “did not meet generally accepted standards in the context of their portrayal of a disability”.


It concluded that it was not necessary to change the guidelines, in ways that had been suggested in the complaint.


One hundred and thirty-seven complaints were originally received about the Top Gear episode.


However, the committee did note that charity Changing Faces, which helps people affected by conditions, marks or scars that alter their appearance, had drawn attention to the programme and asked their supporters to contact the BBC.


‘Changing attitudes’


The charity said today that it welcomes the BBC Trust’s decision to uphold its complaint.


“Everyday people with an unusual appearance and other disfigurements suffer bullying, ridicule and hate crime,” said Changing Faces founder James Partridge.


“This is a small step towards changing attitudes. It is vital that people with disfigurements are not seen as fair game for low level jibes which are unacceptable and cruel.”


Mark Boylan, who has a cystic hygroma and haemangioma which causes facial growths, added that as a “genuine Top Gear fan” he was “gutted presenters felt the need to stoop to such a low level”.


He said: “Their humour singled out people who are visibly different. Although some may perceive these as harmless remarks, the fact that they were seen by millions could potentially influence their reactions to people with visible differences.


“Even though we are in the minority, our right to respect is equal to that of any majority.”

					

	

		
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Mother Calls For Spinal Muscular Atrophy Screening #smashsma

		
October 1, 2012

	

	

		

		

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A bereaved mother from Grimsby is calling for a change in screening procedures for pregnant women to help spot a rare genetic disease.


Laura Taylor’s six-month-old daughter Grace died after being born with Spinal Muscular Atrophy.


Ms Taylor claims a simple blood test would have spotted the disease before birth, and is now hoping to raise awareness of the condition.



					

	

		
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from → special parents

	


					


	

		
Guardian Interview Jaspal Dhani

		
October 1, 2012

	

	

		

		

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From today’s Guardian:




Tell me about yourself, I say to Jaspal Dhani. “I’d rather not,” he replies, smiling warmly. “It reinforces the stereotypes and misunderstandings. It reinforces the charitable model that says there is something wrong with people and we should give them money.” He’s challenging the journalistic model here. He’s a wheelchair user; an activist. We are talking about disability in the UK; these occasions demand a backstory. But he’s not budging. Personalising is a distraction, he says. “When everyone was watching the athletes at the Paralympics, they didn’t focus on their conditions. The issue about David Weir was not what happened to him. It was his amazing performance.” We don’t want benevolence, he says. The fight is for basic human rights.


A bit of colour might help, I say. We knew Gandhi’s backstory; Martin Luther King’s, Mandela’s. But Jaspal has thought it through and that’s his position. I hope it works for him.


Jaspal is chief executive of the UK Disabled People’s Council – which has 57 groups under its umbrella – and co-chair of the forthcoming campaign the Hardest Hit. You’ll hear a lot about the Hardest Hit come 20 October, when proponents will walk at the front of the TUC march against coalition cuts. The disabled do fear being the hardest hit. Half a million, for example, will lose out when the government replaces the disability living allowance.


But even now things aren’t so great. Just weeks ago, we were crowing over our Paralympians and discussing a new found appreciation of disability. But always lurking were the looming cuts and a hardening of the public mood. The British Social Attitudes survey this year asked how many respondents would see the government increase spending on disabled people who cannot work. The noes rose 21 percentage points compared with 1998. Perhaps that’s because the rightwing papers and ministers have worked to toxify the very notion of disability benefit. Perhaps there’s cause and effect. Hate crimes against the disabled rose 30% last year compared with 2010.


You’ve got to make an impact on government; but first, you’ve got to win back public support, I tell him. Worth repeating stuff like the fact that half of the eligible disabled work and don’t rely solely on benefits. Jaspal is one of them. He works in IT. He’s 43. That much he let slip.



					

	

		
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Arty Prosthetic Limbs

		
September 30, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Designed by Scott Summit, who wants to give amputees their shape back and enhance their bodies.

					

	

		
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from → Fun Stuff, links and plugs

	


					


	

		
Malcolm Wicks MP Dies

		
September 30, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Malcolm Wicks, sitting Labour MP for Croydon North, sadly died from cancer yesterday.


I’m posting this little tribute because outside of Parliament, he was Vice President of Carers UK and the Alzheimers Society. 


In Parliament:






					

	

		
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Katie Price Guardian Interview

		
September 29, 2012

	

	

		

		

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The Guardian have interviewed Katie Price about her life with Harvey.

					

	

		
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from → Famously DisAbled, special parents

	


					


	

		
Ade Adepitan To Be On Desert Island Discs This Sunday

		
September 28, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Kirsty Young’s castaway is the Paralympian & broadcaster Ade Adepitan. Wheelchair basketball’s his sport and this year he partnered Claire Balding anchoring the television coverage of the 2012 London Paralympics.


When he’s not stuck in a studio explaining the intricacies of Goalball he’s reporting from the rainforests of Nicaragua or the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Adversity seems to suit him – he even survived turning up for his first day at school aged 7 in a pink checked suit and bow tie. Inspired by his boyhood heroes Seb Coe and Daley Thompson, who he first saw on TV competing in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, sport became his passion.


He says “I think I’ve done more things with my disability than most able-bodied people would ever dream of doing”.

					

	

		
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Untouchable- France’s Oscar Hopeful

		
September 28, 2012

	

	

		

		

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I’d love to see this movie. Does anyone know if it’s in French?


