We need one of those endles adverts – the ‘just two pounds a week would save’ variety. In this case ‘just two pounds a week to the Treasury would cut the debt mountain more effectively than the coalition’ is what I have in mind. Imagine, 62 million people giving £2 a week, not to starving donkeys in Romania,  or lame pigeons in South Africa, but to our own government for the express purpose of cutting the national debt! It seems, according the The Centre for Policy Studies, that almost half the population is under the impression that ‘the cuts, the cuts, the damn cuts’ as reported by the BBC, are cutting the debt mountain by £600 billion. A mere 10% were correct in their belief that the coalition are actually increasing our national debt by £600 billion!

In this week of the Paralympics, that orgy of delight that those who are disabled can achieve mighty feats, the disability activists are out in force in the media. The main object for their ire is Atos, the organisation charged with discovering whether being sick or having suffered an injury is actually sufficient to prevent you from doing any work, ever again. Under normal circumstances, a Doctor telling you that you are not as sick as you feared you were would be a cause for celebration. Where ‘benefits’ are concerned, it turns the Doctor into a ‘Nazi monster’. To say nothing of the ‘national disgrace’ in Atos being allowed to sponsor the Paralympics.

So this week we have the curious spectacle of, on the one hand, documentaries on television showing how losing your legs doesn’t prevent you from climbing Everest, and on the other hand, we are told of the inhuman treatment of a man with depression claiming that he was at risk of committing suicide because henceforth he would only receive unemployment benefit not a lifetime gold card to the national handbag.   Am I alone is seeing the anomaly in this?

There is a vast army out there of people who are determined to continue the lie that having some sort of disability means not that you should adapt your lifestyle, but that the fully able bodied should support you for life. It is ‘chugging’ on an industrial scale.

The Independent has a fine example of this PR exercise this morning. They quote a Pete Whitehead, who complains that he has lost most of his sight. A tragedy for anyone. I am sure it does prevent him from doing the job he did before – but any job? Sean Dilley does a fine job as a political lobby correspondent though registered blind. Not everybody can be a lobby journalist, but being blind is not a bar to doing any work. It makes it more difficult, you may need retraining for some specialist tasks, but to complain as Mr Whitehead did, to the Atos representative, that you cannot work ‘because you might get run over in the traffic on your way to work’ – and cite as evidence that you have had several near misses in traffic in recent times as you go out and about ‘because you don’t want to lose your independence’ is to demand that gold card to the national handbag at the expense of all those who do struggle to support themselves despite disability.

They go on to quote a Lesley Roberts. Lesley had recently had a ‘breast cancer scare’ – as do thousands of working women every week, popping in to the local hospital for a scan in their lunch hour.  Scare by definition implies that she didn’t have breast cancer – and should have been celebrating. She also suffers from a condition where tumours grow on her nerve ends. For sure we would have been told if these were malignant tumours – which doesn’t mean that they can’t be painful of course. Allegedly at the time of her examination by Atos, she had 25 such lumps on her legs – and the nurse couldn’t find them and declared her fit for work. Nine months later that decision was reversed – whether because the 25 lumps were now apparent, or her condition had deteriorated in some other way we are not told. We are told that she doesn’t get disability benefits because her partner ‘earns too much’, but she is still appalled at not being allowed to draw money from the working population! Still cited as an example of the heartlessness of Atos.

DPAC (‘Disabled pople against cuts‘) go further and cite in evidence that  32 people a week are dying as a direct result of having been called in to see an Atos Doctor. This claim is based on a Daily Mirror Freedom of Information request which found that 1,600 people had died before their assessment had been completed – and thus before they could have been found fit for work! The Mirror article in turn is illustrated by an ex-miner, Tony Groves, who had very wisely been told to give up his physically demanding job after a series of strokes and a heart attack. He got himself in such a state at the prospect of having to complete a ‘work capability’ test that, as his widow said, he died of a stress related heart attack. Why would the notion that you might be considered fit to do a desk bound job reduce someone to such stress that they have a heart attack?

Paralympian swimmer Giles Long is being lauded for having designed the graphic above which grades Paralympians according to their ability – when Atos do it, it is called ‘nothing short of premeditated murder!

If the Paralympics are to mean anything, then they should be a national celebration of the fact that having a disability is life changing, not working life ending. Let’s hear more from the people who have a disability and manage to still contribute to society. Let’s celebrate the Sean Dilley’s and those who overcome trials and tribulations.

Cuts? What cuts?

Saul September 3, 2012 at 19:51

The Paralympics just gets better and better, the stadium is packed and I
think the noise levels from the crowd are even higher than the regular games.
I’m in awe of all of the athletes taking part.

To the commenter who called them the “Crippolympics” all I can say is, if
there was a gold medal for being a knobhead, then you sir would be a nailed on
certainty!

Real Life September 1, 2012 at 23:26

Such a badly organised page and I can’t find any responses to my posts that
Lesley, much maligned here, has got dangerous brain tunours. Aso found the
multiple tumours were so large the bulged under her clothing during her brief
asessment. SO sickening to read how she’s derided in this piece. Anyone want
to sawp with her?

James September 1, 2012 at 10:31

Gladiolys, I proclaim you Queen of the Realm.

James September 1, 2012 at 09:47

Oh man! What a mess. You all have an opinion, but some folks are really
suffering and that matters. Gildas, I’m disappointed. I thought I knew you.
Gladiolys, you give me hope.

gladiolys September 1, 2012 at 10:03

Your comment is appreciated. Now… if only I had some power!

john77 September 1, 2012 at 00:10

Anna,
the old-fashioned Tories believed in helping the deserving poor,
which is all those who are in need through no fault of their own, but not
scroungers. You can see the different views between Tories, those who assume
that all Tories drink blood and there are no scroungers (despite the high %age
of those not even attending an Atos interview), a handful who point out that
most disabilities do not stop the sufferer from any employment but just some,
and a few who are trying to reconcile widespread sympathy with the hard facts
that we can’t afford to do all we want. In fact a very, very small proportion
of those claiming incapacity benefit are scroungers, nearly all would take a
job if they could get one and should be entitled to JSA if they were 100%
fit..
PaulBJ is blatantly lying. Britain is less unequal that Russia, let
alone the USA; he claims that 40% appealed against the ATOS decision when only
37% were found fit to work – just how stupid does he think we are? The 25% of
the 37% (i.e. 9% of the total) that PaulBJ says “disappeared” almost certainly
include more scroungers than those unable to cope with the appeals process
since all the latter would simply default to JSA!!! The number of successful
appeals (38% of 40% of 37% is 5.6%) is significantly smaller than those who
“disappeared” after the test. He absurdly claims that all those “seriously
ill” people who died after being declared fit for work did so as a result of
negligence by the DWP – er, isn’t healthcare the responsibility of the NHS?
don’t seriously ill people occasionally die? (I recently read an article on
the dangers of running a marathon that showed the risk of dying as a result
was just over one-third of the risk of killed by being struck by lightning).
He claims that 1100 people died after being found fit to work at some time in
the future – that is less than one in 1000 of Incapacity Benefit Claimants,
less than 1 in 400 of those found fit to work compared to 1 in 80 of the
general population. Why didn’t more of them die?
No, I don’t drink blood; I
do go out in the sunshine and I occasionally eat garlic.
One trouble with
Incapacity Benefit is that New Labour encouraged the odd million to go onto
that to reduce the reported numbers claiming unemployment benefit (the
previous Conservative administration was also, to a lesser extent, much too
willing to accept Incapacity claims) then realised that the Daily Mail
campaign against “scroungers” was costing it votes and launched an
unfit-for-purpose campaign to reduce the numbers claiming Incapacity
Benefit.
IMHO but also, more relevantly, in the opinion of a considerable
number of competent medical practitioners the ATOS test is not fit for
purpose. Part of Brown’s toxic legacy. Tests should be conducted by someone
who has knowledge of the condition from which the claimant suffers. Although
even the ATOS test gives 63% unfit for any work at first question it should
ask whether the claimant is medically fit for any work for which he/she has
the relevant skills or could reasonably the skills before normal pension
age.

Zanshin August 31, 2012 at 20:54

Well done that man, carry on.

