This has been a very busy week in terms of disability news, and all go for The Broken of Britain as well. The only problem with a net-based campaign is that you don't get the same rush of fulfillment as when campaigning in person, but there is satisfaction in knowing that The Broken of Britain have played a part in a number of developments this week. The most exciting news was this consultation response by the Social Security Advisory Committee. This represents a huge bloody nose for the Government.
This week the team at The Broken of Britain have been working away on plans for a new campaign. I can't reveal much more than this, but I can promise excitement - so keep an eye out in a few weeks! The news this week demonstrates that the Government's plans, on DLA and on ESA, are falling apart; that we are winning the battle for attention; and the new #TBofBTT Writers' Series has shown how keen disabled people are to get involved. Most of all, this week has shown that, with a little bit more pressure, we can win this!
Non-partisan UK-based Disability campaign. Advocacy for people with invisible illness and/or physical & mental health conditions. Also Carers, their Families and Friends. Our individual voices are too quiet to be heard, but collectively we can shout loud enough to drown out this tide of abuse against us. Disability Hate Crime, lack of full legal protection, people in care homes costing too much to be let out and not one political party willing to fight for us.
5 comments:
To be honest I do not have the energy to read all that nor - because of fatigue ddo I have the brain power to understand it. Are you at some point able to tell people like me what it means to us in the big scheme of things. I am still very scared and feel very alone in my life where I am the only disabled person that I even know.
I am very dssapointed that the Social Security Advisory Committee so willingly accepts the Socail Model of diability (1.7).
I care for my wife has very Severe ME; people with ME will tell you what harm the promotion of the Social Model of disability has done. Under it, the biomedical reality of ME has virtually been ignored, in favour of millions of pounds being spent upon psychiatric interventions to convince people they are not "really" ill.
Dating back to 1994, when the Conservatives brought in the giant American Medical Insurance company UNUM to advise them on Welfare Reform , the philosophy that the disabled have to be "liberated" from the "Medical" model of illness has powered Welfare Reform, including the introduction of PIP , ever since. I have writen much more about this on my blog :
Sorry, have just posted a response and most of it did not appear !
For more information on the dangers of the social model of disability , please see :
carersfight.blogspot.com/2011/02/dla-reforms-what-disability-community_14.html
and for the 25% Group/Stonebird Severe ME Response to the DLA Reform Consultation please see :
www.stonebird.co.uk/DLA Consultation Response.doc
Thanks
Hope you can fight against this too - This is grossly wrong - charging us for mistakes is just wrongg
http://wheresthebenefit.blogspot.com/2011/02/to-err-is-human.html
I'm with Greg in my concern about the reliance on the Social Model of Disability. Not that I'm against the Social Model as ONE way of looking at things but ignoring the Medical Model entirely just leads to a different blinkered approach. When it comes to assessing someone's needs then, surely, both need considering. People with physical or mental disabilities and people with long-term illnesses are prevented from doing many things as much by their medical condition as by whether or not buses are 'accessible', workplaces are adaptable and welcoming, etc.,
Broadly, I'm pleased by the SSAC's response. I'm sure that all of us could disagree with parts of it and I certainly do but one thing in particular is nagging at me which has nothing to do with what they've said and it is this: did they get a different list of questions?
I know that brain-fog overcomes me rather too frequently for my liking but I honestly don't remember there being twenty-two questions in the Public Consultation. More like twelve, I thought. I could be wrong - I often am - but having also had a mad fit of accidental file deletion-beyond-recovery, I can't check... Help?!
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