#Leicester Green Party’s https://x.com/MagsLewisGreens writes about Labour’s war onh disabled people
It is truly a terrifying time to be disabled in the UK.
Last week, the assisted dying bill was passed by MPs at the very same time as welfare cuts and specifically huge cuts to personal Independence payments or PIP were being “consulted “ on. It speaks volumes to us about how important we are seen, with this timing.
Most disabled charities are against the bill in its current form as they say it puts our lives in danger and is a bad bill. The fact the govt are trying to reduce disabled benefits at the same time, when disabled people are far more likely to be in poverty, is abysmal.
What is really sinister even evil, though, is the misinformation being peddled by the Labour government. Even the prime minister himself doesn’t seem to understand that PIP is claimed by disabled people to pay for essential bits of kit or other expenses we incur just by being disabled, and is not an unemployment benefit. And that lots of us who need PIP do in fact go out to work.
MS Society research says that 94% of PIP claimants with MS are worried the proposals will worsen their MS symptoms such as fatigue, and that 41% of Pip claimants with ms are at high risk of losing all or some of their money.
But most worryingly, 31% of PIP claimants with MS who are in work, say they will be forced to stop work if they lose their PIP.
This is because PiPis often used by people to for example, occasionally pay for a taxi to get to work if they’re too exhausted to walk or lack the mobility to get the bus or can’t afford a car. Or they use it to pay for extra physio or counselling to keep well and able to work.
I myself had to use Access to work and PIP funds in the past to pay to have my car adapted, as I needed a car to get to work at that time, and the adaptation was going to cost me over £1000. If I had not been able to have my car adapted, I wouldn’t have been able to have a job.
Like many disabled people, I now use PIP to help pay for weekly physio/ mobility appointments, without which I would become more immobile faster and a burden on my family and the state.
Of course in an ideal world, I would get these sessions on the NHS, but you are only eligible for a physio course of six weeks on the NHS.
But the government and Liz Kendall claim these measures are to get us back into work? They are proposing cutting PIP which actually enables people to go to work and live decent lives, and also slashing the access to work fund, which is a fund to help disabled people get and retain jobs.
These measures together prove the government are not telling the truth, and far from caring about disabled people, all they want is an easy target to strip funds from us, rather than going after the rich and tax cheats .
Shame on our government, and shame on Liz Kendall.