Penseivat August 31, 2012 at 20:21

Did 22 years in the British Army (amongst other postings were Borneo, Aden
and several tours of Northern Ireland) during which I sustained a number of
permanent injuries – knackered knees but still passed the battle fitness tests
– and then I became a Police officer in a County Force. After 17 years front
line Policing was assaulted by three yobs which resulted in a permanent injury
to my spine. This meant I had to retire from the Police on medical grounds
with a modified injury pension – the specialist provided by the (legal aided)
defence suggested the injury was caused during my military service and the
assault merely aggravated it with the prosecution specialists accepting as a
possibility. I walk anything more than 100 yards at a time with difficulty, am
in constant pain and the spine is apparently crumbling. Despite being active
all my life I had to find a new outlet – I became a florist (no, I’m not!).
With the help of my wife, one child and two part-timers, I have a thriving
small business. I looked at what I couldn’t do, then at what I could do and
chose one of the latter. I pay tax on my military and Police pensions, my
business and through my accountant, NI contributions for my staff. I refused a
disabled badge as I don’t class myself as disabled, just ‘less’ abled.
Self-pity is for losers, whingers and parasites and I don’t class myself in
that group.

Real Life August 31, 2012 at 12:45

btw, Lesley Roberts, who you mock also has a tumour on her brain and it’s
very dangerous. Her tumours were clearly visible at the time of her
assessment, 2 of them were actually remarked upon in the assessment report.
The tumours are extremely painful. they stop her bending limbs, etc. There are
side effects of her medication too. If you like I can find other people with
brain tumours for you to deride?

gladiolys August 31, 2012 at 10:59

Anna – maybe you’d like this system?

http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/society/disability-benefits-to-be-replaced-by-medals-2012083139545

Real Life August 31, 2012 at 09:01

What a nasty person you are. You don’t even live in the UK so what are YOU
contributing? Please stay in France, away from us and away from a ‘puter. No
doubt this response will give you a petit mort as that’s what you write for.
You’re a great example of overcoming disability yourself – not many can write
without a heart. Merci and au revoir!

Anna
Raccoon August 31, 2012 at 09:08

Dear Real Life,
I don’t live in the UK – but I pay my taxes in the UK,
so what am I contributing for?

Real Life
August 31, 2012 at 12:48

you’re contributing for the bankers bailouts, help if and when you need
it, Mp’s expenses, legal bills for schols to be given to the Tory party’s
donors, Unum, large corporations, subsidising large companies lie Tesco
who don’t pay a wage people can live on (tax credits)… you’ve got a lot to
learn.

Ted Treen
September 4, 2012 at 14:31

Bankers’ bailouts:- courtesy of that nice Mr Brown & that nice Mr
Darling, wasn’t it?
MP’s expenses:- like Mrs Becket’s hanging
baskets, the Balls’ house-flipping, Ms Blears house-flipping,
Ms
Smith’s main-residence-is-sister’s broom cupboard (broom cupboard =
garage, perchance?)
Unum:- Selected, like ATOS, by the Labour
Party
Large Corporations:- as approved by that nice Mr Mandelson

All of the foregoing is obviously the fault of wicked Tories, all of
whom desperately yearn to send children up chimneys and down mines,
re-open workhouses, make vagrancy a capital offence…

“legal bills for schols to be given to the Tory party’s donors,”:-
can’t really work out quite what this means

“subsidising large companies lie” – possibly the grand-daddy of
Freudian slips?

Tammy Wyenott
August 30, 2012 at 04:57

hello luv

wow, this sight has been up and down like a yo-yo
so your still here
then i thought you must be dead
still nevermind democracy has been restored
so theys ay cos a public schoolboy is the new england cricket captain
good
old alastare normal service resumed

Anna
Raccoon August 30, 2012 at 10:21

“i thought you must be dead”

I’m not, definitely not – thank you for reminding me this fine
morning……

PaulBJ August 30, 2012 at 03:23

What you’ve written is a load of unmitigated BS and i find your level of
ignorance on the subject extremely depressing.

The UK has one of the most structurally unequal societies in the developed
world.And there is a clear correlation between povety and ill-health. By the
DWP’s own statistics only around 0.5% of those claiming disability benefits
are thought to be fraudulent. And there isn’t a shred of credible evidence to
support your ridiculous and highly offensive claim that sick and disabled
people are spending their benefits living the Life Of Riley at the taxpayers
expense.

What’s happening in our country is that genuinely sick and disabled people
are being put through a fundamentally flawed and deeply inhumane process
called the Work Capability Assessment which is being conducted by a French
company called ATOS on behalf of the DWP. As a result of the negligence of
both the DWP and ATOS between 30-40 seriously ill people died after wrongly
being declared to be fit for work and before they were able to appeal.And this
included about 12 suicides.And last year alone 1100 people died who had been
wrongly classified by the DWP and ATOS as being fit for work at some time in
the future .And in order to get their full benefits had to undertake a number
of work-related activities . Additionally they were to face a means teast
after 52 weeks. So we can only speculate as to the extent the stress they were
put under by the DWP and ATOS speeded up their deaths.

At present 40 % of people appeal against the DWP/ATOS decisons and 38% have
their appeals upheld . And around 25% of people declared fit for work by the
DWP and ATOS neither go into work nor claim unemployment benefits. They simply
‘disappear ”because many of them physically and mentally can’t cope with the
appeals process.So they become completely dependent on family,friends and
charities for their support .

Currently around 40 doctors and nurses working for ATOS are being
investigated for gross misconduct by the General Medical Council and the
Nursing and Midwifery Council. One for instance asked a claimant why she
wasn’t dead after making several suicide attempts.Another was caught on
Facebook making highly offensive comments about the people she was assessing
-referring to them as ”down and outs”.

The way that genuinely sick and disabled people are being treated in this
country right now is nothing short of a national scandal. And the media has
played it’s part in doing the governments dirty work for it by promoting the
myth that most of those claiming disability benefits are malingerers.Plus this
demonisation of those on disability benefits has led to a steady increase in
hate crimes against them.

I hope therefore you’ll have the decency to reconsider your views and face
up to what’s really going on rather than swallowing the propaganda you’ve been
spoonfed..For it’s people like you who’re in effect making it that much easier
for the government to treat the sick and disabled as convenient scapegoats.And
in a supposedly civilised country that’s nothing to be proud of.

Engineer August 30, 2012 at 10:05

Paul – there is another problem. The public purse is not just empty, it
is spending more than the country earns every year. This year’s deficit is
about £120 billion, next year’s will be a bit less (we hope), and each
year’s deficit is added to the National Debt, on which the taxpayer pays the
interest. We can’t go on spending what we don’t have. Current Welfare
reforms are about sharing the diminished pot as fairly as can be arranged.
It’s no good going on about ‘taxing the rich’ – they already make a
disproportionate contribution, and taking too much out of an economy in
taxation just stifles it – the level of taxtake is already a major drag on
economic growth.

It’s nothing to do with political ideology. It’s nothing to do with not
caring. It’s simply a pragmatic response to the country being, to all
intents and purposes, broke.

gladiolys
August 30, 2012 at 10:34

The rich do NOT make a disproportionate contribution, and your comment
is about money being more important than people.

DtP August 30, 2012 at 10:50

Well, err, yeah they do. If you don’t work you don’t pay tax except
ofcourse VAT. But if you earn £100,000 you pay about 47% tax in PAYE
& NI so a welfare recipient is 100% tax free whereas an affluent
worker pays infinitely more (as anything multiplied by Zero is
err…Zero). Go to the back of the class.

gladiolys
August 31, 2012 at 09:17

Did you not notice the word”disproportionate”? 47% of nothing is,
er, nothing. Of course the rich are paying more, but not
disproportionately.
As you pointed out, the unemployed and disabled
will still be paying VAT on their purchases from their benefits – they
still need to dress and there are duties on other purchases, so VAT
takes up a higher percentage of their income than it does for the
rich. A welfare recipient is not, therefore, 100% tax free.

Meet you at the back of the class.

Engineer
August 30, 2012 at 20:46

Gladiolys – money is NOT more important than people. However, you
still can’t keep doling out what you don’t have. Earning it is hard,
spending it is easy. The sooner we balance the country’s books, the
better; and I have suffered financially in all this economic stupidity,
as have all savers, anybody with money in a pension fund, and anybody
paying tax.

You can’t just ignore the fact that your credit card is maxed out.
Neither can the public purse.

gladiolys
August 31, 2012 at 09:30

Engineer… I’m glad to see you write money is NOT more important
than people. Given this common ground, how do we ensure those who
need, get? I’d argue from this point: the whole bloody system needs
re-working. For a start, bring it back in-house, and stop paying
private companies (ATOS, G4S etc) to make profits off the backs of
those seeking help. If these companies can make profits on their
contracts, either the government can do the same work at the same
cost, or they are paying too much for their contracts.

Also, the majority of the welfare budget is claimed by pensioners.
They are ring-fenced, and it’s easy to see why. Everyone can imagine
getting older and needing help as a pensioner… no-one can imagine
becoming sick or disabled long-term enough to require state help.
There’s votes in protecting pensioners. But it means that others bare
the brunt of cutbacks disproportionately (that word again). From my
previous post, you know I believe the system can be re-formed so that
it both helps the disabled and saves money (what about guaranteeing
people a certain weekly stipend and if they are capable of any work at
all, taxing that at 50% per week?).

