David Gauke, MP for South West Hertfordshire,  is our new Work and Pensions Secretary.

His voting record on disability and welfare issues is worrying but not surprising.

A cardiac patient who was declared fit for work by benefits assessors suffered a third heart attack just three hours into a new job.

Michael Bispham, 44, was told he was well enough to work again, despite 11 letters from consultants and other medics saying he wasn’t.

He was refused ESA (employment support allowance) after scoring zero points.

Michael had already suffered two heart attacks, and he collapsed with a third on the day he started work as a delivery driver in Barrow, Cumbria.

His plight has echoes of the Ken Loach film ‘I Daniel Blake’, in which a heart patient battles the benefits system.

Michael, of Dalton, Cumbria, was fitted with a cardiac shock device before he started work on February 13.

To add insult to injury, news that his employment and support allowance assessment was being reversed on appeal arrived as he lay in a ward at Furness General Hospital, awaiting transfer to the region’s cardiac centre at Blackpool Victoria Hospital.

Now, his wife Emily has spoken of the double trauma of helping Michael in his recovery while fighting the “horrendous and unfair” benefits system she claims is designed to make honest people feel “worthless”.

Emily, 38, said: “My husband scored zero points when he was assessed for employment support allowance.

“He’d already had two heart attacks. That should have been it.

“We knew he was too poorly, we submitted 11 letters about his condition from consultants and the hospital, but they declared him fit to work.

“It nearly killed him. I’m so angry about it.

“Just when we needed help and support, we had to navigate the system with pages of forms.

“They stopped any money because he was no longer able to job seek and we were told to start from the beginning and apply again for the ESA he’d been turned down for in the first place.

“We had nothing for three weeks at what was the worst time of our lives. It was so difficult.”

Mrs Bispham, a former greeter at a Barrow supermarket, was forced to stop work herself last year after being diagnosed with Crohn’s disease.

She hopes to return to work as soon as she is well again.

She said: “We were just normal people with jobs. We’ve got a mortgage. This could happen to anyone. But the way you are treated by the government is appalling.

“Basically, it’s a case of guilty until proven innocent at these assessments. You are there to prove you’re not making it up.

A DWP spokesperson said: “The decision on whether someone is well enough to work is taken following a thorough assessment, including all available evidence from the claimant’s GP or medical specialist.

“Anyone who disagrees with the outcome of their assessment can appeal.”

When Theresa May was challenged by a disabled voter over cuts to her disability benefits and social care last month, it shone a light on the way Conservative policies post-2010 have disproportionately targeted disabled people. Recent years have seen the introduction of many cuts and changes – from the rollout of “fit to work” tests to the abolition of disability living allowance – as well as a lack of action on existing inequalities, such as inaccessible housing. It all amounts to an unprecedented assault on disabled people’s rights and living standards in Britain.

In a series of interviews over several months, the Guardian has followed three disabled readers – Stephen, Alex, and Elli – as they experience the reality of life since austerity.

Stephen’s story: Managing to work in pain, but for how long?

“I want the minister in charge to come here and tell me how I’m meant to live. I’ve worked since I was 15. I pay my taxes. Why do I then have my benefit taken away?” Stephen, 52, asks from his front room in Maidstone with his wife, Elaine, next to him.

A car accident in his 30s left Stephen with osteoarthritis of the spine, memory problems and a degenerative disc in his back. There’s rarely an hour of the day his legs or his feet aren’t racked with pain, and he moves uneasily around the house, holding on to the wall with one hand to pull one leg along. Elaine’s ill herself – she has fibromyalgia, a degenerative spinal disorder, and knee problems – but it’s since the austerity cuts came in that, in Stephen’s words: “Our life’s just got worse.”

Elaine had to give up work as a hotel caterer in 2014 but doesn’t get any income support. The government put a time limit on how long disabled people can have some out-of-work sickness benefits, so after six months of receiving employment and support allowance, Elaine’s benefit was stopped – despite the fact her disability hadn’t got better. Packets of medications and pain relief sit in a small basket on the sofa table. Stephen used to get free prescriptions, but when NHS cuts kicked in three years ago, this went too.