Seems like issues of race and disability mix. It would be interesting to know what is more focused on.


The unconventional comedy Untouchable, about a quadriplegic millionaire and his immigrant carer, is on course to be one of the biggest French cinema hits of all time and may represent France at next year’s Oscars.


“From the people that brought you The Artist,” cries the poster for the French comedy Untouchable.


The tagline is a bold and obvious statement of the film’s intent to recreate the critical success of the winner of 2012’s best picture Oscar. In financial terms, though, Untouchable has already surpassed it.


Released nationwide on Friday following a week in London cinemas, the comedy charts the relationship between a wealthy white quadriplegic who has been crippled in a paragliding accident and the young, black ex-convict he hires as his latest carer.


Not your run-of-the-mill laugh-filled romp, it has nevertheless taken an incredible $364 million (£225 million) worldwide. The Artist, in contrast, earned a relatively meagre $133m (£82m).


However, both films share more than a few things in common other than the obvious French connection.


First of all, neither was a particularly easy sell to potential investors – one of whom asked the film-makers if the main character “could walk a little at the end”.


Co-director Eric Toledano says: “Even with friends at dinner, when they asked what the subject was and we’d try to pitch it, you would see their faces drop.


“I said, ‘Let’s stop the pitching’.”


Instead, he and co-director Olivier Nakache relied on the fact that they already had three relatively successful films under their belt.


So they decided to let the tale – based on the true story of French aristocrat Philippe Pozzo di Borgo and his carer Abdel Sellou – speak for itself.


“We thought the story had all the ingredients that we loved in cinema,” says Nakache. “We wanted to make a realistic comedy with a real deep subject.


“Watching Abdel carry Philippe out of his car was a powerful image. How these men connected was through humour.”


Toledano continues: “And not just humour but a special humour, a humour without any limit, a humour which put them outside of convention.


“One is black, one is white; he is rich, he is poor and they can say anything.”


The pair cite British films like Brassed Off, Billy Elliot and The Full Monty as examples of what they hope Untouchable will achieve, having more to say on a social level than simply making people laugh.


So far the gamble has paid off, to Toledano’s delight.


“It has been a big, big surprise, especially in France where people were sending us texts saying, ‘It’s impossible to see your movie, every theatre is full’.”


Untouchable is enjoying a timely launch in the UK, a country still in the throes of a hugely successful Paralympic games.


Their organisers hope they have permanently changed attitudes towards people with disabilities, though the directors of Untouchable are reluctant to say whether this will make people more likely to go and watch their film.


“The movie has been born under a good star but we don’t know how and why, maybe because it speaks to people and touches people,” says Toledano.


“Also, especially in France, we wondered if it would work because of the bad economic situation in Europe. But it seems people need to laugh.”


With the might of The Weinstein Company, which orchestrated The Artist’s successful awards campaign, the film has been selected to represent France as a potential nominee for best foreign language film at next year’s Academy Awards.


“We are so proud,” says Toledano. “Representing France is always an honour and we are only the fifth comedy film in Oscar history to go forward for a nomination.”


“I think there’s no question that it’s going to be an Oscar favourite,” Harvey Weinstein told the BBC. “It’s such a moving story, it’s funny and charming, it’s everything I like in a movie.”


It was Weinstein who did the seemingly impossible and made a silent French film the firm favourite at last year’s awards.


S so much so, in fact, that when the film was called out as the winner, there was almost a sense of anti-climax.


“I’ve always said that it’s just about getting people to see your movie,” says the US producer. “It’s as simple as that and every time I say it, people think there’s a magic formula involved.”


Undoubtedly The Artist’s success has opened doors for a film like Untouchable. Yet even Toledano and Nakache were surprised at how Michel Hazanavicius’s black-and-white silent wowed the world.


“When Michel told us the story, we said ‘Are you sure?'” recalls Nakache.


“We were neighbours in the editing rooms and we would have coffee together and we could never hear any dialogue coming through the wall, only music. We were like, ‘What kind of movie are you making?'”


Weinstein’s support for Untouchable was never more vocal than when the film was seized upon by French right-wing politician Jean-Marie le Pen, who accused it of being an example of France’s move toward ethnic diversity.


In the film wealthy Philippe’s carer Driss, played by French comedy actor Omar Sy, is a Somalian immigrant. The real life Abdel Sellou is Algerian.


“France is like this handicapped person stuck in this wheelchair,” Le Pen told a French TV network. “It would be a disaster if France would find itself in the same situation as this poor handicapped person.”


A furious Weinstein called Le Pen’s attack “repulsive,” saying it represented “a bigoted world view”.


“He has a right to his opinion but it’s dangerous,” says Toledano. “Len Pen always does the same thing, he did a similar thing during the World Cup in 1998.


“He said there were many black and Arab players in the team and this was not the French team. He’s inviting himself into a debate and we didn’t respond, because we don’t want him involved with our movie.


“I’m not a politician, I’m just a writer and a director. But I think that when you have some success, like the Americans say, you end up swimming with the sharks.”


Weinstein, whose other successes include Pulp Fiction and Shakespeare in Love, already has plans to adapt Untouchable for an English-speaking audience.


Let the Right One In, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and the forthcoming Pusher – based on the work of Nicolas Winding Refn, the Danish director of Drive – are among other foreign-language hits to have been similarly adapted.