The government itself started this fiasco because they encouraged
people onto Incapacity Benefit (at it was called then) to save
themselves having to explain away horrendous unemployment figures. If
the government now does not give a toss about those figures, it is
again using people as numerical fodder in an attempt to get IB/ESA
down. Some people have undoubtedly swung the lead in their time. But
to paint all people with this very narrow brush is simply wrong. And
if cutbacks are to be made – well, as Zanshin says, Afghanistan should
be cut, there’s our £20 billion nuclear deterrent, which we’ll never
use, foreign aid needs drastically re-configuring (why do nuclear
states need aid?) and let’s not forget troughing MPs and Lords.

The biggest resource of a country is its people and we are wasting
ours.

Engineer
September 1, 2012 at 13:10

Gladiolys – I have come to a point of view that government has a
few responsibilities – the defence of the Realm, keeping the Queen’s
peace, the impartial administration of Justice, running a stable
currency, and acting as referee and arbiter of last resort in matters
of importance to ordinary people. That, I think, should pretty much be
the limit of government activity. I don’t think that government should
act as nanny and nursemaid to all and sundry, I believe that people
should look after themselves, their families, and their local
communities. I am fully aware that not everyone is in a position to do
so, but government should concern itself to see that suitable support
is available; it should not necessarily provide that support itself.

Consider the situation with two important aspects of life – food
and healthcare. One is provided almost entirely by people and
businesses, the other almost entirely by the state. Food is freely and
abundantly available in great diversity; one can eat at great cost, or
at very little, and with a little knowledge eat very well for
comparatively little. There is no problem obtaining food when you want
it. Government involvement is only ar referee of last resort, and the
system (with one or two hiccups – BSE, milk prices to dairy farmers,
etc) works very well. Healthcare – not so well. I think there is a
great lesson in that. It’s also worth remembering that when government
took to itself control of the means of production (by
nationalisation), it discovered that it was very bad indeed at
managing those means of production. All in all, governments are very
bad at managing things – including looking after the holt and the
lame.

Unfortunately, the good that should have come from the principles
of the Beveridge Report has become a massive, bloated, blood-sucking
burden on the state because the state has ended up doing too much, and
doing it badly; as a result, some have cynically used the state rather
than help themselves. There has also developed a culture of
‘entitlement’ in some quarters. I’ve seen this first hand – my father
died of cancer a couple of years ago; despite his being financially
comfortable (the result of his own hard work – he retired at the age
of 75), at least three agencies pestered (and I use the word
advisedly) him to claim benefits in his last months. He initially
declined, on the quite proper grounds that he did not need to, but the
pestering continued. He accepted in the end just to shut the pesterers
up. Another relative lived for many years on dialysis, and again took
benefits, despite the family income being sufficient; they used the
benefits as holiday money. This is fundamentally wrong – the benefits
system should support those who genuinely need it, not those who
don’t. I agree entirely with you when you say that the system has been
rather cynically manipulated by successive governments to disguise
unemployment. That was a gross abrogation of government
responsibility.

We agree, I think, that there is waste in public spending.
Afghanistan is being cut – withdrawal by 2015, if I remember
correctly; a nuclear deterrent of some sort is an important part of
the government’s primary responsibility to defend the realm, I cannot
understand why MPs are paid at all (though reimbursement of expenses
legitimately incurred is reasonable), and I agree that Foreign Aid
policy requires urgent overhaul. There are many other perfectly
sensible ways in which public spending could be drastically reduced,
and not diminish the life of the country or any of it’s people one
iota. Why must government fund and manage the arts, for example?
Should not that be a community endeavour?

I think that fundamentally, people are responsible for themselves.
Government should serve the people by acting as a forum to settle
differences, and in matters such as Welfare, it should see that only
those in real need are provided for, not all and sundry.

gladiolys
September 2, 2012 at 08:39

Engineer: the role of the state has been debated and has evolved
many times since recorded history began. I don’t believe it’s
co-incidental that welfare states have become the norm in a continent
dominated initially by Christianity, torn asunder by wars of religious
belief, that was the first to industrialise and develop mega-cities
and which then tore itself apart again with two horrific world wars.
History has brought us to where we are and the welfare state was
initiated partially to buy off the working classes who fought those
wars, partly to bribe them to fight further wars (as we feared the
Cold War would heat up), but also aspired to administer a huge dollop
of social justice. After all, wars are largely fought to protect the
interests of whoever is the ruling class at the time, and as
population has expanded, those rulers have lived cheek by jowl with
the “underclass” – welfare has been in some regards an attempt to keep
them there, underneath, but comfortably enough to stop them getting
uppity. Some people actually believed in those principles of social
justice too.

Now you and I can argue about the role of the state. To my mind, it
is largely there to hold everything in equilibrium. For me, especially
with a growing population (and let’s ignore immigration for the
moment, let’s just accept population will grow anyway), apart from the
duties you have outlined, the government should be about maintaining
balance between community and individuals. A healthy community needs
imaginative, strong individuals to help it grow, meet new challenges,
make new discoveries, invent new technologies. Individuals need strong
communities to help them meet their full potential, to flourish, to
nurture and protect them. It would be interesting to wonder what would
have happened to Stephen Hawking without the welfare state.

As far as I can see, the current idealogues in government don’t
think they will ever need this underclass again and is intent on
dismantling the welfare state, all of it, good and bad bits,
regardless of its effects on those who receive its help because, quite
simply, it doesn’t feel the country needs them any more. Labour is
cheaper in China, we are becoming fully globalised with a
supra-national global elite who are increasingly in cahoots with each
other, and the chances of wars are rapidly diminishing – it’s not good
for profits. So who needs all those unemployed? And the chronically
sick and the disabled are collateral damage. This is not about
scroungers, this is about need. Living in gated communities or lovely
Narnias in the Chilterns has isolated those in government from the
people they are supposed to serve, but instead rule with the contempt
of a pre-revolutionary French monarch – “L’etat, c’est nous”.

I firmly absolutely believe you should have the right to live your
life the way you want to. But I also believe you and I have
commitments to help the communities in which we live prosper, and that
includes taxes for welfare and also volunteering or just informally
checking up on your neighbours.

I know I’ve gone on a bit, and maybe wandered off point, so thanks
for keeping with me this far, but finally, I’d like to say your
healthcare and food analogy is flawed. People can grow food of their
own anywhere (ish), or cook and make produce into jams and pickles and
cakes and pies by themselves. Welfare benefits give them the money to
do this. I, however, can’t treat myself for cancers, no matter how
much money the state might give me. Healthcare is an increasingly
specialised, technological and diversified field that needs highly
educated and qualified professionals to administer it, and the NHS
tries to organise that as best it can.

Thanks for your patience.

Engineer
September 2, 2012 at 10:39

Gladiolys – thanks for the reply; it’s interesting to hear other
points of view discussed with intelligence and without the
name-calling and insult that seems to dog so many such forums.

I don’t believe that it’s government’s duty to organise people’s
lives for them. It’s not government’s duty to give everybody a job. It
is government’s duty to try and ensure that economic conditions are
such that jobs can be created, so it has a responsibility to either
encourage, or at the very least not discourage, the people and
organisations likely to create jobs (and wealth) provided, of course,
that those enterprises are legal and reasonably decent. The current
problem of lower labour costs in the developing world won’t last for
ever; indeed, work is currently starting to flow back from China,
something noticed by the foundry industry about three years ago, and
now slowly spreading. The very best thing that government can do is,
frankly, to get out of the way and let the wealth-creators (big
business, small and medium enterprises, the self-employed, part-timers
in the back room) get on with it.

I’m not sure that the actions of the current government are
idealogical, merely the pragmatic (and very limited) response to
pressing problems that have been ignored for too long by too many
governments. The over-riding fact is that the public purse has been
appallingly mismanaged (by almost all governments since WW2), and
unless action is taken to curb excessive public spending (and that
hasn’t happened yet, despite all the noise about ‘cuts’), the
consequenses will be severe for the whole population. We can’t go on
spending beyond our means indefinitely. The same problem, on a far
larger scale, has yet to be realised in the EU and in America. You
can’t build social justice on a mountain of debt.

I think there’s more than enough evidence that welfare payments of
various kinds had become a target for scroungers. One thing that
amazed me was hearing that when the assessments for one such benefit
were being done recently, about 30% of ‘claimants’ did not bother to
attend for assessment. Why so high a proportion? How did so many
claimants of dubious eligibility come to in receipt of the taxpayers’
largesse in the first place? It is quite clear that a massive scandal
had been ongoing for many years, and addressing it is not
‘idealogical’, it is just good governance. Ensuring that those who
need support get it, but those who don’t, do not sponge off the
hard-pressed taxpayer just seems like a basic responsibility of fair
governance to me.