The couple’s only income is Stephen’s job as a warehouse manager at Morrisons. Because the pain in his legs means he can’t use the bus, he relies on a Motability car – a government scheme that lets disabled people swap mobility benefits for the lease of a car, wheelchair, or scooter – to get there. But after being tested for the new personal independence payments (PIP), he was rejected for the mobility part of the benefit this spring and – like more than 50,000 other disabled people since 2013 – he’s been told he must return his vehicle.

The couple have had a temporary reprieve – the Motability charity has extended the lease for a few months – but Stephen will need to return the car in September. Elaine’s already had her own benefit cut in the transfer to PIP – that’s £300 a month gone – but Stephen’s rejection could mean his entire wage could go too. “If I lose the car, I can’t get to work. £30,000 a year,” he says. “Who’s going to pay that?”

The Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) states that “more people are on the Motability scheme now than before PIP was introduced, and under PIP 26% of people get the highest level of support compared to 15% under DLA”, and that anyone can appeal if they wish. Two days ago, Stephen contacted me: the DWP turned down his first appeal to keep his car. “I work despite the pain,” he says. “[And now] they’ve kicked me aside.”

“It’s not just the cuts. It’s how disabled people are being treated within that,” says Alex, from Islington, north London. “You’re treated worse than an animal going to the slaughterhouse.”

The 44-year-old has multiple severe conditions – a spinal and head injury, degenerative hands and feet, chronic fatigue, double incontinence, and mental health problems – and is unable to walk. For the past four years, Alex has been living in a cramped top-floor flat.

Because the flat is too small for a hoist to let a carer help Alex move safely, Alex is forced to crawl to get from one room to the next: slowly pulling along the carpet, legs dragged on one side. To be able to leave the flat, Alex balances on crutches to get down two flights of stairs. It’s a visible strain: Alex’s feet twist with each step and breaths are short. Outside, at the bottom of another seven concrete steps sits Alex’s wheelchair, chained up on the street. With no lift, Alex can’t get it into the flat.

I first spoke to Alex in January, and it’s clear over the months that the flat is making Alex’s health deteriorate. At one point when we speak, Alex has been bed-bound with a hemiplegic migraine for 11 days – essentially, hit with stroke symptoms that lead the body to go in and out of consciousness. By the end of April, Alex is completely bed-bound. “I can’t crawl or go down the stairs at all now,” Alex emails – but every couple of weeks they risk falling down the stairs with a personal assistant to go to therapy appointments “because my mental health has deteriorated” too. (Alex has asked to be referred to as “they”.)

Alex has fought for months for safe housing from the housing association – even to get on the council’s higher medical band – but there are limited accessible properties in the area, and the only options the council offered were out of borough and too far from Alex’s doctors. In March, Alex was given some hope, after accepting a ground-floor wheelchair-accessible flat in Islington, but it needs extensive adjustments, and three months later, Alex is still stuck in the current flat.

Islington council’s corporate director of housing and adult social services says specialist adaptations and equipment are being installed in the new property and this work is being carried out as fast as possible. They add: “Like London, Islington has a severe housing shortage, and finding suitable, ground-floor, wheelchair-accessible accommodation, in the location requested, has been challenging.”

Talk with Alex and what’s striking is not only the direness of the living conditions, but the fact it’s come at a time when, as Alex puts it, every area of life has also been “infected by cuts” against disabled people. Social care cuts mean Alex is alone in the flat for the equivalent of four-and-a-half-days each week. To afford the wheelchair that sits outside, Alex had to sell possessions from the pavement – “My TV, my landline phone, plates, mugs, my second-hand laptop, clothes, everything” – as the NHS waiting list was three years. (Islington council says a powered wheelchair, which would be suitable for the new property, will be provided as soon as the move is complete.) The fridge is filled with large bottles of milk; since the government cut the medications and equipment available on prescriptions, Alex buys incontinence pants instead of food.

“Only dementia patients get pull-ups now, and then only two a day,” says Alex, who can’t afford the £80 a month required to buy them every day. “So I’m left in soiled pull-ups causing sores and infections.”

Elli’s story: I’ve gone from being a citizen, to nothing

“If I can’t get out of bed, I have to shout to get the pizza man to deliver to my bedroom,” says Elli, 39, in her bungalow outside Norwich.

Elli has hypermobility Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (EDS), anxiety, and chronic fatigue and pain, and leans on crutches as she makes her way from one room to the next. Her social care package used to help her with day-to-day tasks – dressing, preparing meals, household chores – and enabled her to found and direct a local arts organisation. But in late 2016, Elli had her care cut from 44 hours a week to 22. “They halved it overnight,” she says. “It took three 30-minute meetings with a social worker.”

