Disabled people who are set to be hit by the government’s controversial “bedroom tax” have won the right to an urgent judicial review of the new rules.

Lawyers acting for the 10 individuals and families taking the legal action say that the changes – due to come into force on 1 April – will have a far greater impact on disabled people than non-disabled people.

They say the regulations breach the Equality Act and the Human Rights Act, as well as the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

The judicial review of the decision to cut housing benefit for those judged to be “over-occupying” their social housing will be heard in early May.

Sue McCafferty, a member of the We are Spartacus grassroots network of disabled campaigners, said: “The policy and the legislation underpinning the ‘bedroom tax’ are fundamentally flawed and it was evident from the government’s own equality impact assessment that the regulations would have a disproportionate impact upon sick and disabled people.

“We are Spartacus are delighted that the flaws of this policy will be examined and, we hope, that the profound distress caused to those affected will soon be over.”

Ugo Hayter, from solicitors Leigh Day, who is representing two of the claimants, said: “This is an excellent result and the first step in over-ruling what we believe is an unfair piece of legislation which has disproportionate negative consequences for disabled people and is therefore discriminatory.”

The new regulation will see a working-age single person or a couple with no children in social housing having their housing benefit reduced by 14 per cent if they occupy a two-bedroom home and by 25 per cent if they occupy a home with three or more bedrooms.

The two claimants represented by Hayter, Jacqueline Carmichael and Richard Rourke, came forward as a result of work by We are Spartacus.

Carmichael lives in a two-bedroom housing association flat with her husband, her full-time carer, and has to sleep in a fixed position in a hospital bed with an electronic pressure mattress.

Her husband cannot share her bed for safety reasons, and there is no space in the room for a second bed, so he sleeps in the second bedroom.

The Carmichaels say they cannot afford the 14 per cent benefit reduction in their housing benefit.

Rourke, a wheelchair-user, lives in a three-bedroom bungalow, with substantial adaptations.

He has a disabled daughter, also a wheelchair-user, who is studying at university but returns home for holidays, and often at weekends. The third bedroom is a tiny box-room used to store mobility and care equipment.

Rourke cannot move home because there is no wheelchair-accessible, two-bedroom social housing available. If forced to move, he risks losing access to his support network.

National Housing Federation figures released earlier this month showed that 230,000 disability living allowance (DLA) claimants would lose an average of £728 per year in housing benefit as a result of the new regulation.

Even if all the extra £30 million funding allocated by the government to help foster carers and disabled people in adapted properties was given to DLA claimants hit by the tax, they would each receive just £2.51 per week, compared with an average £14 a week loss.

27 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

Disabled people are set to lose more than £28 billion in benefits by 2018 as a result of government cuts and reforms to the welfare system, according to new research.

The research – by the disability charity Scope and the thinktank Demos – calculates that 3.7 million disabled people will lose out as a result of the cuts.

By 2018, some disabled people could be affected by at least six different cuts, through reforms to working-age disability living allowance (DLA), housing benefit, and employment and support allowance (ESA). Some could lose more than £23,000 by 2018.

About 150,000 disabled people are set to lose more than £15,000 each by 2018, with the worst-hit likely to be those – in the work-related activity group – who are affected by the new 12-month time limit on the contributory form of ESA.

Those who lose their DLA when it is replaced by the new personal independence payment will also be hit hard.

The research was carried out in a bid to measure the cumulative impact of all of the government’s welfare cuts on disabled people, something the government insists is impossible.

But even the cuts assessed by Scope and Demos under-estimate the total impact of the government’s reforms.

The researchers found that the combined impact of other welfare cuts was too difficult to calculate, including the freezing of child benefit (affecting one million disabled parents), the closure of the Independent Living Fund (affecting 19,000 disabled people), and cuts to council tax credit (1.38 million disabled people) and local housing allowances for private tenants (827,000 disabled people).

There are also continuing restrictions on social care, with local authorities tightening eligibility criteria, increasing charges, and cutting services.

Richard Hawkes, Scope’s chief executive, said: “In 2013, disabled people are already struggling to pay the bills. Living costs are spiralling. Income is flat-lining. We know many are getting in debt, just to pay for essentials.

“What’s the government’s response? The same group of disabled people face not just one or two cuts to their support, but in some cases three, four, five or even six cuts.

“It paints a frightening picture of the financial struggles affecting disabled people in 2013.”

27 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

A disabled artist will place the government’s welfare cuts under the microscope next month, just as the coalition begins to implement its controversial disability living allowance reforms.

Liz Crow’s highly personal live performance Bedding Out will see her putting her “private bed-oriented life” in the public arena over the course of 48 hours.

The writer-director-activist has to spend much of her life in bed because of her impairment, but says that until now she has always succeeded in keeping that part of herself hidden from view.

During the performance, members of the public will be invited to take part in “bedside conversations” with her as she lies in her bed, so they can discuss the work and its backdrop of welfare reforms and cuts to disability benefits and services.

The event will be streamed live on the internet throughout its 48 hours, allowing those who cannot attend to engage with the project via Twitter.

Crow said: “I wear a public self that is energetic, dynamic and happening, but I am also ill and spend much of life in bed.”

She said that the benefits system forces her and other disabled people to “parade” their private selves in order to justify receiving support.

She added: “For some months, I have lain low for fear of being penalised, but instead of letting fear determine who I am, I’d rather stare it in the face.”

Bedding Out is a way of taking her private self and making it public, she said.

“I want to make a twilight existence visible, but more than that, I want to show that what many people see as contradiction – what they describe as fraud – is only the complexity of real life.”

Bedding Out – which is funded by Arts Council England – is a companion piece to Bedding In, Crow’s performance at last year’s SPILL Festival of Performance in Ipswich.

It is part of a new touring show, People Like You, which also features work by disabled artists Sue Austin and Gini, and which “tackles the subjectivity and perceptions of disability, and the place of disability arts in the wider art sector”.

Bedding Out is at Salisbury Arts Centre and on social media (follow @RGPLizCrow and use #beddingout), from 10-12 April, starting at 2pm. It will be live-streamed on Crow’s website, Roaring Girl Productions. The 40-minute “bedside conversations” will take place both online and at the arts centre on Wednesday 10 April at 2pm and 6pm, on 11 April at 3.15pm, and on Friday 12 April at 10.15am. There will also be a Twitter-only conversation from noon on 11 April. To attend one of the conversations in person, contact Salisbury Arts Centre.

27 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

Disabled trade unionists have refused to join the government’s new “alliance” of organisations interested in disability, because they say it will restrict their ability to campaign against coalition policies.

The Office for Disability Issues claims that about 90 disability, public, voluntary and private sector organisations have joined its Disability Action Alliance (DAA), which aims to identify actions and activities that can “make a difference to the lives of disabled people” at local and national level.