Finally – I stand by my food/healthcare analogy. You can’t treat
yourself for cancer, but you can’t produce your own beef, bananas,
olive oil or tea either. The one is almost wholly organised by private
enterprise and works (generally) very well, the other is almost wholly
organised by the state and has been dogged by a string of scandals
involving poor care standards, waiting lists, rationing and all the
rest of it. The private sector is not perfect, but the state tends to
be less perfect.

gladiolys
September 2, 2012 at 11:12

Engineer: a very brief reply – I’m off out for the day and can’t
give you the lengthy response I feel I want to make. So, concisely…
that 30 per cent figure…. I believe a lot of that will be made up of
people who feel there is no point in going to ATOS for their
assessment because it has become a lottery as to who gets ESA. It
seems the new system is set up as a series of hurdles/hoops to
discourage people and only the persistent/informed/well-supported and
advised will make it through. DLA has been like that for years (most
applicants don’t get it on first submission).

I suppose that is the beef of my argument about ESA – it’s
arbitrary, it’s poorly set up, it’s badly administered and is run
solely for the benefit of ATOS, who make a profit on the back of
recipients. Those who need, often don’t get which is why the appeals
process is clogged. It’s wrong.

And as for food and private enterprise… have you seen the latest
stories about banks and food speculation?

http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/379757/20120901/barclays-makes-500-million-betting-food-crisis.htm
http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/1045180/how_goldman_sachs_started_the_food_speculation_frenzy.html

Food prices were instrumental in the Arab “spring”… I wonder when
we’ll see the first green leaves on spring?

gladiolys
September 2, 2012 at 11:35

P.S. Thanks for the compliment. Intelligent debate is never a waste
of time with someone is engaged and informed, like yourself, even if
we fundamentally disagree.

john77
September 2, 2012 at 15:38

@ Engineer
Apologies for butting into your erudite conversation
with Gladiolys but the 30% non-attendance figure includes wheelchair
users who are summoned to an office without wheelchair access, others
physically incapable of attending the interview without aid (some turn
up with support from a family member or carer but some cannot) or
whose interviews would require them to catch a bus before they start
running in the morning, those given appointments clashing with those
for medical treatment *about which Atos had already been informed*,
those who are ill on the day of the appointment (obviously likely to
be a higher %age than in the general population), and a range of other
causes beyond the claimants’ control.
NB you should not compare the
30% non-attendance rate with a norm of zero – the NHS has over 10%
failure rate for appointments with GPs and dentists

Engineer
September 2, 2012 at 16:19

John77 – I hear what you say, and take note. However, it is clear
that there are people claiming who are not, in accordance with the
rules for eligibility, entitled to do so. Weeding them out is just a
responsibility of fair governance, in my view.

I have no direct knowledge of the ATOS test you mention, but some
method must be used. Whatever method is used to determine eligibility
will have flaws. There will always be those who are obviously
reasonably entitled, a few who clearly are not, and some in the grey
zone. There will always be disagreement from some turned down, so
quite rightly, there is an appeals process. Unfortunately, there are
always some prepared to use such cases to advance particular political
positions, and do so noisily and sometimes not entirely honestly; the
government’s duty is to be as fair as it can both to genuine
claimants, and to taxpayers.

john77
September 2, 2012 at 18:12

@ Engineer
I can’t dispute what you say except the implication
of “Whatever method … will have flaws”
Yes, of course there are
people on Incapacity Benefit who should be on JSA instead because
human beings usually do recover from illnesses and injuries (although
a large proportion of those on Incapacity Benefit have incurable
conditions) and there is an incentive *not* to volunteer to switch
voluntarily from IB to JSA if there are no jobs to be found as IB pays
a higher rate than JSA. I assume there will be some scroungers because
you find them everywhere but the Daily Mail hasn’t found many in the
more than a million on IB so they presumably are not common.
The
ATOS test (commissioned by New Labour, incidentally so it’s nothing to
do with the ideology of the current government – assuming that it has
any ideology, which many people doubt) is not fit for purpose. They
use “medically trained” staff who have zero expert knowledge of the
applicants’ condition in 99% of the cases (and zero knowledge at all
in some cases), so they are unable to make an intelligent judgement,
and a tick-box sheet, which has marginal relevance to ability to carry
out a private sector job. The internet is inundated with horror
stories, so much so that probably a few claimants have despaired
before their interview and failed to attend as gladiolys says
(although I have yet to hear anyone put a name and date on any
individual who did so, I suspect this to be largely urban myth). The
successful appeal rate is far too high for a decent selection
process.

Dick the
Prick August 30, 2012 at 21:30

The focus has been lost. All appeals should be free of charge with
full democratic oversight – the one thing town halls are capable of
having is sentimental Cllrs. It’s the appeal process that’s fucked. I do
feel ashamed to be a Tory, it is horrible appearing to gloat in the face
of genuine hardship yet offer no electoral value. However, a little less
entitlement and a little more reason is required. There are jobs going
in the public sector for £125k with final salary pension ‘rights’ yet a
pension is a fucking dream to most people – now come on, we’re all
getting fucked.

Humble
Observer August 30, 2012 at 10:43

I am disappointed in you Engineer. When did you become a “useful
idiot”?

Paul is absolutely spot on. Just paray to God you don’t lose your
health/wealth.

Allegedly – to keep the lawyers at bay – Those bastards in Westminster
are PERSONALLY FUCKING RAKING IT IN . The majority of them are aleegedly
fifth columnists. What happened to “The bonfire of the quangos’”, etc?

If we got rid of all the public sector waste, pointless quangos’,
treasonous politicos’, left the EU etc, the money saved would pay off the
national in one go.

Humble
Observer August 30, 2012 at 10:44

Pray, even *sigh*

Humble
Observer August 30, 2012 at
10:49

Sorry for all the typo’s/spelling mistakes. I’m a bit tired &
emotional…..

Engineer
August 30, 2012 at 20:58

Humble Observer – I’d agree about the public sector waste, pointless
Quangos, excessive salaries and expenses for so-called public servants.
But I also object to those who can help themselves scrounging off the
State, because I have to pay for that as well.

Do I know what it’s like to work when your health isn’t perfect? Yes,
I do – there are things I could not do. So I do the things I can do. I
have never claimed benefits in my life, and I’d regard it as a personal
failure if I had to. I don’t object in the slightest to supporting those
who GENUINELY cannot support themselves, but Welfare has become far too
easily doled out for all sorts of reasons. The current government is
trying, as I see it, to be fair to those in genuine need, and fair to
those who foot the bill as well.

Too many people are heard to whinge, “It’s my rights, innit?”. I’d
like to hear a bit more of, “It’s my responsibility, innit?”

Tough? Well, life is. Since the country has run out of money, and is
spending money it hasn’t got like it’s going out of fashion, it’s going
to get tougher.

Humble Observer
August 30, 2012 at 01:58

Sorry to say this Anna, but you’re talking like an “I’m alright Jack”.

I have Crohn’s disease. When filling out the ‘application form’ if I’d
‘stretched the truth’ on the question about incontinence, I’d have got the
magic 12 points.
Because I was honest (I can control my bowels – as long as
I can outdo that Bolt fella and leg it to a toilet asap), I only got 3
points.
Thing is I also suffer intermittently from chronic fatigue and a
subsequent inability to focus on anything for any length of time.
Trouble
is, the carefully crafted form doesn’t cover any of this – even though said
issues clearly prevent one from working.

I have spent most of my life in work. Re: the Crohn’s, I have run the
gammut of drug treatments & finally, have just had surgery. The Crohn’s is
still active lower down in my digestive tract & yet another treatment is
being tried to deal with that. By God, Anna, I’d love to get back to a
genuine, consistent level of fitness and contribute to helping Mr Clegg piss
my tax money away.

Perhaps I might be eligible for a public sector job. I could turn when up
when I felt able, for as long as I felt able, and do as much/little as I felt
able, all with no repurcusions.

In the case of my Atos assesment, it was bleading obvious I was not fit for
work, but I didn’t score enough points on the cynically crafted form. Personal
judgement, common bleeding sense, didn’t play a factor. The irony is in this
age of the computer, it was the piece of paper which said ‘no’.