Elli laughs at times as we talk – making jokes about not being able to get up once she’s sat down – but it’s clear that what’s happening is taking its toll. She now has no care hours at all to support her for anything her council defines as “social” – including going swimming as physiotherapy – nor anything “medical”, such as someone going to the hospital with her. Elli’s condition means she falls regularly, but with long gaps without a personal assistant, she’s now regularly left to lay on the floor for five hours with dislocated joints because she has no one to help her up. “I’ve stopped going out now really because if I fall, I won’t be able to get up myself,” she says.

In March, Elli emails to tell me she’s had more support cut. Her Access to Work funding – which pays for a part-time support assistant – has been cut by 100%: £13,000 a year to nothing. “That’s not really a cut at all, is it?” she says.

A DWP spokesperson tells me “real terms funding of the Access to Work scheme has increased”, but with hers stopped, when her health is at its worse, Elli’s bed is now not only her dinner table but her office too: a laptop on the quilt and a pile of paperwork.

In recent years, she’s become familiar with fighting for disability support – she tells me she dislocated her wrist filling in the long application forms for PIP – but as she stares at the window from her bed, she sums up the reality for an increasing number of disabled people: “They’ve taken me from a citizen to nothing, hidden behind a door.”

With many thanks to DPAC.

During the Health and Work Conversation, claimants will be asked to fill a questionnaire[1].  It is important to know that this questionnaire can be filled at home and not straight away.

This questionnaire asked questions to help claimants to have a better conversation with their work coaches, and to help them find the best support for claimants according to DWP. What follow are the comments of a Consultant clinical psychologist Dr Jay Watts on the unsuitability of this questionnaire for people with mental health conditions:

JW: It is important to read this new demand on claimants with the wider context in mind. This context is one where the DWP is experienced as punitive, willing to sanction claimants at every turn, with little understanding of the nature of mental health problems, and professionals linking the rise of suicides and mental health epidemic with an austerity regime that belittles and scapegoats disabled people. Professionals like me lack confidence in the DWP’s capacity, or interest in, excluding a wide enough proportion of ‘vulnerable adults’ from this process, who may be made suicidal by yet another requirement. This process is to occur before claimants have their WCA and is mandatory. FOIs tell us that the DWP will presume claimants are fit to work before the WCA, though this demand will be damaging to many. It is likely to increase the time claimants are left waiting before their WCA verdict, leaving claimants in a purgatory that is damaging to mental health.

Some thoughts on the form.

This is not a ‘conversation’ because the terms of reference have been predecided.

DWP: “It’s about helping you get into work when you’re able to in the future.”

It should not be ‘when’ it should be ‘if’. To set up a ‘when’ and indeed to insist on this ‘conversation’ is deeply damaging – it sets up failure in comparison to a (newly created neoliberal) norm. There are many people with mental health problems who will never be able to work. This form is yet another method of equating worklessness with worthlessness, and undermining the other ways disabled people contribute to society.

DWP: You and your work coach will use simple tools to talk about an action that you want to do, and plan how you can do it.

JW: The ‘simple tools’ are not proveably based on positive psychology. But the language of positive psychology runs through every word of this document. One of the core principles of psychology is that intervention should only occur when recipients are able to consent freely. This process is mandatory, and It thus represents a misuse, dare I say it abuse, of power. This is even more problematic in the wider context where many disabled people have been cut off from mental health support and social care. How can it be ethical to deny someone with a history of sexual abuse desperately needed and asked for therapy via the NHS on one hand, whilst insisting they comply with a forced exercise under conditions of extreme stress to return them to work with the other.

What if there is no “action” the claimant wants to do, or is capable of. Not dying is a big enough task these days. Work coaches are to have minimal training, with FOIs suggesting courses will run for 1.5 days max. This is inadequate to understand the complex nature of mental health problems.

DWP: “There are no right or wrong answers”.

JW: Nonsense. There clearly are. What are the consequences of this? Will a copy of the ‘work conversation’ be shared at JobCentre+? If yes, even if these are explicitly not supposed to be used for sanctioning, not having the ‘right attitude’ during the work conversation will bias people to sanction.