Disability Rights UK, which is convening DAA, says the alliance will advise on “implementation” of government policy and focus on how existing policies could be improved at a local level.

Disabled people’s organisations signed up so far include Equalities National Council, People First (Self Advocacy) and the National Survivor User Network. The government has yet to publish a full list.

But the TUC’s Disabled Workers’ Committee (DWC) said this week that it had decided not to accept a government invitation to join DAA.

DWC said that joining the alliance would restrict the TUC’s ability to campaign against government policies that were affecting disabled people.

Sean McGovern, DWC’s chair, said unions had been working with disabled people to challenge the government’s “brutal and inhumane cuts”, including the closure of the Independent Living Fund, the replacement of working-age disability living allowance with personal independence payment, and the “bedroom tax”.

He said: “Every single one of these changes is punishing and impoverishing disabled people and their families.

“Joining this government-inspired alliance now would be to pretend that none of this is happening.”

He added: “We want to see all disabled people and the organisations that represent them continuing to oppose government policy and not conned into becoming part of the problem rather than part of the solution.”

A Department for Work and Pensions spokeswoman said: “It’s disappointing that the TUC have chosen not to join around 90 other organisations that make up the alliance so far, and who want to work together to make a real difference to the lives of disabled people.

“The membership agreement that we ask organisations to read before they sign up states very clearly that, although organisations should not campaign or lobby ‘in the name of the alliance’, this would not affect them campaigning or lobbying in their own right.”

27 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

People in mental distress are being denied the personalised support they need to stay healthy and out of hospital, according to a mental health arts charity.

CoolTan Arts was screening three new films by its members about the personalisation of care and support, and how such support can help people with mental health conditions by offering them more choice and control over the services they use.

Michelle Baharier, CoolTan’s chief executive, said: “Personalisation was meant to come in to enable people to have choice and control… to choose things that keep them well.”

But she told the audience at the British Film Institute (BFI) on London’s South Bank that CoolTan had lost funding that paid for 46 people in mental distress to use its services.

This had been replaced by funding for just 12 people who have been found eligible for a personal budget from their local authority and could use some of that money to pay the £3,000 it costs to support them for a year at CoolTan.

Since the cuts, 18 of those denied support have had to return to hospital because their health has deteriorated, while four of the people who had to stop using CoolTan’s services have died in less than a year.

Baharier said: “Just pulling the carpet from under people’s feet is absolutely disgusting. In mental health it is like taking the wheelchair away from the wheelchair-user.”

She said there was a “good body of evidence” that providing a small amount of funding to organisations like CoolTan saves public services much larger amounts of money.

The police helicopter that was used after one of CoolTan’s former members committed suicide cost about £5,000, while the money spent on a two-week spell in hospital could pay for two years’ support from CoolTan.

She also criticised local MPs who were “hiding under the bed” rather than “fighting our cause”.

Two of the films made for the Making it Happen project are animations and the third is a short documentary.

Richard Muzira, one of the film-makers, told the audience that he hoped CoolTan could produce more work that illustrated the issues faced by people with mental distress.

He said: “There is room to create more media, not just film, to extend, to do more, to show the effects as we are hearing right now.”

Another of the film-makers, Doug Taylor, said the film he worked on showed “what people are having to go through… when the people supposed to be helping us and support us are not seeing it through”.

He said he was concerned that cuts to day services would lead to “more and more people going back into hospital”, while many people were still waiting to hear whether they would receive a personal budget from the council.

A third film-maker, Adrian Whyatt, told the BFI audience: “We do have to fight this idea that there is no money out there. There is money out there.”

He added: “At the moment, most people suffering from mental distress are not aware of their rights and are not getting the things they need.”

One of the two animations – which has yet to be completed – focuses on the benefits of personalisation to disabled lesbian gay bisexual and transgender people, and features the words and voice of Steve Hampson, a CoolTan member who died last November.

He says in the film: “If I don’t have money, I fear being isolated, being pushed in the corner, where I have to stay indoors and go round to a soup kitchen and a church.

“There’s nothing wrong with that, but I just don’t want to live that life, so it gives me a kind of freedom… If I can live OK, I can help other people… I can help my people around me.”

The second animation looks at the experience of a man with schizophrenia, and how he discovers that he can use a personal budget to pay for guitar lessons.

The third film, A Stitch in Time, is a documentary. Service-users describe what personalisation means to them, such as “a bit of freedom, a bit of confidence”, “the ability to get up and do things”, and “giving individuals the power to carry out personal tasks”.

One service-user tells how she used to attend CoolTan three times a week to paint, but now her council funding has been withdrawn she has to just “stay at home and smoke”.

Another says that without the support she needs, her health will deteriorate and she will end up being sectioned.

She says: “They don’t do nothing until I have got a breakdown and it will cost thousands and thousands… Yesterday I qualified [for funding] and today I don’t.”

The Making it Happen project was funded by the research and consultancy company Ecorys and the Department of Health’s Volunteering Fund Health and Social Care.

26 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

The government appears to have a secret plan to reassess disability living allowance (DLA) claimants who have “indefinite” awards, in a bid to sidestep delays to implementation of its benefit reforms.

Three disabled people, who all work or volunteer as welfare advisers in different parts of the country, have described to Disability News Service (DNS) what they say is a suspicious trend being seen among long-term DLA claimants.

All three say the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) seems to be trying to cut the number of people on indefinite awards by reassessing them for DLA, while at the same time promising that no-one with a lifetime or indefinite award will be reassessed for the new personal independence payment (PIP) – the replacement for working-age DLA – until 2015.

Only last December, Esther McVey, the Conservative minister for disabled people, announced – following concerted campaigning by disability organisations – that those with lifetime or indefinite DLA awards would not be reassessed for PIP until October 2015 at the earliest, six months after the next general election.

But by reassessing claimants using existing DLA rules instead of PIP, the government can sidestep its own announcement.

A disabled activist, who tweets as Blueannoyed and volunteers on various disability-related internet forums, has spoken to DNS about her concerns, after dealing with at least five disabled people with indefinite DLA awards.

All five – including two from Wales, one from Swindon and one from Northumberland – have been told by DWP that they will need to be reassessed for DLA.

“Blueannoyed” said she had not previously heard of anyone with an indefinite award being reassessed during her three years on the forums.

She said: “I think there has been a dramatic shift. They are saying 2015 to the public but I think they are trying to shift the goalposts.”

Mick Dillon, chief executive of the Disability Resource Centre, in Bedfordshire, was another to raise the same concerns.

He said there had been a “very tangible shift” in the number of disabled people with indefinite or lifetime awards being reassessed. He said he was now expecting to be called in for a reassessment of his own indefinite DLA award.

Dillon said: “Our chair sits on the disability appeals panel, which is held in our building in Dunstable. She has been seeing, for quite a few months, people with lifetime awards being called in.”