Britain’s Colin Firth is apparently tipped to taken on the role of Philippe, played in Untouchable by Francois Cluzet.


“We think he is a wonderful actor and we loved him in The King’s Speech,” says Toledano. “If the remake has to be made, than better with him.


“We trust Harvey but for our part, we made the movie that we liked and we have to leave this adventure now and think about a new one.”


Untouchable is out in London and is released nationwide on Friday.

					

	

		
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from → DisAbility on Screen, Fun Stuff

	


					


	

		
Jess McGee, 19, Ordered Off Bus After Driver Called Her Epilepsy A ‘Pisstake’

		
September 27, 2012

	

	

		

		

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I am shocked by this story. I wrote here a few years ago about how insulting it was for me when, on one of the rare occasions I have used a bus, a passenger asked me if I had a Disabled Person’s Bus Pass.


That was bad enough but for the driver to ask what her disability is was completely unneccessary. Especially as she did have a relevant and completely valid disability travel card provided by her local council.


To have been asked, by the driver, to show the card as proof she is disabled would have been bad enough but Jess’ mum takes the words out of my mouth:


“It was just absolutely none of his business what her disability was.”


Sadly, incidents like this are not rare. Bus drivers need to accept that disabled people use buses, too. They need to be trained in how to react with respect when we do.


 


 

					

	

		
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from → mainstream madness

	


					


	

		
M&S To Run Job Drive For Disabled People

		
September 27, 2012

	

	

		

		

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This is such good news. Sincere thanks to M&S. Many other big companies should follow this example.


A drive by Marks & Spencer to recruit more than 1,000 workers is targeting disabled people.


The retailer is looking to staff its new distribution centre at Castle Donington in Leicestershire.


The company said it was working with Remploy, which gets disabled people into work, to make sure this group are represented in the process.


Remploy said the centre, which will open in early 2013, would provide important opportunities.


A Marks & Spencer spokesman said Remploy would conduct initial training before applicants came to the site.


‘Quite special’


“Participants will then complete a two-week work placement where they will be working in a team, in a live environment.


“At the end of their placement the team leader and participant will review whether the participant is ready for employment at M&S Castle Donington or whether further training and support is required,” the spokesman said.


Beth Carruthers, director of employment services at Remploy, said: “Less than 50% of disabled people are in employment and they have the lowest employment rates in the UK.


“So this programme is quite special, in that M&S are making a massive investment but also they are ring-fencing jobs for disabled people and that give those people a start and a step up, which is fantastic.”


Marks & Spencer said the facility was set to be the UK’s largest dedicated e-commerce warehouse, distributing two million items a week to homes and stores across the country.


The retailer is looking to recruit warehouse operatives, engineers, mechanics administrative staff, transport controllers and managers.


The building covers an area the equivalent of 11 Wembley size football pitches, and is over 25 metres high.


 

					

	

		
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Colin Traynor- More DWP Madness

		
September 27, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Thanks to Channel 4 News:


					

	

		
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Doors Open For Dyslexia Accessibility Font OpenDyslexic As It Goes To Instapaper

		
September 27, 2012

	

	

		

		

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I hadn’t yet heard of this, but then, fonts and tablet devices are too technical for me. I do think it’s a great idea, though. Can someone invent a Braille app next? Or is there one already?


A free-to-use font designed to help people with dyslexia read online content is gaining favour.


OpenDyslexic’s characters have been given “heavy-weighted bottoms” to prevent them from flipping and swapping around in the minds of their readers.


A recent update to the popular app Instapaper has adopted the text format as an option for its users.


The font has also been built into a word processor, an ebook reader and has been installed on school computers.


The project was created by Abelardo Gonzalez, a New Hampshire-based mobile app designer, who released his designs onto the web at the end of last year.


“I had seen similar fonts, but at the time they were completely unaffordable and so impractical as far as costs go,” he told the BBC.


“I figured there’s other people who would like the same thing but had the same issues, and so I thought I’d make an open source one that everyone could contribute to and help out with.


“The response has been great: I’ve had people emailing saying this is the first time they could read text without it looking wiggly or has helped other symptoms of dyslexia.”


The 28-year-old released OpenWeb – a free web browser based on the font – on Apple’s iOS app store earlier this year.


He then used online adverts to publicise his invention on a series of related sites.


Several developers who heard about the innovation subsequently jumped on board, including the creator of Dox on Box, an e-reader for iPads; and the makers of Wordsmith, a stylised word processor for Mac computers.


Users have also installed the font onto Android devices, allowing it to be used across a range of software, and the jailbreak community has also enabled adapted iOS devices to install it to permit similar functionality on Apple’s mobile devices .


However, the inclusion of the font in Instapaper last week is perhaps the clearest sign yet that it is going mainstream.


The program – which allows users to save versions of webpages so that they can be read offline – has about two million registered accounts.


The app’s developer Marco Arment said he had first looked for a dyslexia-optimised font two years ago, but had failed to find one until he discovered OpenDyslexic.


“Given what Instapaper does – capture any web page and present it in a consistent, adjustable, customer-controlled environment – it’s a natural fit for bringing improved accessibility and legibility to anyone who needs it,” he wrote on his blog.


Enhanced e-readers


Mr Gonzalez said he had also been contacted by The Kildonan School – which specialises in teaching children with dyslexia – to tell him it had started testing the font with its pupils.