DWP:  ‘Do you need to take part? Yes

JW: Why yes to ‘do you need to take part’. For many people work is impossible and the idea they should work can feed in to or trigger mental health deterioration. Having to do this could quite literally produce the conditions that make suicide the only option.

DWP: What kinds of things do you like doing in your life and at work?

JW:  The inability to like anything, to enjoy life, to feel pleasure or anything but emptiness, is a core symptom of many mental health problems. This is made worse by people’s material circumstances for example poor housing, and poverty. Shining a light on what people like, or the lack thereof, can therefore be dangerous especially in a context where claimants feel obliged to perform. Claimants tell mental health professionals again and again that they simply do not feel safe enough to complete DWP forms openly. These types of questions situate claimants as performing dogs, a task that can be the final straw for many. Liking anything obviously a distant country when in mental distress/poverty. It is an absurd question and most people will not be able to fill in this form as they actually feel due to being so scared of the DWP taking away means to live. Ditto ‘what are you good at?’

DWP: ‘How does your health affect your life and your ability to work?’

JW: This is a very difficult question; people do not have the answer to this easily accessible. Claimants are likely to underestimate the effects of health on life, because guilt fuelled by the ‘striver or skiver’ discourse means people emphasise the good days, leading to inappropriate work plans which will place further pressure on claimants. Work coaches will be under huge pressure to produce encouraging statistics for their supervisors and the DWP, shaping how they ask questions ad hear answers.

DWP: ‘What work have you done in the past, if any?’

JW: Many mental health and physical disabilities start after a few more functional years of adult life. There has often been a period where activity was possible before breakdown. This question is potentially dangerous in that it asks people to reflect on potentially a lost time that can never be got back, forcing into relief the difference between now and then. This is likely to provoke a mourning, an increased depression, a shame, that causes a deterioration in mental health. It may make claimants feel ‘you are not what you were, you should be, and you are not wanted otherwise’ with devastating effects.

DWP: ‘What are some of the things that have made you proud in your life and at work?’

JW: It is none of DWP business. Again it could be damaging if nothing comes to mind, or if something special is thought of which then gets connected with the DWP (so basically a good memory and, say, fear get tied together so the good memory gets polluted). This is not a safe conversation for this environment.

DWP: ‘Is there anything else in your life that makes it difficult for you to work?’

JW: Claimants could answer: not having treatment for my mental health issues due to NHS cutbacks, unstable housing, being continually threatened with sanctions and having my benefits cut by the DWP, but most people will feel too scared to say it as it is, or won’t have that awareness of quite how much say austerity is a causal factor because of the ongoing governmental agenda to make claimants feel it is they who are failing somehow as work is really a possibility for all.

DWP: ‘Tell us how and what you want to do’.

JW: There is no freedom to answer this properly.

The stated aims of ‘My 4 steps’are to boost confidence and motivation to work again. This form will not help with this. It is more likely to undermine confidence and worth with potentially devastating consequences.

DWP: ‘Step 1 want’.

JW: What people want is often something like being able to leave the flat. This is something that work coaches are simply not qualified to help with. The whole four-step programme is again obviously based on ideas from CBT and Behavioual Therapy though not proveably. These should not be worked on outside a trusting therapeutic relationship, where power dynamics are considered, and when the person feels safe. All these requirements are not possible in a ‘work conversation’ DWP setting.

How are these work coaches going to be trained to work with disabled people? What are they going to do when suicidal material comes up? GPs and secondary services no longer have capacity to help when a referral cites suicide risk.

How are they going to screen for people who could be made suicidal by this task. Guilt and shame are central to so many mental health problems (and obviously the governmental discourse have made many claimants feel like this). This form will press on those emotions, making live more unbearable and increasing suicide risk. The suggestions in the form that this is not for now will not help. They set up a trajectory of moving to work which is not achievable for many, making people feel they do not have a worth otherwise. This is not only unethical but will end up increasing healthcare costs.

Some people want help to return to work. Claimants and professionals have repeatedly told the DWP that this should be made available outside the DWP setting, where informed consent is genuinely possible, and where hindrances can be explored safely. Making these ‘conversations’ mandatory is not only likely to be ineffective and damaging for those for whom work is impossible, but will place additional strain on claimants who already feel persecuted by the increasing number of hoops the DWP demand claimants jump through. Demanding claimants fit adhere with an ideal which is unrealistic for many, and which suggests other ways of living are undesirable and meaningless, will adversely affect the mental health of many claimants, increasing the number of suicides connected with an increasingly brutal governmental regime.