Another advice centre, Buckinghamshire Disability Service (BuDS), has seen a recent surge in disabled people with indefinite DLA awards being called in for reassessments.

Andrew Clark, chair of BuDS, said: “A number of people have said that they are being invited to go for a reassessment of their DLA because of a change of circumstances, but they have not actually reported any change of circumstance. They all had indefinite awards.”

He said he feared DWP was carrying out a “covert rolling programme of reassessments”.

A DWP spokesman said: “Awards of DLA, whether made for life, indefinitely, or for a fixed period, are made on the basis that the entitlement conditions continue to be met.

“An indefinite or life award would not generally be reviewed unless there is a change in circumstances that affects the entitlement.

“This would include a change reported by the claimant, as they are required to do to ensure they receive the correct amount of benefit, or through another source such as fraud referral.

“There are no plans to reassess people for PIP earlier than the timeline already set out by the government.”

14 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

ormal>�k tl
��di-font-weight:normal’>14 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

The prime minister has been caught out for the second time giving MPs misleading information about cuts to disability benefits.

David Cameron had been asked last week about the impact on disabled people of the so-called “bedroom tax” – new regulations which will see housing benefit cut for families in social housing who are judged to have more bedrooms than they need.

But in a bid to defend the government’s overall record on disability benefits, Cameron claimed that government spending on disability living allowance (DLA) was rising, even though it is falling.

He told Labour leader Ed Miliband, who had asked the question: “The last thing he said before sitting down was that we are cutting the money going to disabled people. That is simply not the case.

“In 2009-10, the money spent on disability living allowance was £12.4 billion. By 2015 it will be £13.3 billion. There is no cut in the money going to the disabled.”

But Cameron failed to tell MPs that forecasted spending on DLA this year, 2012-13, is £13.6 billion. This means – according to the Department for Work and Pensions’ own figures – that spending on DLA will fall over the next two years.

A spokesman for Number 10 said the prime minister was pointing out that spending on DLA would rise over the course of this parliament, between 2010 and 2015.

He said: “That is often how we talk about spending, in terms of over a period, rather than year on year.”

Asked whether it was reasonable for the prime minister to use figures from three years ago, rather than the most up-to-date statistics, he said: “Yes, he was referring to the period over this parliament. That’s why he gave the date from 2009-10.”

Cameron had also claimed at last week’s prime minister’s questions that “people who need round-the-clock care” would be exempt from the bedroom tax, which come into force on 1 April.

But although disabled people who need a spare room for an overnight paid care worker will be exempt, those who rely on their partners for their support will not.

14 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

p�Qry
��ood the serious impact of these changes on some of the most vulnerable people in society, and would urge them to think again.”

Despite the decision to drop the appeal, Duncan Smith claimed there had been “no climb-downs at all” by his department.

He told Channel 4 News: “These are adjustments already because of the court case over the severely disabled children for local housing allowance [housing benefit] so this is nothing to do with it. This is a reality. We simply put the guidance out there to say this reality exists.”

It is still unclear what impact the appeal decision will have on a different court case, an attempt by 10 individuals and families to seek a judicial review of the impact of the bedroom tax on disabled people.

Anne McMurdie, who represents three of the claimants – a disabled man with a mental health condition, the father of a disabled child who shares caring duties with the child’s mother, and a disabled woman cared for by a parent in a significantly-adapted property – said the government’s announcement was “not entirely clear in many respects as to how it will work and who is covered”.

McMurdie, from Public Law Solicitors in Birmingham, said the government had until the end of Monday (18 March) to produce its written response to the judicial review claims.

She said: “At that point we hope to have a clear picture about what concessions or exemptions apply in these cases and to whom and whether the regulations themselves will be amended. Once we have this info we can decide how to go forward.”

14 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

The government has withdrawn an appeal to the Supreme Court that – if successful – would have meant that families could no longer claim enough housing benefit to pay for separate bedrooms for disabled children with high support needs.

The decision by the Conservative work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith followed a week in which the prime minister had used the court ruling to try to show that his government was supporting disabled children, even though it was attempting to have the judgment overturned.

The Court of Appeal ruled last year that the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) had breached the Human Rights Act by stating that local authorities could not provide housing benefit for the extra bedrooms needed by four young disabled people living in private rented accommodation.

Duncan Smith had been seeking to appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court, but decided this week to withdraw his appeal.

Linda Burnip, whose son Ian is one of the four young people, said it was “very satisfying” that DWP had withdrawn its appeal, following a five-year legal battle.

She said: “This case reinforces disabled people’s right to not be discriminated against within the benefits system and also affirms their rights under the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.”

Her son’s lawyers, Irwin Mitchell, said the “landmark” Court of Appeal judgment clearly set out how to “ensure that disabled people are not discriminated against by the government’s benefit system”.

The decision to drop the appeal means the government’s controversial “bedroom tax” will now not apply when a disabled child with high support needs is unable to share a bedroom with a sibling for impairment-related reasons.

The bedroom tax – to be introduced on 1 April – will see benefits cut if a household in social housing is judged to have more bedrooms than they need.

DWP yesterday (Wednesday) issued new guidance for local authorities, which lays out how local authorities will decide if children should not have to share a bedroom, and will apply in both social housing and private rented accommodation.

Irwin Mitchell said it was “disappointed” that the guidance did not protect other disabled people, such as couples who are unable to share a bedroom, who will “continue to be discriminated against” by the bedroom tax.

Polly Sweeney, Ian Burnip’s solicitor, said: “We believe the government has not properly understood the serious impact of these changes on some of the most vulnerable people in society, and would urge them to think again.”

Despite the decision to drop the appeal, Duncan Smith claimed there had been “no climb-downs at all” by his department.

He told Channel 4 News: “These are adjustments already because of the court case over the severely disabled children for local housing allowance [housing benefit] so this is nothing to do with it. This is a reality. We simply put the guidance out there to say this reality exists.”

It is still unclear what impact the appeal decision will have on a different court case, an attempt by 10 individuals and families to seek a judicial review of the impact of the bedroom tax on disabled people.

Anne McMurdie, who represents three of the claimants – a disabled man with a mental health condition, the father of a disabled child who shares caring duties with the child’s mother, and a disabled woman cared for by a parent in a significantly-adapted property – said the government’s announcement was “not entirely clear in many respects as to how it will work and who is covered”.

McMurdie, from Public Law Solicitors in Birmingham, said the government had until the end of Monday (18 March) to produce its written response to the judicial review claims.

She said: “At that point we hope to have a clear picture about what concessions or exemptions apply in these cases and to whom and whether the regulations themselves will be amended. Once we have this info we can decide how to go forward.”

14 March 2013

The minister for disabled people has refused to apologise for misleading MPs about the impact on disabled people of the controversial “bedroom tax”.