Oh, ps: I was on contributions based allowance, which ended. So I’ll be
living off my ‘rainy day’ money anyway.

binao August 29, 2012 at 21:50

Life is unfair, very much so for some..
Be under no illusions about the
barriers to employment for those with any form of disability or longterm
illness, regardless of laws.
When staff have to be able to turn their hand
to whatever job needs doing on the day, i.e. be flexible, guess where anybody
that might be less capable stands, or wheels? And most employers are small
affairs, not nationals. No capacity for gestures.
We shouldn’t be misled by
the achievements of the few- recognise what they have done, which surpasses
the average able bodied, but they are the exceptions.
Engineer’s right,
we’ve run out of money, but I reckon the state’s take is so high and so poorly
used, we are perhaps personally less generous than we might otherwise be
within our own communities.
40% tax and NI contributions is crazy.

Brian August 29,
2012 at 23:04

binao,

An excellent contribution that encapsulates the various problems
succinctly. Perhaps winter fuel payments should be withdrawn from expat
pensioners to concentrate on more deserving cases at home. After all, I’m
paying for those present day pensioners just as those pensioners paid for
pensioners when they were working.

I am physically disabled but have never considered myself so. I made up
the numbers in a school sports day relay race when no one else in my house
could be bothered and finished last. It made the headmaster laugh, though.
After the first week at work in the Civil Service, I asked my line manager
how I was doing. He said that it had not been necessary to instal handrails
in the corridors. He was not joking. A couple of years later I was told by a
member of staff whom I had just been appointed as his line manager that he
would not work for me. When I raised that with my line manager I was
informed that they valued him more than me. And so on … And ladies, you
always say you like men who can make you laugh – until you see me limp
towards you
“It’s not you, um, I’m … fill in the gaps”. It’s so funny how people assume
a physical disability goes hand in hand with learning difficulties. That
seldom works to my advantage as many people find it threatening to be
outsmarted by someone with an unaesthetic disability. Still, my disability
didn’t stop me learning to glide or snorkel, until I developed epilepsy.
That didn’t help the bouts of depression caused by the lack of opportunity
to do what even the average able-bodied person takes for granted. I have
always set myself high targets and view perfection as my benchmark.
Sometimes the Chumbawumba “I get knocked down, but I get up again” wears a
bit thin when an averagely able person suggests all I need is a more
positive mental attitude. Been there, tried it, stepped on the rake too many
times.

Zanshin August 30, 2012 at 20:51

How about stopping the useless fighting in Afghanistan as a cost cutter
instead of going for politically “soft” targets like the disabled and
unemployed.?

Saul August 29, 2012 at 21:44

Well I’m watching the opening ceremony of the Paralympics and I think the
whole thing is bloody brilliant!

GildasTheMonk
August 29, 2012 at 21:31

I love the debate here in the virtual pub! With exceptions from the
occassional buffoon (as one finds in any pub, before they are barred), it
spirals off with interesting sub plots and variations, all gleaned from
lifetimes of experience!

Mudplugger August 29, 2012 at 20:49

What is disability ? I was born completely colour-blind. That unusual
condition has had numerous and significant effects on my life, for example,
limiting the range of subjects I could study (Chemistry = explosive,
Electronics = explosive, Art – you’re joking), the jobs I could do (no
train-driver, policeman, pilot, surgeon, painter etc.), the pastimes I could
pursue (Birdwatching – they all look the same to me, Motor-racing – can’t read
the flag-colours so can’t get a race license), even the range of clothing I
can wear to ensure non-clashes, all manner of life’s daily fundamentals are
affected and compromised by my ‘disability’.

Who knows about my ‘disability’ ? Hardly anyone – they don’t need to know.
Have I ever sought to use it as an excuse for non-self-sufficiency ? Obviously
not – it’s there to be overcome, life just gets quietly edited to accommodate
it.

There are some disabilities which genuinely render people incapable of any
meaningful work-input, but those are a very small minority. Most disabilities
can be accommodated and overcome if the ‘victim’ doesn’t want to be a
‘victim’. In my working career I employed people with all sorts of
disabilities (wheelchair-bound, blind etc.), not from any altruism on my part,
but because they could, and wanted to, do a good job just like everyone else.
Jobs and employers are out there, but too many potential employees have taken
the easy cop-out, adopted the victim stance and played to the flexible
benefits gallery.

Life can be tough, some folk get dealt a worse hand than others – like
Poker, the real skill is in how you play a bad hand: any fool can play a good
one.

Real Life August 31, 2012 at 09:28

That has to be the worst analogy ever. Actually if you look at the facts
there are many more unemployed than jobs – those going down the
self-employed route are struggling as business after business fails. What
about the Remploy workers who have fought and fought to save their jobs yet
the govt have shut them down. Many have been in tears, some will lose their
homes. Because of the extreme depth of their disabilites many will never
work again because that protected environment was the only one they could
work in. They fought with everything they had to keep working while the
(non-disabled) directors paid themselves massive salaries. Soemone who is
wheelchair bound, btw, can have a much fuller life than someone who
seemingly in a visible sense has ‘nothing’ wrong with them. Pain,
side-effects of medication, cognitive function, etc are big factors.

Michael Graves
August 29, 2012 at 18:51

Reading this anybody would think that disabled people don’t work or
contribute to our nation at all. This is absolute rubbish. many work fulltime.
Indeed there are MP’s who are disabled like Anne Begg. Tanni Grey is in the
HoL too. Not all aspire to such heights but many work up and down the country.
others work part-time or do voluntary work. The appalling bashing of disabled
people is out of order.

There are also those who can’t work. Why should anyone take to hounding
them into non-existent work? What is the gai in that? DLA helps those in and
out of work to maintain some level of independence. It seems to me that there
are many here would quite happily remove that from them. Just how callous do
you have to be.

The Paralympics will show what some, an elite, of disabled can achieve –
let’s celebrate that. But it is just that. How many of you can run a hundred
meters in under 9 seconds???? Are you therefore unworthy? I find this article
disengenious in the extreme and some of the comments disgusting. There’s no
wonder disabled people are killing themselves. Who would want to remain in a
country with the attitudes expressed here? Goodness me!!! What have we
become?

Bunny August 29, 2012 at 19:11

Obviously you haven’t read the article or the comments and just trotted
out your usual line. People are referenced here who are disabled and who are
working and getting on with life. Please feel free to leave the UK
though

James Oliver
August 29, 2012 at 20:05

bunny – rabbit – hole – bigot – disability denier

Woman
on a Raft August 29, 2012 at
20:59

List. Of. Words. Pointless.

JuliaM August 30, 2012 at 17:51

Engineer August 29, 2012 at 20:20

“What have we become?”

Well, for one thing, skint. It seems to have escaped some people’s
notice, but gummint currently spends about £120 billion a year more than it
raises in taxes, and that deficit, year on year, just adds to the National
Debt, on which the taxpayer is paying interest (of about £30 billion a year,
currently).

This is nothing to do with penalising disabled people, but it has
everything to do with trying to be fair with the taxpayers’ cash. We can’t
dole out what we haven’t got. Sadly, it’s as simple as that, really.

Real Life
August 31, 2012 at 09:21

{sigh} Disabled people are tax payers. Rich people are not. If the rich
and big businesses such as Vodaphone, Goldman Sachs, etc paid the tax they
owe and the tax Cameron himself says it morally behoves us to pay then no
cuts would be needed…. We DO have it. Now with cuts people are having to
lie on urine soaked pads int he beds for hours because there’s no money to
pay for someone to change their catheter. The new PIP rules mean you only
have the right to be washed from the waist up…many are committing suicide
because the work test is so flawed they are taken off \incapacity Benefit
and not allowed to go on Job Seeker’s Allowance by the Job Centre because
they are too sick/disabled to work. This means they are left with NO money
to live on. It’s happening to a lot of ex-servicemen who are injured from
fighting under the goverbnment’s orders. Lack of financial support while
adjusting to his injuries and trauma was a big factor in the ecent suicide
of the policeman who was injured by Raoul Moat. This si the reality of
cutting back on spending so that the rich don’t have to pay what they owe
– including Cameron’s family who built their money through offshore
accounts – even though he criticised Jimmy Carr for the same thing!

Engineer
September 2, 2012 at 09:55

“Disabled people are taxpayers. Rich people are not.”

Oh dear. Complete failure to understand reality. I didn’t bother
reading the rest.

cascadian August 29, 2012 at 21:27

“Goodness me!!! What have we become?”……..A nation where a large majority
have very poor reading comprehension skills, for one, and as Engineer points
out, very little ability to understand basic budgetary skills too. It is a
tragedy.

Dioclese August
29, 2012 at 18:49

What I find fascinating is exactly what the criteria are for being eligible
for inclusion as a disabled athlete.

On the other hand, I was sick to the back teeth of the Jubilympics and I
even more sick to the back teeth of the Crippolympics.

Saul August 29, 2012 at 20:48

Crippolympics. Shame on you.