[1] https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/403431/response/983255/attach/3/1816%20HWC%20Claimant%20Booklet.pdf

With many thanks to Disability Rights UK.

The DWP has confirmed to DR UK that it will not enable disabled students claiming Universal Credit (UC) to have the opportunity of a work capability assessment (WCA).

In most cases, this means that their claim for Universal Credit will be immediately refused.

Under Employment Support Allowance (ESA), a disabled student can be treated as having a limited capability for work and entitled to ESA if they receive DLA or PIP.

However, a disabled student must not only receive DLA or PIP but also have a limited capability for work to be entitled to UC.

A disabled student can only be “treated as having a limited capability for work” under UC in very restricted circumstances.

But most disabled students will not otherwise be able to show that they have a limited capability for work as they will be denied a WCA.

DR UK contacted the DWP to ask if a disabled student’s UC claim could be held at least until a WCA had taken place.

It replied that:

“Your understanding of Regulation 41 in the Universal Credit Regulations 2013 is correct: a person who meets entitlement conditions for UC is referred for a work capability assessment where appropriate. 

As the work capability assessment is not part of determining whether a person is entitled to UC, determining entitlement to UC cannot be delayed until a person has had a work capability assessment.”

Ken Butler DR UK’s Welfare Right’s Adviser said:

“We are concerned that the UC system does not allow a disabled student to be assessed as to their limited capability for work.

It puts them in a Catch 22 situation – they cannot be entitled to UC unless they have a WCA but they cannot have a WCA unless they are entitled to UC.

There seems no justification for replacing ESA rules by stricter UC ones given that other financial support for disabled students has not increased to compensate for this.”

Liz Sayce DR UK’s CEO said:

“Only 16% of disabled people have a degree level qualification compared to 30% of non-disabled people.

We are concerned that the current UC position could act as a financial barrier to disabled people accessing higher education and bar for some accessing residential college if they are unable to access UC housing costs support.”

ESA and Housing Benefit are being replaced by Universal Credit as it is rolled out across the UK.

If a disabled student is not eligible for Universal Credit they will not get help with extra living costs or rent.

With many thanks to reader Neil Vaughn.

We have no words, so the words are left to our editor’s favourite broadcast journalist, who handled this MP very well yesterday. Lets send this clip viral and hope that he loses his seat next month!

The Government has failed to deliver the £4bn of savings it was expecting to make after cutting disability benefit, according to new analysis. 

The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) said the Government was hoping to cut spending by 20 per cent by moving from the Disability Living Allowance (DLA) to Personal Independence Payments (PIP). 

Forecasts initially predicted £13.6bn would be spent on disability benefits in 2018-2019 but now this figure is thought to be £18bn.

Senior Labour MP’s accused the Tories of “creating further waste and expense” resulting in the need for cuts elsewhere. 

Shadow work and pensions secretary Debbie Abrahams said: “This analysis clearly shows that the Government’s social security cuts are failing disabled people. It is becoming increasingly clearer that these flawed Tory assessments only create further waste and expense.”

Frank Field, chairman of the Work and Pensions select committee, added: “Clearly the Government was as over-optimistic with PIP as it has been with universal credit.

“Its failure to deliver either project on time, as well as to achieve the savings it had assumed would be possible, has resulted in a series of cuts having to be made elsewhere in the welfare budget. One way of saving money, of course, would be to ensure a higher percentage of PIP assessments return accurate decisions.

“This would prevent both the immediate hardship among claimants as well as the need for lengthy, costly appeals which serve in many cases to delay justice.”

The rise in payments has been attributed to an ageing population and more pay-outs to those with behavioural and mental health conditions. 

There has also been an increase in the number of people fighting decisions to be rejected for PIP. A total of 161,000 people have had rulings overturned since 2013. 

A Department for Work and Pensions spokeswoman said: “We will always make sure there’s a strong safety net to provide the right support for disabled people, which is why many disability benefits are exempt from the benefit cap and were not subject to our welfare savings.