Esther McVey’s comments follow similarly misleading statements on the same subject last week by the prime minister, David Cameron.

Cameron claimed at last week’s prime minister’s questions that “people who need round-the-clock care” would be exempt from the new housing benefit regulations, which come into force on 1 April.

But although disabled people who need a spare room for an overnight paid care worker will be exempt, those who rely on their partners for their support will not.

The new regulations will see housing benefit cut if a working-age individual or family in social housing is judged to have more bedrooms than it needs.

This week, McVey was questioned about the bedroom tax by Anne McGuire, shadow minister for disabled people, who pointed out that Cameron was still insisting that families with disabled children or with family members as carers would be exempt.

McGuire said that although some families with disabled children would be protected, there was not enough in the £30 million “discretionary” fund provided to local authorities by the government to support all those who will need extra funding.

She asked McVey whether Cameron was “pulling the wool over the public’s eyes” and if she was failing in her ministerial duty to tell disabled people the “exact impact” of the government’s policies.

But McVey replied: “In line with the judgment, the prime minister was correct. We have clarified today that they will have the room and they will not need to move.”

McGuire told Disability News Service that McVey’s answer was “as evasive as ever”.

She said: “There is now a systematic denial from the prime minister to the minister for disabled people about the impact of the well-named ‘bedroom tax’ on disabled people, including families with disabled children, and their carers.”

She added: “The government is trying to spin their way out of this by pretending that local discretion will deliver respite from the bedroom tax that disabled people need, when this is simply not the case.”

A spokeswoman for McVey said: “The policy on family carers remains as it was. I think Anne McGuire asked a question that had many different elements.

“Esther answered the first part of it. Oral questions are quite quick. Her answer was correct.”

She said that an MP would have complained if he or she had thought that McVey misled them.

14 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

A disabled woman has warned that the government’s decision to scrap the Independent Living Fund (ILF) will force her and others to seek an assisted suicide in Switzerland, rather than face an alternative of residential care.

The warning came as five disabled people asked the high court this week to overturn government plans to close ILF.

Judgment in the case has been reserved, but is expected within four weeks.

The five claimants fear that without ILF funding and support they will be forced into residential care or be left unable to leave their homes.

Their fears were underlined by Jackie Edwards, an ILF-user from Coventry, who told Disability News Service: “The last thing I want to do is end up in residential care. It’s not something I want to contemplate.

“My parents are both in their 70s and I have a daughter of 20 and there is no way I want either end of the scale to feel they have to look after me because of what the government is doing.”

Asked if she was serious about wanting to end her own life in a Dignitas assisted suicide clinic in Switzerland, rather than living in a residential home, she said: “Deadly serious, if my only other option is residential care.

“I will make the most of the next two years and then if it comes to that… I am deadly serious.”

She said that three or four of her friends, all ILF-users, had made similar statements, and added: “They are living in fear at the moment of what is going to happen.”

When asked if her friends were also serious about ending their lives in Switzerland, she said: “If things go the way people think they are going to go, with people stuffed into residential care, yes, I think they are.”

She holds out no hope that the government will listen to her and other ILF-users who have expressed their fears about what will happen when the fund is closed in 2015.

She said: “They have done this so-called consultation and they have had a great deal of response from people in my situation saying the worst thing they could do is close ILF, and they have taken no notice. The only hope is the court case.”

Jaspal Dhani, chief executive of the UK Disabled People’s Council, said her comments demonstrated “the desperate state disabled people find themselves in”.

He said: “To say that I feel angered or sickened by it would be an under-statement. This has been going on for the last 12 to 24 months.”

He said disabled people were already deciding to kill themselves because of the impact of government cuts on their lives.

He said: “Everywhere there are stories of people taking their lives because of the reduction of care packages or the threat of ending up in residential care.

“We know that that is a reality, and it is an unacceptable reality.”

Edwards has spoken to her parents about her plan to go to Switzerland if she finds herself forced into residential care after 2015.

She said: “My mum keeps saying that it won’t come to that and it’s not going to happen, but we will see.

“If I don’t get the funding I am getting at the moment, I will not be able to pay my carers to work for me.”

Edwards has previous experience of a care facility. As a teenager, she spent a couple of months in a residential home, while an accessible extension was built onto her parents’ bungalow. She said the experience was “awful”.

14 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

ILF judicial review: DWP ‘misled public’ over local government support

Research by disabled activists suggests that the government misled MPs and the public about the level of support among local authorities for the closure of the Independent Living Fund (ILF).

The results of the research by Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC) have played a central role in this week’s judicial review of how the government responded to a consultation on its plans to close ILF in 2015.

Five ILF-users have been taking on the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) in the high court, arguing that its consultation was unlawful and so its decision to close ILF – a government-funded trust which helps about 19,000 disabled people with the highest support needs – should be reversed.

Esther McVey, the Conservative minister for disabled people, confirmed last year that ILF would close in April 2015, with non-ring-fenced funding passed to local authorities and the devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

But there is overwhelming opposition to the closure among disabled people, with many believing that it threatens their right to independent living.

DPAC’s research saw councils asked – via Freedom of Information (FoI) Act requests – how they had responded to the consultation.

DWP claimed in its response to the consultation that “most councils… expressed strong support for the proposal in principle”, but DPAC says the FoI material shows that that was a “total misrepresentation”.

At least nine of about 80 councils that responded to the consultation in writing appear to have opposed the government’s plans, while many more expressed grave reservations.

The FoI material seems to show that only one of the local authorities agreed with the government that the funding should not be ring-fenced, while the vast majority told DWP it had not provided them with enough information to answer its consultation properly.

A significant number of the councils said they believed the government’s plans would result in disabled people ending up in residential care.

Aberdeen council, one of the councils that said it opposed closure, stated in its consultation response: “It is not an attractive proposition for local authorities when the impact on individuals is considered.”

Barking and Dagenham council told the government: “The consultation document appears to suggest that funding for individuals would not be maintained at current levels and this will have a devastating impact on individuals’ lives.”

And Conservative-run Hertfordshire County Council said: “No we do not agree with this proposal.”

It added: “Local authorities are having to apply eligibility criteria with increasing rigor and there is a fear that people’s funding will have to be reduced to the minimum amount required to ‘maintain’ their lives rather than supporting full and active lives, including support with employment.”

Another Conservative council, Cheshire West and Chester, also refused to back closing ILF and devolving the money to local authorities. It said that DWP’s consultation paper “leaves too many questions unanswered”.

The five claimants are asking the high court to quash the decision to close ILF. Judgment in the case has been reserved, and is expected within four weeks.

14 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

A crowd of activists gathered outside the Royal Courts of Justice in London this week to support five disabled people as they asked the high court to overturn government plans to close the Independent Living Fund (ILF).

The five ILF-users fear that without the fund’s continuing financial support they will be forced into residential care or left unable to leave their own homes.