He added that he had also heard from other teachers in the US and UK who were using the product in a less formal capacity.


Although he is happy to see the font spread organically, Mr Gonzalez said he was also trying to encourage some of the major tech firms to support it.


“Sony and Amazon have said they would consider it for their e-readers,” he said.


“Google is also hopefully going to publish a version to its web fonts directory which would make it really easy to integrate it onto websites without administrators having to upload it to their servers.”


According to the British Dyslexia Association (BDA), about 4% of the UK’s population has a severe form of the disability. The campaign group welcomed the innovation’s spread.


“As a dyslexic, I find this font very easy to read and reduces the effects of visual stress that I experience,” said Arran Smith, the group’s project officer.


“I especially like the spacing between letters, as it is even and regular, which is also recommended within the BDA Style Guide.”

					

	

		
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California Governor Drives Driverless Car To Google Headquarters To Sign State Bill

		
September 26, 2012

	

	

		

		

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What this article says is absolutely true. Driverless cars will be a great help to those who can’t drive themselves. My disability means I will never be able to drive a ‘real’ car. So the chance to have a driverless car would mean the world to me. It would change my life, and my mother’s life, so much for the better. It would give me the freedom to leave my house without having to wait for anyone to come with me.


I know 10 years is a long time. That’s just for America and I live in England. So maybe I am getting a little bit carried away.


But the fact I can’t drive is the last thing I have still to accept about my disbility. It’s the last thing I can honestly say I don’t like about being disabled. If only I could drive, my life would be perfect, disability and all.


So forgive me if I seem over excited. For that is the power of technology- and wishful thinking.


California governor Jerry Brown travelled to Google headquarters in a self-driving Toyota Prius – then signed state legislation that will pave the way for driverless cars.


The bill by Democratic senator Alex Padilla will establish safety and performance regulations to test and operate autonomous vehicles on the state’s roads and highways.


“Today we’re looking at science fiction becoming tomorrow’s reality – the self-driving car,” Mr Brown said. “Anyone who gets inside a car and finds out the car is driving will be a little skittish but they’ll get over it.”


Google has been developing autonomous car technology and lobbying for the regulations. The company’s fleet of a dozen computer-controlled vehicles has logged more than 300,000 miles of self-driving without an accident, according to the internet company.


“I think the self-driving car can really dramatically improve the quality of life for everyone,” Google co-founder Sergey Brin said. Autonomous cars can make roads safer, free commuters from the drudgery of driving, reduce congestion and provide transport to people who can’t drive themselves, such as the blind, disabled, elderly and intoxicated, Mr Brin said. “I expect that self-driving cars will be far safer than human-driven cars,” he said.


He predicted that autonomous vehicles would be commercially available within a decade. He said Google had no plans to produce its own cars, but instead wanted to partner the industry to develop autonomous vehicles.


But the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers expressed concern that California was moving too quickly to embrace self-driving cars and needed to first sort out liability issues. “Unfortunately this legislation lacks any provision protecting a car manufacturer whose car is converted to an autonomous operation vehicle without the consent or even knowledge of that auto manufacturer,” the trade group said.


Autonomous cars use computers, sensors and other technology to operate independently, but a human driver can override the autopilot function and take control of the vehicle at any time.


With smartphone-wielding drivers more distracted than ever, backers say robotic vehicles have the potential to significantly reduce collisions and traffic fatalities, noting that nearly all car accidents are a result of human error.


The legislation requires the California Department of Motor Vehicles to draft regulations for autonomous cars by January 1 2015. Currently, state law does not mention self-driving cars because the technology is so new. The regulations would allow vehicles to operate autonomously, but a licensed driver would still need to sit behind the wheel to serve as a back-up operator in case of emergency.

					

	

		
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Locked In Man ‘Martin’ May Consider Starving Himself

		
September 26, 2012

	

	

		

		

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The wife of a man known as Martin, who has locked in syndrome, says he may consider starving himself to death if he cannot be helped to die legally.


Both he and Tony Nicklinson, who had the same condition, lost their attempt at the Royal Courts of Justice to get the law changed.


For the first time, the families of Mr Nicklinson and Martin have spoken.


5 live‘s Victoria Derbyshire indroduced Jane Nicklinson to Martin’s wife ‘Felicity’, whose words have been spoken by an actress.

					

	

		
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Did You Know Franklin D Roosevelt Was In A Wheelchair?

		
September 26, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Someone has left a comment on my Guardian article that has proved the point of the Old Is Gold campaign to me yet again.


Did you know that the former American President Franklin D Roosevelt was in a wheelchair while he was president? I didn’t until about 5 minutes ago. But when I studied his Presidency, no teacher ever hesitated to tell me the full details of his New Deal policy.


A Wikipedia article titled Franklin D Roosevelt’s paralytic illness   reveals:


Franklin D. Roosevelt’s paralytic illness began in 1921 at age 39, when he got a fever after exercising heavily during a vacation in Canada. While Roosevelt’s bout with illness was well known during his terms as President of the United States, the extent of his paralysis was kept from public view. After his death, his illness and paralysis became a major part of his image. He was diagnosed with poliomyelitis two weeks after he fell ill. However, a 2003 retrospective study favored a diagnosis of Guillain-Barré syndrome.


