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This is welfare abolition, not welfare reform

The House of Lords yesterday rejected proposals outlined in the Welfare Reform Bill to restrict the payment of employment and support allowance (ESA). ESA is the replacement for incapacity benefit, which is claimed by most non-working disabled people. The disabled are amongst the poorest and most vulnerable in society and, at a time when basic living costs are spiralling out of control, the Welfare Reform Bill makes such chilling reading that the audio version should be voiced by Vincent Price.

The government proposed that all successful claims would be limited to 12 months, after which claimants will either be moved to job seekers allowance or come off benefits completely. This is not welfare reform; it’s welfare abolition, and a perverse reversal of the dole-queue-to-disability-benefit scam masterminded by Thatcher who actively encouraged labour exchanges to move dole claimants onto invalidity benefit to disguise rising unemployment in the 1980s. This deceit has been used unconscionably by subsequent governments to hide unemployment figures, but in the process has tarnished the reputation of what we now know as incapacity benefit.

Instead of being regarded as a vital life-line for people who become too ill to work, it’s now viewed suspiciously as the hiding place of cheats, scroungers and freeloaders, giving Cameron full justification to go after those claiming it. When he says he wants to cut the benefits bill by £18bn he’s pointing directly at incapacity benefit claimants: he wants those lard-ass fakes off the sick. The use of the phrase ‘dependency culture’ now comes smeared with contempt, yet it is the result of a deliberate policy to sweep the unemployed under the carpet.

Whilst governments have been abusing the incapacity benefit system to cover their failings for the past 30 years, it does not follow that the majority of today’s claimants are equally abusing the system in return. However, monitoring of the Work Capability Assessment (WCA) by the DWP shows that 64% of claimants are being judged fit to work every month – 64% monthly without variation: are people being properly assessed or are quotas are being met?

The despised WCA strikes fear into the hearts of disabled people. It has been discredited by experts as being unsuitably rushed into implementation as well as being unfit for purpose. Claimants are assessed not by doctors but by a computer programme run by private companies being paid to get people off benefits.

The assessment takes no account of pain, mental health problems, or spectrum disorders such as autism; it is based on the ability to carry out simple motor functions such as standing, sitting, reaching etc. Someone with rheumatoid arthritis may well be able to reach for a computer mouse, but that doesn’t mean she can pull her own knickers on of a morning, let alone shower, dress, travel to work and manage her pain and exhaustion enough to work in a way that any reasonable employer might expect. And what she can do on Monday isn’t necessarily what she can on do on Tuesday.

The bill threatens to plunge many thousands of disabled people into deep and further poverty and should be anathema to Labour’s traditional principles. But labour MPs have been largely silent because these injustices, including the WCA, were formulated under its own 2009 welfare reform act. Labour has said nothing because it simply won’t admit it was wrong in the past, and with the Lib Dems effectively silenced by their pact with the devil, this draconian cruelty has been basically unopposed.

So, thank goodness for that dusty old institution, the Lords. Some may claim they are out of touch, but as Labour peer Lady Meacher said ‘the government had crossed the line of decency with its proposed reforms’ and thankfully this realisation was enough to shake some life back into them. Let’s hope they stay awake long enough to vote with a conscience on housing benefit caps in the next part of the bill.

Keren Suchecki
Keren Suchecki lives in Bristol and works in community regeneration

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Merry Cross
Merry Cross
12 years ago

We disabled people are fighting a major battle with despair. This article is good, but things are so much worse already. Many people have committed suicide having lost their benefits. And many, many more are set to lose theirs as the criteria become increasingly divorced from reality. Please encourage everyone to sign my petition at Avaaz/stop_stealing_disabled_peoples_benefits/
Many thanks

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