Woman on a
Raft August 29, 2012 at 23:13

On which point, there is currently a young lady singing beautifully in
the opening ceremony. Next to her is a signer who is doing a splendid job
interpreting the words for the deaf. It’s more of a dance than a signing,
giving a very good idea of the performance. They are linked, both part of
the same event but addressing different disabilities.

The editing desk for the TV keeps making the camera leave the signer,
cutting her out of the picture. Despite all this care and arranging the
Paralympics and the wretched editor does not seem to be able to conceive of
people at home being deaf and therefore needing to see the signing as
looking at a static singer making goldfish faces is not all that much
fun.

How is it not possible for the editors to just keep the cameras on the
relevant action and not screw around with pointless changes of shot which
only detract from the event. It’s not a secret that many disabled people
might be watching.

Dick the
Prick August 30, 2012 at 07:45

Not the same thing but for the past few years the director(s) of the
French Open tennis comp randomly show sweeping shots of the main court
when the bloody players are playing – ooooh, it’s infuriating.

gladiolys August 29, 2012 at 16:29

While having a disability means you may be capable of some work, it does
not mean you are capable of all work. If ATOS declares you fit for work, you
get chucked onto JobSeekers Allowance, for which you have to be prepared to
find work. Fair enough, but if you can’t find a job that can accommodate your
disability, you end up claiming JSA until they put you onto “workfare” schemes
where you can be sent to do anything and if you can’t do it, have your
benefits stopped.

Sickness benefits (or Employment Support Allowance as it has been stupidly
re-named) needs to be much more flexible to take into account the nature of
the persons particular ailment. I have no problem with degrees of
conditionality – what about accepting that some people can do only a certain
number of hours per day/week? What about accepting they need to work only in
certain circumstances? Let’s not forget here that disability means not only
paraplegics, but those with mental health conditions, and those with chronic
conditions where physical well-being changes on a daily basis, such as various
cancers, AIDS, multiple sclerosis, ME etc. It’s difficult to talk to people as
part of your job if you are hearing voices and paranoid; it’s hard to work
outside or stay in one place or work with episodes of diarrhoea 15 times a
day. It’s difficult to concentrate when the side effects of medication make
you tired or nauseous, but your attitude seems to be: “Who cares? Be happy
you’re alive, now clean out the bogs while you’re chucking up and carry those
packages while you’re feeling fatigued.”

Most ill, sick or disabled are not scroungers. To accuse them of
“industrial chugging”, while imaginative, is insulting.

Paralympians train and exercise and compete – but not all day, every day
(how could they work otherwise?), and some of them claim DLA which is also
being threatened by cuts (the government wants to cut the bill by 20%, and it
will do that by changing the definition of what disability is).

You’re one-size fits all solution is as flawed as the system it is trying
to replace.

Wigner’s Friend
August 29, 2012 at 16:56

I am glad, if surprised, to note that you recognise that the current
system is flawed.

gladiolys
August 29, 2012 at 17:05

I’m surprised you’re surprised.

Zanshin August 30, 2012 at 20:36

Well said Gladiolys.

Boldfield August 29, 2012 at 16:17

High paid people need large bonas to work but poor people out of work need
to be punished to make them work. Funny old wold isn’t it

brenda bondage
August 29, 2012 at 18:01

you won’t get any change on that one love, people here think they’re
entitled

as if the rich don’t have enough already – most of it tax free

i thought it was all of our world not just the self select few

Engineer
August 29, 2012 at 20:11

Something I have observed in life is that many of the Idle Rich aren’t,
and some of the Working Class don’t.

Putting it another way – you don’t get rich by being idle. You can’t
redistribute wealth unless someone’s creating it, and if you
disincentivise the wealth creators, they may well stop creating it
(happened in the 1970s). You can’t build social justice on a pile of
debt.

deep fryer August 29, 2012 at 14:54

hi
can I ask how many of you have direct experience of atos and the work
capability assessment?
can I ask how many of you have had an
assesssment/
how many of you know anything about atos and its parent unum
insurance?
how many of you know about the the process of training atos
staff for between 3 – 17 days to become assessors?
how many of you know
anything about the psycholgy that underpins the atos/dwp approach to
determining whether disabled people are fit for work?
how many of you are
aware of the criminal charges brought against this company in america which
has outlawed them?
can i ask you for reasons why the coalition government
(sic) ignored all the help and assistance proferred them b disabled people and
organisations prior to the Welfare Reform Act?
can I ask why this process
is suggested to be about helping disabled people into work when there are no
jobs, when many employers will not employ disabled people, when access is a
major and largely uunresolved issue?
if this process is about helping
people why are those who fail penalised when too many assessments are
incorrect or whilst they wait an appeal?

when you have adequately answered these I may well have some more for
you
don’t want to over tax any tories do we???????????????

Anna
Raccoon August 29, 2012 at 15:25

can I ask how many of you have direct experience of atos and the work
capability assessment?
Yep, had a work capability assessment,
passed with flying colours – absolutely delighted!
can I ask how
many of you have had an assesssment/
See above, although not by
Atos.
how many of you know anything about atos and its parent unum
insurance?
I know it as a respected French company – does that
help?
how many of you know about the the process of training atos
staff for between 3 – 17 days to become assessors?
What is their
relavent experience beforehand? If they are trained Doctors/nurses, how many
days do you think they need to ascertain how sick someone is?
how
many of you know anything about the psycholgy that underpins the atos/dwp
approach to determining whether disabled people are fit for
work?
Absolutely nothing, do tell!
how many of you are aware
of the criminal charges brought against this company in america which has
outlawed them?
If they have broken US law I would expect charges to
be preferred – what was the outcome?
can i ask you for reasons why
the coalition government (sic) ignored all the help and assistance proferred
them b disabled people and organisations prior to the Welfare Reform
Act?
Vested interests presumably.
can I ask why this process
is suggested to be about helping disabled people into work when there are no
jobs, when many employers will not employ disabled people, when access is a
major and largely uunresolved issue?
I was under the impression that
it was about helping people with a minor disability to realize that it was
still possible to work for a living – not forcing the wheelchair bound
unreasonably into employment – which is the implication fo your ‘access’
question.
if this process is about helping people why are those who
fail penalised when too many assessments are incorrect or whilst they wait
an appeal?
Why are people found guilty in the criminal courts jailed
whilst they wait for an appeal against their sentence? Surely those found
guilty should be free to wander the streets whilst they appeal…
when
you have adequately answered these I may well have some more for
you
Is this some sort of assessment?
don’t want to over tax
any tories do we???????????????
I would say you do want to “over tax
Tories” – or anyone you perceive as ‘better off’ in order to fund the
lifestyle of those who are perfectly capable of contributing to society.

Dr Cromarty
August 29, 2012 at 15:37

You can ask all you like. The examples given seem to show there are some
people with severe disabilities who overcome them and work. There are others
with less severe disabilities who won’t.

Given that I’m expected to pay for those who won’t, I don’t think it’s
unreasonable to Adam why they won’t/can’t.

Why do you want to tax Tories in particular? Some people here may be
Tories, some not. It’s revealing of your mindset that it’s ‘Tories’ you’re
after.

JuliaM August
29, 2012 at 15:56

Dr, if you aren’t 100% behind these people’s whacky demands, that makes
you a ‘Tory’ no matter how you vote.I think in their language, it means
‘enemy’.

lifeisthejourney August
29, 2012 at 16:30

Disabled with an entitlement chip on your shoulder are we? Or just a bad
case of cognitive dissonance?

How about having a disability and just wanting to get on with life while
retaining what little dignity you have left? Can’t be done without some
condescending socialist on an altruistic power trip looking for another
“victim” to “save”.

Sammy Conn
August 29, 2012 at 17:38

the only ones with an entitlement chip on their shoulder are those here
‘newly disabled’ who can talk out of their arse!!

Ted Treen
September 4, 2012 at 14:16

I would have said “well balanced”:- i.e. a chip on EACH shoulder

Wigner’s Friend
August 29, 2012 at 16:53

Can I ask why, on a daily basis, we see perfectly fit people being
caughtfalsely claiming disability benefit?
I’ll give you a clue, for a
long time now the disability set up has been too easy to abuse and as a
result too many people have abused it.

DWP August 29, 2012 at 17:42

Disability Livng Allowance fraud 0.5% including DWP errors

Incapacity Benefit fraud 0.3% including DWP errors

you must read about the same story everyday then – try specsavers next
time

Dick the
Prick August 29, 2012 at 18:44

Considering the size of the compliance departments that’s just a
random statistic – if they don’t look for it, they won’t find it. I used
to work at HMRC and it’s a piece of piss to make fraudulent claims
knowing full well no-one’s gonna look.