Roosevelt was able to convince many people that he was in fact getting better, which he believed was essential if he was to run for public office again. In private he used a wheelchair. But he was careful never to be seen in it in public, although he sometimes appeared on crutches. He usually appeared in public standing upright, while being supported on one side by an aide or one of his sons. For major speaking occasions an especially solid lectern was placed on the stage so that he could support himself from it; as a result, in films of his speeches Roosevelt can be observed using his head to make gestures, because his hands were usually gripping the lectern. He would occasionally raise one hand to gesture, but his other hand held the lectern.


Roosevelt was very rarely photographed while sitting in his wheelchair, and his public appearances were choreographed in such a way as to avoid having the press cover his arrival and departure at public events which would have involved his having to get in or out of a car. When possible, his limousine was driven into a building’s parking garage for his arrivals and departures. On other occasions, his limo would be driven onto a ramp to avoid steps, which Roosevelt was unable to ascend. When that was not practical, the steps would be covered with a ramp with railings, with Roosevelt using his arms to pull himself upward. Likewise, when traveling by train as he often did, Roosevelt often appeared on the rear platform of the presidential railroad car, the Ferdinand Magellan. When he boarded or disembarked, the private car was sometimes shunted to an area of the railroad yard away from the public for reasons of security and privacy. A private rail siding underneath the Waldorf Astoria was also used.


In keeping with social customs of the time, the media generally treated Roosevelt’s disability as taboo. News stories did not mention it, and editorial cartoonists, favorable and unfavorable, often showed the president with normal mobility. According to famed broadcaster David Brinkley, who was a young White House reporter in World War II, the Secret Service actively interfered with photographers who tried to take pictures of Roosevelt in a wheelchair or being moved about by others. However, there were occasional exceptions.


 


 


 

					

	

		
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Article By Me On Guardian Professional

		
September 26, 2012

	

	

		

		

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The Guardian recently asked me to write this on the Old Is Gold campaign.

					

	

		
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UK Floods: Are You Disabled Or Caring?

		
September 26, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Large parts of the UK are flooded. Luckily my part of London only had a little rainstorm on Monday, but unfortunately, Kew Gardens was not so lucky.


Anyway, the point of this post is to ask how the floods are affecting disabled people and carers.


Are you stuck at home? Does this prevent you getting to hospital appointments or treatment sessions?


Are you a parent carer whose disabled child can’t get to school? Are you a carer who can’t get to work to care for disabled people?


Are you a disabled adult whose carer can’t get to you?


Please leave comments below. If nothing else, they’ll make interesting reading for anyone stuck at home because of the floods!

					

	

		
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‘Cannabis Chemical’ May Combat Autism

		
September 26, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Natural cannabis-like chemicals in the brain may help combat the leading genetic cause of autism, research has shown.Scientists linked blockages in a signalling pathway dependent on the compounds, called 2-AG endocannabinoid transmitters, with symptoms of Fragile X syndrome.


Correcting the fault with drugs led to dramatic behavioural improvements in mice with a version of the condition.


Fragile X syndrome is the most common known genetic cause of autism.


It results from a mutation in the FMR1 gene on the female X chromosome. Men possess one copy of the chromosome, paired with a male Y chromosome, and women two.


Boys are much more likely to be born with Fragile X than girls. This is thought to be because with two X chromosomes, a defect in one may be compensated for by the other.


People with the syndrome suffer mental impairment, learning difficulties, and may be hyperactive or impulsive. They also possess notable physical characteristics such as an elongated face, flat feet and large ears.


The scientists, writing in the journal Nature Communications, stress that while their discovery may help people with Fragile X syndrome it will not provide a cure.


“What we hope is to one day increase the ability of people with Fragile X syndrome to socialise and engage in normal cognitive functions,” said lead researcher Professor Daniele Piomelli, from the University of California at Irvine in the United States.


The study was the first to identify the role of endocannabinoids in the neurobiology of Fragile X, she said.



					

	

		
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The Word Is My Activism

		
September 25, 2012

	

	

		

		

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This is a guest post by Penny Pepper. Thanks to Penny.


At a time when disabled people are under attack from all sides, I am often asked about my activism and if it informs my writing.


Every line I write is a form of political activism. The passion inside each thought and word is my weapon. When I perform a poem such as ‘Fraud’, there is my view, my frustration at injustice and our lack of equality.


My first statement of rebellion was when I was about seven. At ‘special school’ my best friend Becky had cerebral palsy. We sat on the special bus – local kids called it the “spaz bus” – chatting and sharing sweets. She was strong and wobbly. I was steady and frail. We made a good combination. A time came when a teacher decreed I had to go up a class but my friend Becky was staying where she was. I wrote a little rhyming poem about this and all I can remember now is the line ‘they don’t care, it isn’t fair’.  I felt an injustice was taking place, even though I was too young to articulate it fully. Later, I realised with angry disbelief, it was because Becky was deemed beyond further educating. The dismissal of a young girl’s potential in such an offhand way, still makes me growl in anger today.


From my punk days, writing poems for fanzines about the riots in Thatcher’s time, to my incarnation as a pop singer, onto the hard slog of writing novels and trying to sell them, I burn with a desire to coax people to question, to open minds to different perspectives, to celebrate and embrace difference. Human beings are not like homogenised milk. Our strength is our differences and where they overlap. It is unfortunate that at present we live in a society and under a government where the opposite appears to be extolled. We find that our basic rights are under threat, seen as luxury and privilege. The crips have had it too good, now we must conform to old stereotypes of being ‘the vulnerable’, in need of ‘care’ provided by a system that knows what we need better than we do.