Esther McVey, the Conservative minister for disabled people, confirmed in December that ILF would close in April 2015, with non-ring-fenced funding to be passed to local authorities and the devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

But the five claimants – Stuart Bracking, Paris L’amour, Gabriel Pepper, Anne Pridmore and John Aspinall – say that a government consultation on the closure plans that was carried out last year was unlawful, and breached the Equality Act’s public sector equality duty.

They also argue that the government failed to consider options other than closing ILF, and that the consultation exercise did not provide enough information about the difference between the basic support offered by local authorities and ILF’s focus on enabling people to be independent, to work and to be full citizens.

Pridmore, a former chair of the British Council of Disabled People, said: “People are very frightened about the future.

“I don’t think we should have to go through a court procedure to defend something that is written in the UN Convention [on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities], the right to independent living.

“What does it say about a country that doesn’t protect the most vulnerable members of society?”

Tracey Lazard, chief executive of Inclusion London, told campaigners outside the court: “No ILF means no life. That’s the truth.”

She said the fund had “transformed the lives of a generation of disabled people” with the highest support needs.

“Make no mistake, the end of the ILF will have a devastating impact. It will condemn disabled people to a life shut away from society, to a life of isolation and survival in their homes or forced incarceration in residential care.”

She said most local authorities had told the government in its consultation on the closure that they could not guarantee that ILF-users would be able to maintain their current care packages, with some warning that many disabled people would end up in residential care. But she said the government had refused to listen.

The disabled actor, comedian and activist Liz Carr, an ILF-user, warned that the protest was “just the beginning”.

She told Disability News Service: “Many of us who have so far benefited from that fund are terrified of the prospect of what is going to happen to us.

“I believe that in the next two years we have to do as much as we can to make sure this issue doesn’t go away.”

Carr said ILF funding ensured disabled people have “the same kind of lives that everybody else takes for granted”, which was “not a privilege or a luxury, just the right to go to the toilet, get up in the morning and get on with our lives”.

“It is an amazing fund that has changed people’s lives fundamentally. I would not be the person I am today, with the position I am in today, if it had not been for the ILF.”

Another disabled actor, Lisa Hammond, who was at the protest to support friends who used ILF, said the decision to close the fund was “shocking” and “really sad”.

She said: “It’s a pretty grim situation. If it happened it would be a dark day. We haven’t come far but the distance we have come, we don’t want to go back.”

The Equality and Human Rights Commission “intervened” in the case, to argue that if the government’s policy adversely affected the right to live independently and be included in the community (article 19 of the UN Convention), and was made without “appropriate information”, it was likely to breach the Equality Act’s public sector equality duty.

The claimants are asking the court to quash the decision to close ILF. Judgment in the case has been reserved, and is expected within four weeks.

Linda Burnip, a co-founder of Disabled People Against Cuts, which has supported the claimants in their legal action, said she was optimistic about the chances of the case succeeding.

She said that she and other campaigners had been encouraged by the Department for Work and Pensions’ decision to drop its appeal against another high-profile court action involving disabled people – in which her disabled son was one of the successful claimants – as the ILF judicial review was taking place.

That case saw the Court of Appeal ruling that the government had breached the Human Rights Act by not allowing the housing benefit claims of four young disabled people to be treated differently to claims of non-disabled people.

14 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

The success of the London 2012 Paralympics appears to be encouraging more disabled people to take part in disability sports, according to new research.

A survey of councils in England and Wales found that a third of them had seen more disabled people taking part in Paralympic sports such as sitting volleyball, boccia and swimming, in the wake of the games.

The Local Government Association (LGA) survey found that five per cent of councils had seen a large increase in disabled users of their sports facilities when comparing October-December of 2012 with the same period of 2011, with 28 per cent seeing a small increase and only two per cent seeing a small decrease.

Nearly a third of councils that provide goalball facilities saw a rise in numbers, while 25 per cent of those that offer cycling, and a third of the small number that provide equestrian facilities for disabled users, saw a post-games increase.

Nearly a quarter of councils that provide boccia saw an increase in numbers, with sitting volleyball (20 per cent), swimming (20 per cent of councils), wheelchair basketball (18 per cent) and wheelchair rugby (17 per cent) also seeing a rise in participation across a significant number of councils.

More than seven in 10 councils provide swimming facilities for disabled people, while the next most commonly-offered Paralympic sports are boccia (59 per cent of councils) and football (55 per cent).

The Paralympic sports least likely to be offered by local authorities are shooting (two per cent) and equestrianism (four per cent), while six per cent of the 29 per cent of councils that responded to the survey provide no Paralympic sports or facilities at all.

Among the measures being taken by councils to boost participation were relocating adult day centres into sports and leisure centres, and offering a discount card aimed at disabled and older people and other disadvantaged groups.

Jaspal Dhani, chief executive of the UK Disabled People’s Council, who plays and coaches with the London Raiders wheelchair basketball club in east London, said he has seen a number of “green shoots” in the wake of London 2012.

He said he was seeing more younger disabled people at matches, while his club was receiving more enquiries from schools and even some from companies that organise corporate events and want their clients to try wheelchair basketball.

He said: “Either the Paralympics or the governing body’s strategy or the two combined is working in wheelchair basketball.”

But he said clubs had also been motivated by the Paralympics to do more work themselves to attract new members, while funding was easier to access, with Sport England last year launching a new £10.2 million Inclusive Sport fund to encourage more disabled people to take up sport.

The British Paralympic Association (BPA) said there had been a 25 per cent increase in people playing wheelchair basketball, and a 33 per cent increase in wheelchair rugby since London 2012, while 1,000 people had visited its first SportsFest, where they could try out Paralympic summer and winter sports.

There are now more than 3,000 disability sports clubs listed on the BPA’s Parasport website, compared with 2,146 before London 2012.

There has also been an increase in interest in Paralympic winter sports, with the number of sledge hockey clubs increasing from five to eight since London 2012.

A BPA spokeswoman said: “We see a number of different indicators across the board that indicate there is interest out there and we are hearing from our sports that there is a rise in participation. Our membership is reporting interest across the board.”

Councillor Flick Rea, chair of the LGA’s culture, tourism and sport board, said it was essential that councils, sports governing bodies, local sports clubs and community groups kept working together, but warned that investment and innovation in sports and leisure services “could become near-impossible” if councils experienced further government budget cuts.

14 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

One of the stars of London 2012 has told MPs that government cuts to disability living allowance (DLA) risk making it even harder for disabled people to find work, because of the inaccessibility of public transport.

Sophie Christiansen, who won three equestrian gold medals at last summer’s Paralympics, told members of the transport select committee that she relied on her Motability vehicle, which like hundreds of thousands of other disabled people she pays for with her DLA mobility component.