Ted Treen
August 29, 2012 at 19:36

It is generally accepted that 93.74% of statistics is made up on
the spot…

Real Life
August 31, 2012 at 09:13

ou” find that IF (and I say IF) one can get DLA – which is an IN
WORK benefit – and keep it for the constant reassessments that have
been going on since its introduction anything you have left over from
the extra costs of disability have to be given to social services
towards care costs. This money doesn’t go into peoples’ pockets but
back into local services. ALL disabled people pay tax. Every single
one of them. I have lived a jet-settig life and the people I know
personally who pay the least ta are the super rich. They claim back
VAT, they have off shore accounts. Their rule of thumb is you always
pay your accountant more than the tax that accountant finds you owe.
They are piddling themselves laughing as the ‘hard working tax payer’
falls upon the poorest and blames them. If people reading and writing
here had hung out amongst the different groups as I do/have they’d
know wht’s REALLY going on and how you’re being duped and laughed
at.Don’t forget David Cameron recently claimed disability benefits for
his son. A multi-millionaire (not hard earned as previously suggested)
yet so greedy he had to get everything he could from the public purse.
Look up Grayling’s second home scandal. He claims £400 a month for
FOOD from the public purse. It’s smoke and mirrors..

john77
August 31, 2012 at 21:22

Testing by Atos was introduced by the Labour government, not the
coalition. It tests for Incapacity Benefit (now being replaced by
ESA).
There IS a problem with Atos – its interviewers are
generalist rather than using specialists in the condition suffered by
the interviewee so they get some wrong. Big screams by Guardianistas
and “The Independent” that 40% of appeals succeed – but what
percentage of *decisions* is that? The last data I saw more people
opted out before interview than actually had Incapacity Benefit/ ESA
withdrawn on interview.
@ Real Life
Try getting some facts
right: DLA is NOT an “in-work” benefit: my younger son has received
DLA since early childhood. He now volunteers for a local charity two
or three days a week while looking for a paid job. NO he does NOT pay
tax because his income is too low. DLA is not taxable. ESA/Incapacity
Benefit does not on its own put anyone in the tax-paying bracket so
claiming all disabled people pay tax is blatantly wrong. Guy a few
doors away can’t get a paid job because he struggles to walk at 2 mph
so he volunteers in a local Charity shop. Not an “in-work”
benefit.
As for your spiteful smear: David Cameron is *not* a
multi-millionaire even if he has inherited a quarter of his father’s
wealth – his lifestyle has, until he became PM, almost certainly been
subsidised by his wife’s earnings. I presume that you have hacked into
the DWP computer if you know whether Ivan Cameron claimed DLA as well
as having hacked the HMRC computer to discover everyone’s tax
returns.

gladiolys
September 1, 2012 at 09:05

Re Cameron: http://www.publicservice.co.uk/news_story.asp?id=19097

So, from his own mouth. And I’m sure he regards his wife’s wealth
as family wealth, so he is a millionaire. If we are talking about
saving money, as some on this thread have, why are we not
means-testing this benefit? Does a millionaire need £526 every four
weeks for his disabled son?

Also, I would add, that if you stop claiming DLA, because you think
you don’t need the money, it does affect other parts of your benefits
(the income-support element some people receive is, I believe, removed
and that is the gateway to free medication, eye tests etc). The system
is badly set up and should be re-designed, but not in the way that is
proposed. Not by making sure the more money you get, the more you are
entitled to… (if you get DLA, you get a free bus pass…. but not if you
are on IB/ESA and have trouble walking and don’t get the mobility
component of DLA). Means testing should be introduced. And what about
setting rates that are directly related to the costs someone who is
disabled incurs, so that each individual receives a different rate
within set parameters? You won’t convince me this is more expensive
than the current system.

Yes we need to cut costs, but we need to do it fairly and it is
obviously not being done that way. The only criteria is the DWP
budget.

DLA is an in-work benefit in as much as you can claim it while
working and earning as well as when you are not. It is never taxed,
nor does it affect the rate at which any other benefit to which you
may be entitled is paid to you.

Noise September 4, 2012 at 23:14

If there’s one thing more annoying than a tax avoiding tory, it’s a
welfare addicted lefty who loves to remind you that they’ed be really sad
with your money

LJAR August 29, 2012 at 13:34

I have a friend who cannot sit down for more than 30 minutes without
getting back pain.

The answer?

he works standing up – simple.

Babel6 August 29, 2012 at 22:23

I have a close relative who also cannot sit down for more than 10
minutes. I cry for him daily.

This inability to sit means it’s a bit uncomfortable for him to endure a
7 or 8 hours flight in order to take his annual holiday in the good ol’ USA,
and it might verge on the marginally stiff when he steers his ‘look-at-me’
roadster touring the length and breadth of Europe every summer following
either the F1, the Tour de France or just the sunshine. When in the UK, this
man, who can’t sit for more than 10 minutes, braves terrible discomfort on
successive Saturdays and Sundays because he must follow the FOOTBALL and
endures hours driving from one end of the country only to face the pain of
sitting (or standing) for the interminable hours it takes for his team of
crybabies to beat or be beaten by the other team of crybabies …

This same close relative pops when he’s passing and calls upon our shared
elderly shared relative (parent actually!) who gets a 10-minute look in
before the match or a 10-minute look in after the match but it’s no more
than that and no more than once a week. Because he can’t stand, you know,
and must get off for a lie down ….

I could spit with annoyance…..

Zanshin August 30, 2012 at 20:24

Turn the numpty in – he is hurting those in real need and giving
ammunition to the idiots who think that all disabled are just swinging the
lead.

Ted Treen
September 4, 2012 at 13:30

Hardly any of us believe “…all disabled are just swinging the
lead.”

It’s just that those of us who stand on our own feet – sometimes with
difficulty – resent having to pay for those who just won’t attempt to
take responsibility for themselves when their health or physical state
is so often better than ours.

And only in the black & white only, clearly defined but immature
comprehension of the naive student-politician, could this equate us to a
Nazi eugenicist

James Oliver
August 29, 2012 at 12:53

what a lot of disablist bollocks

you’re all cunts

Dr Cromarty
August 29, 2012 at 13:06

…and you are a foul-mouthed buffoon.

‘Disablist’. Pah!

James Oliver
August 29, 2012 at 20:03

I think its you who’s the foul mouthed buffon mate

you and your ideology o f the nazis

you stink

Anna
Raccoon August 29, 2012 at
21:01

“you stink”

Jesus, how old are you?

Saul
August 29, 2012 at 21:11

You’re going to have to enforce that 12 years old and older rule
Bat.

Saul
August 29, 2012 at 21:16

Roughly about 2000 yrs. Sorry, couldn’t resist that one.

JuliaM August
29, 2012 at 15:54

Get back in the kitchen, son…

JuliaM August
29, 2012 at 15:54

…but top marks for getting ‘you’re’ right!

Engineer
August 29, 2012 at 20:04

Though it would only be right to dock a couple of marks for his
forgetting to use capital letters….

GildasTheMonk
August 29, 2012 at 21:29

Buffoon.

Dr Cromarty August 29, 2012 at 12:14

I know of a Physician in Scotland who broke his neck in a climbing accident
and is paralysed from the waist down. He also lost a hand in the accident. He
works as a consultant oncologist.

Robert Edwards
August 29, 2012 at 11:55

It really beggars belief, how backward we have been. In 1956, a racing
driver, Archie Scott Brown, one-handed and afflicted with a similar condition
to that endured by Oscar Pistorius, qualified tenth on the grid at the Formula
1 British Grand Prix, driving a Connaught. Scott Brown never grew to more than
5′ tall and was to die as a result of injuries (burns) received at a sports
car race in Belgium nearly two years later. In 1957, he won over 90% of the
races he entered in a Lister-Jaguar. Behaviourally, Archie was right-handed,
but was born with no right hand, so all had to be learned. He never
complained, never moaned, never demanded special treatment. He simply won
races. It is what he did for a living. He was in receipt of a special
allowance, during rationing, for petrol, so he could do his day-job, which was
that of a salesman for a tobacco company. As soon as rationing ended, so did
his allowance.

Compare and contrast…

Other men were quite relaxed about racing against him and contesting a
corner at speeds not so very far removed from those experienced today,
although brakes were primitive by comparison.

Dr Cromarty August 29, 2012 at 11:52

I know of a Physician in Scotland who broke his neck in a climbing accident
and is paralysed from the waist down. He aldo lost a hand. He works as a
consultant oncologist.

JuliaM August 29,
2012 at 11:15

“Nature isn’t perfect. Neither is life.”

Well said, Ted, indeed!

Ted Treen August 29, 2012 at 10:42

Anna,

Nice idea of £2 each per week to cut the national debt. Initially it might
work, but not if the same cretins who built up the debt in the first place
remain in charge.