So my activism travels all down the difficult way to ‘Desires Reborn’ which has just been released as an ebook (details below). I roll my eyes when it’s categorised as merely ‘sex’. Not because I regret writing a collection of explicit adult stories that feature disabled people, but because I believe sexuality cannot be expressed and explored in isolation. That’s what society likes to do to us – pigeon hole us. And that’s what medics often do – label us. Relationships with others, (sexual AND otherwise) and the freedom to have them in all their variety is a core political issue to me. It is at the heart of what we need to feel contentment, to place ourselves in our lives one way or another.


I am inspired by those that have fought discrimination and prejudice in past times, including black civil rights, gay and women’s rights movements.  When I am writing I remember that change doesn’t have to come with loud aggressive action. For me, it comes in the word, the story, the enticement of curiosity that may – hopefully – lead to an opening up to new possibility in someone’s way of thinking.


I might have been on this (often tricky) poeting, writing, singing journey for over 20 years, but as long as I can get the words together in my head, dug out from my heart and sent into world with my commitment and creative energy, I’ll do it till the world stops turning.


 


© Penny Pepper 2012.


 


‘Desires Reborn’ by Penny Pepper is available in all ebook formats including

Amazon Kindle

Kobo

Ipad, Ipod Touch and Iphones via Itunes 


www.pennypepper.co.uk

Twitter: @PenPep

					

	

		
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‘Disabled Writers Gave Me Faith In Words’

		
September 25, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Novelist AL Kennedy writes for the Guardian today that the disabled writers she worked with early in her career made her the writer she is today.


As a disabled writer, I say the mainstream need many more like her!

					

	

		
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Former ATOS Nurse Says She Was Forced To Find Disabled People Fit For Work

		
September 25, 2012

	

	

		

		

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A former nurse who was employed by the controversial capability assessor Atos has claimed she was forced to manipulate tests so that disabled people were deemed fit for work.




Joyce Drummond alleged she was warned by the French-owned firm she was being “too nice” to claimants. She said candidates were considered more able to work if they arrived for their interview with brushed hair, had a toddler with them, or wore make-up.


Ms Drummond, a former staff nurse at Glasgow’s Southern General Hospital, said bosses ignored her 20 years of medical experience. She told the Daily Record: “People trusted me and they confided in me. I felt I was having to stab them in the back.”


A recent investigation by The Independent revealed that more than 40 doctors and nurses working for Atos have been reported to medical regulators for professional misconduct.


Anyone who claims employment and support allowance because they are too sick or disabled to work must pass a work capability test, designed by the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) but conducted by one of Atos’s 1,400 staff. The company has £3.1bn of government contracts.


Ms Drummond, who resigned from the company three-and-a-half years ago, said: “If a woman was wearing make-up and was nicely dressed, she was deemed as functioning and capable.


“If someone came in with a toddler in tow, if they could manage a child, they could surely work. If someone had a pet, they were able to function and if they smiled while talking about a pet, I had to mark down that they smiled spontaneously and were therefore not depressed.”


Atos healthcare said the claims were completely unfounded, and said Ms Drummond was not involved in conducting ESA assessments but worked on other “unrelated” assessments.


A spokesman said: “Our trained doctors, nurses and physiotherapists use their clinical knowledge and apply the Government’s policy and criteria to each assessment. They look at a number of factors based on the individual and using the Government’s questions and descriptors to provide detailed information to the DWP.”





					

	

		
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CP Woman, 18, Gets £5.5M Compensation

		
September 25, 2012

	

	

		

		

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A woman left with irreversible brain damage due to a “catalogue of errors” during her birth has been awarded a total of £5.5m in compensation.


The woman, 18, was starved of oxygen in the days leading up to her birth at St Luke’s Hospital in Bradford in 1994, said the family’s solicitor.


Her disabilities mean she is dependent on family and carers.


Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust admitted liability and apologised.


The woman, whose family want her to remain anonymous, has been awarded a £2.2m lump sum and will receive periodical payments totalling £3.3m.


The payout will fund care for the rest of her life.


Her mother contacted Morrish Solicitors four years ago to pursue a claim for medical negligence against the hospital.


The firm argued that there were significant delays in the mother’s medical review and adequate care was not provided leading up to her daughter’s birth.


‘Extremely stressful’


As a result, the daughter was left with cerebral palsy, problems with speaking and hearing, severe learning difficulties and epilepsy.


Her mother said: “This has been a long fight to secure justice for my daughter.


“The last 18 years have taken their toll and been extremely stressful not only on myself, but the whole family.


“I hope we can now get the care and equipment that she needs to provider her with a better life.”


Solicitor Jane McBennett said: “The mother has had a hard fight to get justice for her daughter.”


She added: “Her daughter would have been left with nothing had her mother not decided to fight on.


“This settlement means that she will be looked after financially for the rest of her life.”


A spokesperson for Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust said it was pleased an agreement had been approved.


The spokesperson added: “The trust would like to take this opportunity to wish the patient and her family well for the future.”