She told the committee, which is conducting an inquiry into disabled people’s access to transport: “The message the government is sending is for more disabled people to get into employment and get off benefits, but how can they when they can’t get to work in the first place?

“I rely on my [Motability car] for everything, to get out, and I use my car when I can’t access public transport.”

Christiansen was one of four disabled campaigners who gave evidence to the committee this week.

Tanvi Vyas, campaigns officer for the Trailblazers network of young disabled campaigners, said the DLA cuts could mean many more disabled people turning to public transport because they were no longer eligible for the Motability scheme.

But George Fielding, chair of the Kidz Board at the charity Whizz-Kidz, which “provides disabled children with the essential wheelchairs and other mobility equipment they need”, declined to comment on the impact of the change from DLA to the new personal independence payment (PIP) on the mobility of disabled people.

He told the committee: “I can’t comment. It is not something Whizz-Kidz has expertise in.”

Christiansen was highly critical of the accessibility of the public transport system.

She told the MPs that the need to book rail assistance 24 hours in advance “takes away spontaneity and flexibility”.

She added: “Many users have to sit on the train and just wait and see whether they get help at their station. It’s really unreliable.”

Christiansen told the MPs she believed that taxi-drivers were more willing to stop and get their ramps out for wheelchair-users since the Paralympics, while having trained staff on hand to support disabled people at the start and end of train journeys during London 2012 pointed the way to a “key legacy we could have from the games”.

But she said physical access was “still the key”, and raised fears that the giant Crossrail project across London might not be completely accessible, even though it was a new project and “access should be at the forefront of new planning provision”.

Christiansen said she was “very disappointed” that the Paralympics had not led to bigger improvements in the number of accessible stations.

She said: “I am very aware how expensive putting a lift in is, but other transport networks around the world are a million light years in front of us.

“I went to Vienna last year and their underground is perfect and I came back absolutely disgusted by London underground. I think we should be learning from other countries, quite frankly.”

Marije Davidson, policy and research manager for Disability Rights UK, told the committee that there was “inconsistency” in the levels of accessibility and reliability of public transport across the country.

She said it was “very important” to involve disabled people in making sure public transport was accessible.

And she said: “What is really important to bear in mind is that it may be OK for a disabled person to make a journey if it involves just one mode of transport, but if it involves train… bus… tube, it becomes very, very hard because there may be a weak link.”

Fielding said he now felt confident using all forms of public transport, and claimed that “the majority of the problems we have are attitudinal”.

He agreed that the rail assistance scheme was not “consistently reliable”, but added: “I believe that once you get to know the people who work at stations and bus stops you are absolutely fine.”

When asked later by Disability News Service why the charity did not want to comment on the DLA reforms – which will see the number of working-age people claiming DLA and PIP cut by as much as 28 per cent by 2018 – a Whizz-Kidz spokesman declined to comment.

13 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

Channel 4 is hoping to build on its acclaimed coverage of the London 2012 Paralympics by bringing its coverage of disability issues into the mainstream.

Channel 4’s chief creative officer, Jay Hunt, said the broadcaster wanted to “escape from the idea that disability issues are niche”.

She was speaking at a party at the broadcaster’s central London headquarters, held to mark its attempts to “lead a fundamental change in the way we feel and talk about disability”.

The party was co-hosted by the disabled TV presenter and former model Katie Piper, who said that being given the opportunity to work with Channel 4 – on programmes such as My Beautiful Face, and The Science of Seeing Again – had been “genuinely life-changing”.

Hunt announced a string of new commissions of disability-related programmes, including a second full series of The Last Leg, which features disabled comedian Adam Hills and rising star Alex Brooker.

There will also be a third series of the reality show The Undateables in 2014, following more single disabled people as they look for love, and a second series of I’m Spazticus, the prank show written by and starring disabled people.

Ade Adepitan, one of the London 2012 presenters, who also fronted last month’s Dispatches documentary on disability living allowance reform, will travel to Cuba as a reporter for the foreign affairs strand Unreported World, to investigate why some of the country’s sports stars are still defecting to the US.

And Arthur Williams, one of the disabled presenters trained by Channel 4 for its 2012 coverage, and himself a pilot and plane-restorer, will present The Wooden Wonder, a documentary about the wooden fighter plane, the Mosquito, described as the “unsung hero of World War Two”.

Hunt told the party that there had been a “bit of a quiet revolution” in Channel 4’s disability programming.

She said it had “gone further than any other broadcaster” in putting disabled presenters at the centre of what it does, including the “extraordinary achievement” of having two disabled presenters – Hills and Brooker – fronting a “highly successful entertainment show” on a Friday night.

She said: “It isn’t tokenism – it’s about great presenters telling amazing stories in every genre from current affairs to history, science to entertainment. It just so happens those presenters are disabled.”

Esther McVey, the Conservative minister for disabled people, said Channel 4’s coverage of London 2012 had “changed public acceptance” of disabled people, and she called for a “fair representation” of disabled people “right across the media”.

Channel 4 also announced this week that it had commissioned the first autobiographical documentary about the disabled theoretical physicist Professor Stephen Hawking.

The documentary will be told in his own words and by those closest to him, is being co-produced by PBS in the US, and will be shown in UK cinemas and later screened on Channel 4.

13 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

A disabled campaigner is to play a leading role in a 300-mile march to parliament that will follow the historic path of the Jarrow Crusade and deliver a protest message about government cuts to parliament.

Angela Walker has volunteered to be pushed in her wheelchair along the route of the march from Jarrow to the Houses of Parliament, where she will hand over a petition.

She and other activists who plan to take part are protesting about the impact of government cuts and the coalition’s “austerity” programme.

The March to Parliament follows in the footsteps of more than 200 men from the town of Jarrow, near Newcastle, who marched nearly 300 miles to London in 1936 to protest to MPs about the lack of jobs in their home town and across the country.

The marchers will set off from Jarrow on 22 June, passing through town and cities including Darlington, Harrogate, Leeds, Sheffield, Nottingham, Leicester, Northampton and Luton, and hoping to arrive in Westminster on 10 July.

The “re-enacted” Jarrow march is being organised by the radical international protest collective Anonymous, which wants to show “how we feel about all the cuts, the austerity, DWP/ATOS and bankers that are destroying this country”.

Walker, from Great Lumley, near Chester-le-Street, who has several long-term conditions, including arthritis and fibromyalgia, admits she is concerned about the effect of such a long trek on her health.

She said: “I am concerned, but it is something I feel I have to do. I hope it will raise the awareness of those people up and down the country that the benefit cuts do not affect.

“I have thought more than twice about [going on the march]. I have a son who lives with me and he keeps saying, ‘are you saying you have to do this?’ and I say, ‘yes, I have to.’

“I was born on the fourth of July, Independence Day, so I am a very independent person and I am living up to that.”

She added: “I hope the government will take some notice of the petition and the lengths we have gone to to get it there.”