“PIP is still a new benefit and we are determined to ensure that it is rolled out effectively to get it right for claimants. We expect the number of claimants to grow over time, and it’s important that all claimants get the best possible support.”

The Government spends more than £50bn a year on disability and health condition related benefits. A figure which is up by more than £7bn since 2010.

This is approximately 2.5 per cent of GDP and more than 6 per cent of all government spending.

Now he faces a PIP review a year early. DWP madness.

Shannon’s mandatory re-consideration appeal was rejected. Struggling with a 10% decrease in her benefit allocation, she has been forced to confront the reality that she might not be able to cover the costs of transport if she leaves the house and loses her way.

“Now, I don’t have emergency taxi money without getting overdrawn,” she said. “I have had to start making decisions about what I can and can’t go out to do.”

Disability charity Scope has called the changes “concerning” and warned it could mean disabled claimants lose their independence.

“Disabled people spend an average of £550 a month on costs related to their impairment or condition,” Scope’s head of policy and public affairs, James Taylor said.

Shannon has decided to take her case to tribunal in a bid to regain the mobility component of her PIP.

If the ruling doesn’t go in her favour, she could be in danger of losing more of her disability benefit.

“For me it’s worth the risk because I can see that there is a greater issue here,” she said.

“I think the more of us that put our case across to try and explain to the government, and explain to the courts that our mental health can affect our mobility, the better.”   

With many thanks to Benefits And Work.

Scope, the charity for disabled people, tweeted an interesting number when the general election was announced. There are, it said, 13 million disabled people in Britain. Some 89 per cent have said they will vote. 

The reason that number is worth paying attention to is that if the 89 per cent are true to their word, and if they use their franchise to hold the Government to account for its brutal treatment of disabled people, it might just spell trouble for Theresa May’s dreams of a three-figure majority. 

Now, let me make one thing clear at the outset. I’m not about to say who you should vote for. Journalists too often do that. I would simply invite you to consider the Government’s record when it comes to disability.

If I were to take on the role of prosecuting ministers over that, I would struggle to find somewhere to start. So long would be the charge sheet be that it would take a couple of days’ court time just to read it all out. As I’m writing a column, not a novel, I’ll simply draw your attention to just a few of the lowlights. 

Take the Personal Independence Payment. The replacement for Disability Living Allowance was sold not as a means of imposing a cut, but as a way to get more money into the hands of the most disabled. 

Then it turned out that those who have been left disabled through mental health conditions don’t count. After an appeals tribunal made some pointed comments about the way the rules had been written, they were changed to exclude them at a time when May was telling us how seriously she took the subject.

Talking of those tribunals, just last month I revealed that they are being swamped with more than 50,000 appeals logged against decisions made by the Department for Work and Pensions between October and December last year. Nearly two-thirds of them are being upheld.

Just last week the Press Association revealed that Capita and Atos, the profit-driven companies that carry out assessments used by the DWP to make its decisions, are set to be paid more than £700m for their five-year contracts against an original estimate of £512m. Talk about rewards for failure. 

The process of applying is miserable, dehumanising and humiliating. Decisions are frequently perverse. A friend of mine with spina bifida was, for example, turned down. My friend can’t walk at all. The decision was overturned on appeal, but the fact that it even got that far tells you all you need to know about the process.

Then there is the Employment and Support Allowance, paid to people who have conditions that are sufficiently severe to impact their ability to work. The DWP’s plans to cut it as a means of “motivating” claimants to find work were savaged by the all party Work & Pensions Select Committee, which rightly pointed out that the cut was more likely to do the reverse by denying them the means to obtain equipment they might need to support themselves in employment.

The Government’s workplace assessments seem to produce stories of terminal cancer or heart patients told to get down to their Job Centre Plus every few months. 

Want more? How about the Government’s promise to halve the disability employment gap by 2020. A manifesto commitment, it was quietly dropped when it had become very obvious that there was scant chance of it being achieved, not least because ministers didn’t much fancy the idea of, you know, actually doing something about it. 

Ministers for disability come and go through a revolving door. While in post, they pretend they care about issues such as access, or getting disabled people into work. They put their names to statements claiming Britain is a world leader, even though no less than the United Nations has said it is anything but. Then it’s on to something else. Wait  a minute, is that a photographer? Grab the guy in the wheelchair and let’s get a pic of me smiling with him on my way out!  