					

	

		
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Norwich Benefit Assessment Centre Isn’t Wheelchair Accessible

		
September 24, 2012

	

	

		

		

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An assessment centre in Norfolk that decides whether disabled people are fit for work has been criticised for not being accessible to wheelchair users.


Atos, the company which runs the government assessments, has a second floor office in St Marys House, Duke Street, Norwich.


North Norfolk MP Norman Lamb said it was “fundamental” the service was accessible for all disabled people.


An Atos spokesperson said home visits could be arranged where necessary.


Liberal Democrat Mr Lamb said he was amazed a centre that decided whether disabled people were fit enough to work could not see people in wheelchairs.


‘Somewhat amazed’


“It was a constituent who said to me the assessment centre for disabled people was on the second floor of a building in Norwich and it did strike me as extraordinary,” he said.


“It seems to me as a priority they should be looking to locate this somewhere that is accessible for all disabled people.


“It does not make sense for a centre for disabled people to be based on a second floor – it leaves one somewhat amazed, but that’s what happened.


“We need to try and make sure an alternative is found as soon as possible.”


The building has a lift, but this cannot be used in the case of a fire which means people in wheelchairs are not able to be assessed at the Duke Street premises.


In a statement, Atos Healthcare said: “The government have provided St Mary’s House to us to carry out assessments on their behalf.


“We let people know about access prior to their visit and will reschedule an appointment at the nearest ground floor assessment centre or arrange a home visit where necessary.”


The nearest alternative assessment office is in King’s Lynn, about 45 miles from Norwich.

					

	

		
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Buddies Respite Care Scheme Builds Social Skills For Children With Autism

		
September 24, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Today’s Guardian Professional section carries an article about a respite care scheme that also builds social skills for children with learning difficulties and autism.

					

	

		
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Dale Cregan Due In Manchester Court Today

		
September 24, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Dale Cregan is due in court later today. I’ll update this post with his sentence when it is revealed.


Update 12pm: He’s still in custody. Case adjourned till 5 November.

					

	

		
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Liam Barker And #liambarker: How An Opinion Post Went Viral One Weekend In The Wonderful World Of Twitter

		
September 24, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Readers, it’s been a crazy weekend here on Same Difference. On Saturday afternoon I wrote this post on the case of Liam Barker. In a matter of hours it had hundreds of hits. So I made a decision to start a hashtag and try to get it trending on Twitter. The hashtag is not quite trending yet, but in what felt like no time at all the post had been ReTweeted and linked on Facebook by everyone from my best friend to Polly Toynbee.


To my great joy I discovered that Polly Toynbee’s Tweets are linked anywhere that is anywhere in the world of mainstream political websites. So here’s a tip- if you want a Tweet to go viral, send it to the most famous person in your field that you can think of!


The Liam Barker post has now had over 1100 hits daily for each of the last two days. Twitter and Facebook truly are the two most amazing things ever to happen to bloggers and journalists and anyone who tells you otherwise is usually an old fashioned adult who has probably never used either of them! I think it went as viral as the 16th birthday party in Holland that, unlike the case of Liam Barker, made headlines on the BBC this weekend.


I was and still am deeply affected by the case of Liam Barker. If you haven’t already heard the details please, please read the original post linked above.


The point of writing this post is not only to show off the number of hits I have had this weekend. It is not only to sincerely thank every one of the amazing people who shared the Liam Barker post and helped to send it viral.


After seeing the great success of my one simple little post, I have decided to turn it into a full Twitter campaign against benefit assessments for those who are too severely disabled, or too seriously ill, to ever be physically capable of working.


The good news is that if you wish to, you can help. If you know someone in a similar situation to Liam Barker, please tell their story using the #liambarker hashtag.


If you know someone who has appealed against a Work Capability Assessment that they should never have had in the first place, please tell their story using the #liambarker hashtag.


If you know someone who isn’t yet a Liam Barker, but will be unless we put a stop to unnecessary assessments, please tell their story using the #liambarker hashtag.


If you share my views on this story, please, please join the fight to make sure that there will never, ever be another Liam Barker.


Today I’ll be Tweeting the post to disability charities and celebrities who are sensitive to disability issues. If you wish to, please Tweet the link to the original post to any celebrity or disability charity you can think of.


Over the next few days I’d like to collect all the Tweets in one place so if you can use Storify, please let me know because I don’t have a clue where to start with it.


Finally, newspapers, if you have the space in your online editions, please, please cover the Liam Barker story or this campaign and help to spread the word.


This can never happen again and if we don’t spread the word as far and wide as possible we are, in some small way, allowing it to.

					

	

		
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National Television Awards To Honour 2012 Olympians And Paralympians With Landmark Award

		
September 23, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Stars from the Olympic and Paralympic Games will be honoured at the National Television Awards in January.


A special Landmark Award will be presented to key members of London 2012 “to pay homage to the UK’s greatest Olympic teams in over 100 years”.


The most contentious awards battle is expected to be between talents shows.


The first series of BBC One’s The Voice will compete against more established rivals, The X Factor, Strictly Come Dancing and Britain’s Got Talent.


The newly revealed longlist also features Dancing on Ice, Got To Dance and Let’s Dance for Sport Relief.


A special film featuring highlights of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, which achieved record TV audiences, will be shown during the ceremony to celebrate the Landmark Award.


Viewers are being asked to vote on their favourite moments, such as Mo Farah’s gold medal wins, Ellie Simmonds’ swimming triumphs and even the Queen’s James Bond-style skydive.