She said she was particularly concerned about the cuts and reforms to disability living allowance.

She also pointed to the impact of the “dreadful” work capability assessment on disabled people seeking out-of-work disability benefits – although she has not faced one herself yet.

And although she will not personally be affected by the government’s new “bedroom tax”, she knows many others who will. “It is for them that I am doing it,” she said.

The marchers are hoping to persuade hotels along the route to donate rooms. Otherwise, there may be a support bus she can sleep on. If not, she said, she will be sleeping in a tent.

12 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

The government has again been accused of sending out misleading and confusing information about its disability living allowance (DLA) cuts and reforms, after a senior civil servant apparently contradicted the minister for disabled people.

Disabled people’s organisations (DPOs) at a Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) event had been anxious for clarity on eligibility for the new personal independence payment (PIP), which will gradually replace working-age DLA from April this year.

But contradictory comments from Esther McVey, the Conservative minister for disabled people, who spoke at the event, and one of her own senior civil servants, have only added to the confusion.

In December, McVey shocked disabled activists and DLA claimants by announcing that the key walking distance criteria for PIP had been reduced from 50 metres to 20 metres.

The following month, she bowed to intense campaigning pressure and agreed that PIP claimants should only be assessed on what they could do “safely, reliably, repeatedly and in a reasonable time period”.

This should have meant that some people who could walk a little more than 20 metres could still claim the enhanced rate of PIP, and so still qualify for a Motability vehicle, and McVey confirmed this at last week’s PIP Delivery Update and Claimant Journey Teach-in.

But her comments were later apparently contradicted by a senior civil servant, when he agreed with a benefits expert from Disability Rights UK (DR UK) that current regulations only allow for this group of disabled people to receive the standard rate of PIP.

DR UK has now written to the minister, urging her to make the PIP position “legally clear”.

The letter, from DR UK chief executive Liz Sayce, says: “While we along with other DPOs welcome your clarification, the present wording of the Social Security (Personal Independence Payment) Regulations 2013 provides for those disabled people who cannot stand and move up to 50 metres safely, reliably, repeatedly or in a reasonable time period to be awarded only the standard (lowest) PIP mobility rate.

“This was acknowledged and confirmed to us by a senior DWP officer at the end of yesterday’s meeting.”

Sue Bott, DR UK’s director of development, said she feared the government intended that people who could walk a little more than 20 metres – even if they could not do it “safely, reliably, repeatedly and in a reasonable time period” – would only receive the lower PIP mobility rate.

She said the situation facing disabled people preparing for the move to PIP was now “very unclear” and a “lawyer’s paradise” that would end up having to be tested in the courts.

She said she was “a little bit suspicious” about the government’s motivation in stirring up confusion, and added: “It feels like trying to implement a cut by the back door.”

She said: “The problem with something that is obscure is that it is very easy then for people to not get what they are entitled to.

“You can imagine how the likes of Atos [the controversial IT company which will be carrying out many of the PIP assessments] will interpret this descriptor.

“As usual, it will be left to people knowing their rights and having the energy to pursue an appeal to get what they ought to be entitled to.”

She added: “The [PIP] system was supposed to be simple, but it has turned out to be anything but.”

A DWP spokeswoman insisted that there was no confusion, and that “individuals who cannot stand and then move 20 metres will receive the enhanced rate of the mobility component”.

She said that if a claimant could “move distances between 20 metres and 50 metres but cannot do so safely, to an acceptable standard, repeatedly and in a reasonable time period, they would also receive the enhanced rate”.

She added: “The minister made this clear, as have our officials.”

She said that McVey would be responding to DR UK’s letter in due course.

It is just the latest example of confusion and apparently misleading information from DWP over its DLA reforms.

Last month, Disability News Service reported that the government’s own telephone helpline advisers had been passing DLA claimants with lifetime or indefinite awards out-of-date information about when they would face reassessments.

And last week, DWP was accused by MPs of “manipulating” its own DLA statistics in a bid to justify scrapping the benefit.

7 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

Disabled people could soon find it almost impossible to use foreign personal assistants (PAs) to drive their Motability vehicles, because of strict new rules on driving licences.

Motability says that foreign drivers without a UK driving licence can now only be named on a customer’s insurance policy if they provide written proof – in English – of their driving history, including details of endorsements and any disqualifications in their home country.

But because this proof has to come from the organisation that issued their licence, most foreign PAs who want to drive a vehicle obtained through the disabled people’s car scheme will have to obtain a UK driving licence instead.

But they can only apply to do this – for a £50 fee – after they have lived in the UK for at least six months, while those from many non-European Union countries would have to pass a UK driving test.

Foreign drivers already named on insurance certificates will be able to continue to drive their employer’s vehicle until the Motability lease expires, but the new rules will apply if the disabled person recruits a new PA or once the lease expires and they decide to hire another Motability car.

Helen, a Motability customer since last October, only found out about the new rules by accident last week, even though Motability claims to have written last December to the “limited” number of customers who would be affected.

Helen’s support needs are met by 24/7 live-in PAs from an agency which recruits from the European Union, Africa, Australia and New Zealand. She said she was extremely concerned about the impact the new rules would have on her mobility and independence, and felt “let down” by Motability.

She said: “This has left me feeling so vulnerable – the polar opposite to what Motability and their ‘hassle-free’ driving is all about.”

Tracey Jannaway, director of Independent Living Alternatives (ILA), a disabled people’s organisation which provides personal assistance services, said that almost all ILA’s clients had at least one foreign PA driving for them.

Although she had not heard about the new rules until today (Thursday), when she was shown them by Disability News Service, she said they appeared to be “untenable”.

She said: “The majority of disabled people using PAs, at least in London, will have at least one PA who is not British.”

She said the new policy could leave many disabled people temporarily unable to use their Motability vehicles.

She added: “The majority of people who use ILA are dependent on a vehicle and cannot use public transport.

“It’s just not workable. It seems like another crazy example of Motability shifting the goalposts.”

Last year, Motability began fixing location tracking devices to the cars of customers who live in care homes or have an open insurance policy.

The previous year, it introduced a series of tighter rules, including restricting named drivers – such as PAs – to those living within five miles of the customer’s home.

Motability says in the letter that its new rules on foreign drivers are being introduced “to help protect the scheme from misuse and keep costs low for all our customers”.

The letter says: “From the 1 January 2013, we will only accept driving licences where we are able to obtain a driver’s history from the issuing agency; we are able to do this for all UK licences.

“Non-UK licences will only be accepted if the driver is able to organise official confirmation (in English) of their driving history from their issuing agency. In practice, it may be simpler and quicker for all non-UK licence holders to apply for a UK licence.”

A Motability spokeswoman said it had to “do all it can to protect the scheme from misuse and keep costs proportionately low for all customers”.