Under this Government, disabled people are either paralympic saints, there to provide inspiration porn and yet more of those smiley photo ops, or they are burdens on the state who should just stay out of the way. Or they’re not really disabled at all.  

May has a habit of claiming she speaks for the country. If she follows that practice, she will interpret a victory as a mandate to do what she pleases and the thugs her Government employs at the Department for Work and Pensions will follow her lead. There are no rational arguments in favour of the policy programme they have overseen, and it is regularly roundly criticised by just about anyone with a voice. But that won’t matter. It hasn’t up until now. 

The 13 million have a chance to change that narrative, if they are willing to say that enough is enough. 

All parties employ psephologists to tell them who does what during elections, and to help them to tailor their policies. If they latch on to the fact that disabled people are starting to use their votes to push back against the treatment they are receiving, and if it starts to have an impact on results, then politicians will start to wake up. 

Ministers need to be taught that there is a price to be paid for the way they have behaved. A sufficiently high vote against the brutal treatment meted out to people with disabilities by the Government could at the very least deny Theresa May the landslide she is hoping for. It might even force her to open up her eyes. 

Her Government, and the previous governments of which she was an important part, have done what they have done because they have been allowed to. People with disabilities, and their families, and their friends, now have the power to say that they will no longer accept such disgraceful treatment. 

It will be years before this opportunity comes around again. Now is the time to seize on it. 

The BBC’s main headline today is “Grammar Schools Must Serve Ordinary Families.” This is based on a speech by Education Secretary Justine Greening.

Let me put on record that I fully agree with her statement. However, I want to take it one step further. I believe that, in order to be fully inclusive, grammar schools must serve anyone who has the academic ability to attend them. This must include disabled children.

Disabled children like myself cannot be forgotten in the debate about whether to create more grammar schools. The article linked, which was written in December, states:

“Compared to the secondary school population as a whole, grammars contain 18 times fewer children with special educational needs or education health and care plans, and three times fewer disabled children without such documentation.”

One reason why grammar schools would be reluctant to accept pupils in wheelchairs, of course, would be that they may not be in accessible buildings. This, of course, applies to all mainstream schools. However today, all buildings must be wheelchair accessible by law. So lack of wheelchair access is no longer a legally acceptable reason for a school not to accept a disabled pupil.

Thankfully most state schools have been ready to make changes to their buildings to keep this law, since it came in. Before creating any more grammar schools, the government needs to ensure that they would be given fully accessible buildings, so that they would not be able to use this as a reason to reject disabled pupils who pass the entrance exam. Grammar schools which are already running and are not wheelchair accessible should also be made to update their buildings to keep the law.

Also, grammar schools should make every effort to make their entrance exams fully accessible. All the usual adjustments and allowances should be made for a disabled pupil who wants to take the entrance exam. Extra time, separate rooms, rest breaks, typing answers or dictating them to someone else to write, large print papers. The list may sound endless but it is necessary. And, once a disabled pupil has passed the entrance exam, the same adjustments should be made for them in lessons.

Disabled children are intelligent, too. I was once a disabled child with a high level of intelligence. I never applied to a grammar school but if I had tried, I could have got through the 11+ exam.

I have many very intelligent disabled friends. I know there are many disabled children out there with a lot to offer any mainstream school, grammar or not, particularly in traditional academic subjects.

All any disabled child needs in mainstream education, all we ever asked for, is a chance to try. As the government considers creating more grammar schools and opening them to children from ‘ordinary’ families, I ask them not to forget disabled children.

I ask the government to clarify, at the earliest opportunity, what provision they plan to make for academically able disabled children at any new grammar schools they may create. While they are at it, I ask them to open more of those grammar schools that already exist to us, too.

With many thanks to Benefits And Work.

The DWP is continuing to do its best to ignore the law when it comes to PIP mobility criteria.

As readers will know, the law relating to PIP mobility was changed on 16^th March to make it harder for claimants with mental health problems to get an award.

However, even though the change in the law was not retrospective, the DWP has been writing appeal submissions asking tribunals to apply the law as if it had been.

It would definitely be an error of law for a tribunal to do so.

For decisions before 16 March, the much more favourable decision of a panel of upper tribunal judges should apply.

Although we understand that this decision is now being appealed. This may mean that some appeals will not be heard until the appeal has been adjudicated on.