This year’s drama category pits hit ITV1 period drama Downton Abbey against BBC One’s new Edwardian adaptation Parade’s End, and detective dramas Scott & Bailey and Lewis.


The Great British Bake Off gets its first NTA nomination, up against Paul O’Grady: For The Love Of Dogs and Anne Robinson’s Watchdog in the factual entertainment category.


Jonathan Ross’ ITV1 chatshow is again nominated against The Graham Norton Show, which replaced Ross in the coveted Friday night slot.


Earlier this year they both lost out in the chat show category to Alan Carr’s Chatty Man.


However 2013’s awards will see them compete in the entertainment programme category, against shows including Piers Morgan’s Life Stories, The Only Way Is Essex and The Million Pound Drop Live.


Presenting duo Ant and Dec – Anthony McPartlin and Declan Donnelly – will be fighting to take the Entertainment Presenter award home for a twelfth consecutive year.


Alan Carr, Keith Lemon and Dermot O’Leary, who will host the 18th NTAs ceremony live on ITV1 on 23 January, are among their competition.

					

	

		
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from → london 2012, progress

	


					


	

		
How Many More Liam Barkers Will There Be?

		
September 22, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Liam Barker, 18, was born paralysed and has been on life support since birth. He has a rare muscle wasting disease, myotubular myopathy, which meant that he was not expected to live longer than three months. Today, Liam can only communicate by blinking. He uses a ventilator to breathe.


The Barker family recently received a letter, seen by Same Difference, saying that Liam might have to prove he is unable to work in order to receive Employment Support Allowance (ESA), by attending a Work Focus Interview and/or a Work Capability Assessment (WCA). This has understandably left father Phil Barker, 52, ‘disgusted.’


Mr Barker believes that Job Centre Plus should know his son’s situation, as they have his National Insurance number which can be used to reveal he claims disability benefits. He has explained that his son would be unable to attend an interview, as the only place he visits is the hospital.


The family are waiting to be instructed on what their next step should be.


Mr Barker said: ‘If another disabled person had these issues and didn’t have a full time carer, they might lose their benefits or not know what to do. It’s caused a lot of upset.


‘I don’t think they really understand the situation and if they’d just looked into his National Insurance number or looked into his records properly they would realise he can’t work.’


A spokesperson for the Department For Work and Pensions said: ‘Often as a child gets older their needs change over time.


‘The Work Capability Assessment looks at what a person can do, not only what they cannot.


‘If someone is not capable of any work, then they will of course get long term incapacity support through the benefits system.’


Disabled people have feared incidents like this ever since plans to assess benefit claimants regularly were revealed to the public. There are many severely disabled people in similar situations to Liam Barker,  who will never be physically able to work. Campaigners have argued for quite some time that assessing such people regularly would be a greater waste of Government time and public money than simply providing them with the benefits to which they are certainly and genuinely entitled.


This is without taking into consideration the unnecessary emotional stress that assessments would cause to the disabled person and their carers.


It is now to be hoped that David Cameron and all relevant Government Ministers are made aware of this case as soon as possible. It is to be hoped that a Government Minister will intervene in this case, and that Liam Barker will be provided with appropriate benefits as soon as possible, without having to carry out any assessment.


Otherwise, disabled people fear that very soon, many more Liam Barkers will receive similar letters from the Department For Work and Pensions.

					

	

		
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from → disability political policies, mainstream madness, politics, Rants

	


					


	

		
Sesame Street To Feature Assistance Dog And Girl In Wheelchair

		
September 21, 2012

	

	

		

		

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Thanks to Disability Bitch for sharing this on Facebook.


This is a big move in the right direction by Sesame Street. I hope this episode will make disabled children who watch it feel included, and that it will make non disabled children think about disability.


 

					

	

		
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Bon Voyage Martyn Sibley!

		
September 21, 2012

	

	

		

		

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FRIDAY 21STSEPTEMBER – OVERNIGHT FERRY TO AMSTERDAM


SUNDAY 23RD – LEIPZIG, GERMANY


TUESDAY 25TH – GORZOW, POLAND


THURSDAY 27TH – GDANSK, POLAND


SATURDAY 29TH – VILNIUS, LITHUANIA


MONDAY 1ST OCTOBER – WARSAW, POLAND


TUESDAY 2ND OCTOBER – KRAKOW, POLAND


THURSDAY 4TH OCTOBER – PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC


SATURDAY 6TH OCTOBER – SAARBRUCHEN, GERMANY


SUNDAY 7TH AND MON 8TH – LUXEMBOURG, BELGIUM


TUESDAY 9TH – FRANCE AND UK


Have a great trip, Martyn!

					

	

		
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from → Fellow Bloggers, updates

	


					


	

		
Dale Cregan, 29, In Custody For Killing Two Manchester PoliceWomen, Has One Eye

		
September 21, 2012

	

	

		

		

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I hadn’t realised that Dale Cregan has one eye.


Cregan, 29, has today been taken into custody charged with the tragic murders of two female police officers in Manchester. He has also been charged with the recent murders of father and son Mark and David Short, who were also from Manchester.


I share the shock of the whole nation at these crimes. No words can describe how serious the crimes are.


This case proves that there is a disability link behind most news headlines, however small and insignificant the link may be.

					

	

		
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