“Motability checks the driving history of UK licence holders with the DVLA. However, we are unable to verify the driving history of non-UK licence holders without written confirmation from the issuing agency.”

She added: “The policy has been in place for over two months and where in a few cases we are aware of concerns, we have looked at this on an individual basis and been able to find solutions in line with disability needs.”

Both Helen and Tracey Jannaway said Motability had not written to them about the new rules.

7 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

The prime minister has caused anger among many disabled people by giving MPs a misleading account of his government’s new “bedroom tax”.

David Cameron claimed at this week’s prime minister’s questions that “people with severely disabled children” and “people who need round-the-clock care” would be exempt from the new housing benefit regulations.

Although some families with children with high support needs will be exempt from the regulations – which come into force on 1 April and affect those in social housing – this exemption will be at the discretion of their local authority.

And the exemption is only the result of a court success last year by disabled people and their families, a victory the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) wants the Supreme Court to overturn.

Cameron also failed to point out that only disabled people who need a spare room for an overnight paid care worker will be exempt from the bedroom tax, while those who rely on partners or other family carers for their support will still lose out.

His comments caused anger among disabled people on Twitter, with many furious to hear of more misleading information from the government on the impact of its welfare reforms.

A DWP spokeswoman told Disability News Service that local authorities “have the discretion to exempt families with a disabled child” but that family carers “would not be exempt”.

The new regulations will see housing benefit reduced by 14 per cent if a household is found to have an unoccupied bedroom, and by 25 per cent if they have two or more unoccupied bedrooms. Children under 16 of the same gender – and all children under 10 – will be expected to share a bedroom.

Cameron’s comments came as his government faces a possible judicial review over the impact of the bedroom tax on disabled people, after claims were lodged on behalf of 10 individuals and families.

Lawyers acting for the claimants argue that the changes will have a far greater impact on disabled people than non-disabled people.

They say the regulations breach the Equality Act and the Human Rights Act, as well as the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

The high court will decide by the end of this month whether there will be a full, four-day judicial review, which would take place in May.

Cameron’s comments also came as National Housing Federation (NHF) figures showed that 230,000 disability living allowance (DLA) claimants would lose an average of £728 per year in housing benefit as a result of the new regulations.

Even if all the extra £30 million funding allocated by the government to help foster carers and disabled people in adapted properties was given to DLA claimants hit by the tax, they would each receive just £2.51 per week, compared with an average £14 a week loss.

A lawyer representing five of the families seeking the judicial review – who all have disabled children who need separate bedrooms for impairment-related reasons – said the regulations would have a “catastrophic impact” on thousands of disabled children and adults.

Anne McMurdie, who represents another three of the claimants – a disabled man with a mental health condition, the father of a disabled child who shares caring duties with the child’s mother, and a disabled woman cared for by a parent in a significantly-adapted property – said the court case raised “issues of the greatest significance”.

McMurdie, from Public Law Solicitors (PLS) in Birmingham, said the government had failed to address properly the “true impact” on disabled people, or the “true costs” of the new regulations.

She said the long-term impact was likely to include the costs of rehousing, extra respite care, people being forced to move into residential accommodation, and adaptations in people’s new homes.

She said: “Inevitably, disabled people will fall into debt and some will lose their homes or be forced into accommodation which does not meet their needs.”

She added: “The case may well have wide implications for future welfare policy-making – just how much the burden of cuts can fall disproportionately on disabled people.”

The final two claimants, Jacqueline Carmichael and Richard Rourke, came forward as a result of work by the We Are Spartacus online network of disabled campaigners.

Carmichael lives in a two-bedroom housing association flat with her husband, her full-time carer, and has to sleep in a fixed position in a hospital bed with an electronic pressure mattress.

Her husband cannot share her bed for safety reasons, and there is no room for a second bed, so he sleeps in the second bedroom.

The Carmichaels say they cannot afford the 14 per cent benefit reduction which will be imposed from 1 April.

Rourke, a wheelchair-user, lives in a three-bedroom bungalow, with substantial adaptations.

He has a disabled daughter, also a wheelchair-user, who is studying at university but returns home for summer vacations, other holiday periods, and often at weekends. The third bedroom is a tiny box-room used to store mobility and care equipment.

Rourke cannot move home because there is no wheelchair-accessible, two-bedroom social housing available. If forced to move, he risks losing access to his support network, say his lawyers.

7 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

Deaf and disabled people seeking elected office have welcomed new rules that have doubled the potential financial support they can claim from a government fund.

The £2.6 million fund, open for applications until the end of March 2014, helps to meet the additional costs faced by disabled people seeking election, such as taxi fares and British Sign Language (BSL) interpreters.

The fund was previously offering grants of between £250 and £10,000 to disabled people who wanted to be selected as candidates, or who were standing for election. But the upper limit has now been doubled to £20,000 per person per year.

The Government Equalities Office said the decision to double the £10,000 limit was taken because it was “creating a barrier for people with expensive costs such as BSL interpreters”.

David Buxton, chief executive of the British Deaf Association, campaigned for 20 years for the fund to be set up, because of his own experiences in being elected as a Liberal Democrat councillor and standing twice for parliament.

He said the new £20,000 limit was a “fantastic opportunity” for Deaf candidates, although he said the government should “seriously consider” increasing it for the next general election campaign, because the estimated cost of two interpreters for a five-week campaign could easily reach £20,000.

He said: “After 20 years of campaigning for this, I am still very pleased to see this happen now and also that the government is keen to encourage disabled and deaf people to stand for the election.”

Greg Judge, who hopes to be selected as a prospective parliamentary candidate for the Liberal Democrats in 2015, said the increase in the upper limit would be “a tremendous help” to all Deaf and disabled people standing for elected office because of the “vast amounts” of money spent on campaigning.

He said: “Personally speaking, being a wheelchair-user has an impact on transport, access and event planning, all of which are extremely expensive.”

Judge read Deaf studies at university and said he was “acutely aware of the costs of BSL interpretation and the limitations in needing to normally hire two interpreters, to allow for rest-breaks”.

He said the increased upper limit would be of “significant assistance in securing the right of any candidate, Deaf or not, to communicate with members of the public”.

Helen Grant, the Conservative women and equalities minister, said: “A strong democracy is an inclusive one. We need everyone’s contribution.

“This is why [the] government is committed to providing extra support to tackle the particular obstacles faced by disabled people who want to become MPs, councillors or other elected officials.”

The government has also worked with disabled people and their organisations to develop an online training course, which details the skills needed in standing for office and includes advice and tips from disabled politicians.

And last April, it published guidance to help political parties meet their own obligations under the Equality Act.

The measures are just some of those to come from the three main political parties in the wake of the cross-party speaker’s conference on parliamentary representation, which reported in 2010 on ways to increase the number of disabled, female and minority ethnic MPs.

7 March 2013

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com