But that still doesn’t give the DWP any legal right to try to enforce a law that wasn’t in place at the time of their original decision.

Not that a little thing like breaking the law is likely to trouble the DWP, as long as it’s them that’s doing it.

A fellow disability rights campaigner, who our editor highly respects, is currently supporting a claimant to fill out an ESA form.

She recently informed her Facebook contacts that one of the questions on this form asks whether claimants have been in prison in the last six months.

Same Difference is more than a little shocked by this question. We can’t understand how it is relevant. Since you can’t claim either JSA or ESA while on remand or, we assume, in prison, surely anyone making a claim for ESA would have to have been released before making the claim.

Also we feel that the six month time limit is a bit long. Maybe two weeks or even one month would be a sensible time period, but six months? So does being in prison six months ago make a person less disabled? Or are people supposed to go without benefits for six whole months after release? What would that mean for them if ESA or JSA is their only source of income?

We’ve also seen through the link above that Carers Allowance stops if the person being cared for goes to prison, which makes sense as they no longer need care from their carer on the outside. However DLA also stops, which makes less sense.

Consider the case of Daniel Roque Hall, a severely disabled wheelchair user who still needed a significant amount of personal care while he was in prison.

Same Difference fully understands stopping the transport/getting around component of DLA/PIP for prisoners, since they no longer need to be transported. However, for those prisoners who are severely disabled, wouldn’t continuing the care component make sense?

Your thoughts are very welcome, as always.

With many thanks to Benefits And Work.

The DWP have told an influential parliamentary committee that claimants with a mental health condition but no physical health condition, will still be able to claim the enhanced rate of the mobility component of personal independence payment (PIP).

However, the ‘non-exhaustive’ list of claimants with mental health conditions only, who will still be able to claim the enhanced rate includes people with ME/CFS, people with cognitive impairments, people with developmental disorder and people with psychosomatic pain.

It does not include any claimants with common mental health conditions such as depression, anxiety, PTSD, bipolar disorder, OCD, psychosis or personality disorder, for example.

The DWP statement says:

The following is a non-exhaustive list of examples of situations where a person with a mental condition (unaccompanied by a physical condition) could receive the mobility component of PIP at the enhanced rate:

A person (person A) with a cognitive impairment who cannot, due to their impairment, work out where to go, follow directions or deal with unexpected changes in their journey, even when the journey is familiar, would score 12 points under descriptor f in mobility activity 1 (“planning and following journeys”), and hence be entitled to the enhanced rate of the mobility component. Examples of such conditions could include dementia, or a learning disability such as Down’s Syndrome. (Some people covered by this example may experience psychological distress as well, and may also meet descriptor b, requiring “prompting” – i.e. reminding, encouraging or explaining – from another person in order to be able to undertake a journey. They will still receive 12 points under descriptor f and be entitled to the enhanced rate.)

A person (person B) with a developmental disorder could qualify on a similar basis to person A if the disorder affects their ability to work out where to go, follow directions or deal with unexpected changes in their journey. If their disorder results in them having difficulty assessing and responding to risks, or in impulsivity, then they could also score 12 points under descriptor f on the basis that they need to be accompanied for their own safety. Examples of developmental disorders which could have these effects include Autistic Spectrum Disorder and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).

A person (person C) who suffers psychosomatic pain could qualify for the enhanced rate through satisfying descriptors e or f in mobility activity 2 (“moving around”). The case of NK v SSWP [2016] UKUT 146 (AAC) concerned a claimant who suffered significant pain when moving around, but the pain resulted from a mental condition rather than any physical impairment. The Upper Tribunal found that the claimant could score points towards an award of the mobility component under mobility activity 2, even though her pain did not have a physical cause.

A person (person D) who has chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) and experiences symptoms including significant fatigue following physical exertion, muscular and joint pain and balance problems, together with psychological difficulties which manifest as depression and panic attacks, could qualify for the enhanced rate under mobility activity 2, or by scoring points on a combination of mobility activity 1 (4 points under descriptor b, for requiring prompting to avoid psychological distress when undertaking any journey) and mobility activity 2 (8 points under descriptor c, for being able to stand and then move unaided more than 20m but no more than 50m). As explained above, Chronic Fatigue Symptom (CFS), also known as myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), has complex causes which are still not well understood, but which may involve both physical and psychological factors.

You can read the full statement here