Regarding disabilities, I have none – not by normally accepted definitions,
anyway – other than asthma, worsening arthritis & psoriasis. I am well the
wrong side of 60 and travel over two hours each way daily by public transport
and work an 8-hr day – not including travel time. My travel includes an
initial walk of half a mile to my local station, and just over a mile at the
other end. The walks are repeated on the return journey, and can be unpleasant
with arthritic wear in my hips, shoulders & lower spine. Economic
necessity dictates that I continue with this, but I don’t think I do anything
exceptional – neither do I think my employer has any duty to lay on taxi
transport etc for me.

I do find myself somewhat irritated when I hear (unfortunately all too
regularly) others complain that they can’t work because of lesser ailments
than mine, or that they would find a 45min – 1 hr commute too much. And I
include those sensitive little souls who are too “highly-strung” for the
everyday stresses & strains of working life.

I am perfectly willing to help others, but there is, I admit, a degree of
resentment at forking out for those who won’t even try to help themselves, and
think they have a right to have everything handed to them on a plate, and that
it is my duty to continue to support their lifestyle choice.

There certainly does need to be a clearer separation of those who can’t,
from those who won’t.

And if life has dealt you a less than perfect hand in your physical state,
that is just the way it is. Yes, I DO sympathise – and will try to help where
I can. But it is not the fault of the rest of us, and harsh though it may
seem, it does not necessarily mean that others have to work harder &
longer to compensate you for a mishap of nature.

Nature isn’t perfect. Neither is life.

Anna
Raccoon August 29, 2012 at 10:53

Well said Ted!

GildasTheMonk
August 29, 2012 at 12:42

Bravo indeed!

Zanshin
August 30, 2012 at 20:14

Huzzah! String them all up – bastards! Put them all in a home
somewhere, preferably without natural light and beat regularly, that’ll
learn them.

Ted Treen
September 4, 2012 at 13:20

Oh dear, there’s always one, isn’t there?

Express a point of view or belief not entirely in accord with the
current liberal/left dogma, and you’re immediately painted as an
advocate of Hitlerian eugenics.

Still, better to allow them their little rants than to impose
censorship, I suppose.

alan August 29, 2012 at 11:56

Doctors are not perfect either, they are about 30 years behind the
science.

Get the Robb Wolf book “Paleo Solution”. Going Paleo will put your
arthritis into remission, if you had asthma for life (ie not smoking
related) again the asthma will go into remission. Psoriasis is a rather
pernicious auto-immune disease, but in most cases the symptoms are reduced
by going on a paleo autoimmune protocol. Read the testimonials on the Robb
Wolf site, or Marks Daily Apple, if you have any doubts.

GildasTheMonk
August 29, 2012 at 12:43

Interesting!

Zanshin August 30, 2012 at 20:18

Hopefully we can all have a Paleo Mortality average of 30 years as
well??

TheNoseyMole
August 30, 2012 at 18:34

Well said sir, I have severe osteoarthritis in both knees (bi lateral
replacement next month) and never had a day off because of them, by the way
I do not even have a disabled parking card and certainly would not wish to
be on any sort of disability allowance.

As you say “There certainly does need to be a clearer separation of those
who can’t, from those who won’t.”

Moley

Real Life September 1, 2012 at 22:54

Nature sn’t perfect buty if society is stopping an ex minister from
attending the paralympics can you not ubderstabd how hard it must be for the
‘normal folk’ just to live? http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/09/01/david-blunkett-paralympics-ceremony_n_1848777.html

john77 September 3, 2012 at 20:33

Since “Society” did not do so and neither did G4S (who allocated him to
a different seat where there was space for his dog), and I grew up in a
working-class town, had made only one trip by jet before my mid-forties
and my main abnormality is a belief that I can do sums, perhaps I can
understand how hard it is for normal folks to live rather better than
“Real Life” with his boasted jet-setting lifestyle.
Channel 4′s
stupidity in booking him into a seat where there was no room for his dog
is NOT the fault of “Society”. One might ask why they didn’t invite the
dog rather than Mr Blunkett to watch the opening ceremony! Mr Blunkett
could have experienced it better using a radio.

JimS August 29, 2012 at 10:33

“They quote a Pete Whitehead, who complains that he has lost most of his
sight”

Maybe he should listen to Peter White, on BBC Radio 4. That Peter has lost
all of his sight.

Joe Public
August 29, 2012 at 10:55

Lack of sight didn’t prevent David Blunkett from achieving high political
office.

Or, (at least) two mistresses.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-329630/Second-mistress-threat-Blunkett.html

Real Life
September 1, 2012 at 22:41

You’ll see that Blunkett has been stopped from attending the
paralympics because fo his guide dogs. If an ex minister is stopped from
attending the biggest celebration of disabled achievements ever how much
chance does anyone else have. DO reply! http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/09/01/david-blunkett-paralympics-ceremony_n_1848777.html

john77
September 3, 2012 at 20:22

Real Life’s usual standard of accuracy is to say that Blunkett was
stopped from attending the Paralympics when he was told to sit in a
different seat…
As anyone can see from simply reading the original
article.

gladiolys
September 3, 2012 at 20:35

No. He was prevented from taking the seat allocated to him in the
main stadium because he had his guide-dog with him. Ironic, no?
Personal point-scoring is tedious.

john77
September 3, 2012 at 22:55

For Pete’s sake gladiolys, you’re not usually stupid.
Have you
failed to notice that “Real Life” is just repeatedly lying to the
point that I get annoyed? Possibly for that purpose?
Channel 4
booked Blunkett a seat but no space for his guide dog: he could have
taken that seat without the dog.
That was incompetence on the part
of Channel 4, not G4S or Locog or “Society” which “Real Life”
blames.
I personally think that the guide dog who can see should
have had the seat! Blunkett *watching* the ceremony???

gladiolys
September 4, 2012 at 07:50

John – I have some days that are so blonde, I’m platinum, all my
intelligence resides in my hair… however, I can’t see Mr or Ms Life
blaming anybody, just slightly exaggerating their case. Blunkett
indeed was not stopped from attending the event but he was prevented
from following his plans and taking his allocated seat. Channel 4
boobooed, but do you not think that encapsulates brilliantly the
problems disabled people face?

Real Life September 1, 2012 at 23:21

@John77 I get ALL my facts right. Otherwise I wouldn’t post them. You’ll
find that the terminology for benefits is that some are ‘in work’ or out of
work’ the latter, if you bother to look, is not exclusive but not dependent
on being ‘out of work’. Why can you not be bothered to look up terminology?
Are you so stupid that you do not undestsand that people like your son will
NO LONGER be entilted to benefits because they haven’t paid in’. Are you so
stupid that we’re fighting for people EXACTLY like your son? He will now be
forced to work 30 hours a week indefinitely for charities, whatever, outside
safe environments and the support he needs to acieve that WITH NO PAY. This
is precisely what people are fighting for, for people like your son. From
now on anyone born disabled will not have the right to their own monies to
help them live independently – look it up… Asto your comment about do I have
inisght to DC’s DLA claims: HE put it out there. HE told us he claimed, and
yet, under HIS reforms Cameron’s own family woul not now qualify for that
monetary help. Musr be awful for you to have people trying to save your son
from being exploited while you can’t be bothered goggling the basics.

john77 September 2, 2012 at 00:24

If you want to use jargon that means the opposite of very different to
the normal English of the words it is required grammar to put them in
italics or inverted commas to show that they are not normal English words:
you did *not* do so, hence I was fully justified in pointing out that DLA
is not a benefit for those in work like working tax credit. I can and do,
look up terminology IF someone is clearly using terminology – otherwise I
assume that the individual is using English. I am NOT stupid – I did
actually look at the DWP explanation of PIP which says NOTHING about it
being contribution-based and it has NO dependence on working or not, let
alone 30 hours a week. Perhaps you might take the trouble to read it. It
categorically states that those with Disabilities will have right to spend
the money in any way that they wish. Also it states that the new PIP test
will start in April 2013 so you claim that it *is* so flawed … is utter
bullshit. Maybe you should put “all” in inverted commas because you do NOT
get all your facts right using the normal Englis definition of the word
“all”.
I do not believe that you are fighting for my son who is quite
determined to be independent – you are fighting to spread lies and
disinformation and spread a dependency culture. If you are so clever, why
do you not realise that local charities create a safe environment for
their volunteers?

gladiolys
September 3, 2012 at 20:42

The problem is that people conflate IB/ESA with DLA/PIP. Real Life is
partially right. ESA is contributions based, Your son, if he is
entitled, will only get it for one year. If he continues to claim, it
would then become income support which means that he may not be getting
anything at all if he has savings over a certain threshold or is living
with someone who is earning above a certain amount.

DLA/PIP can be claimed in or out of work and is not contributions
based, but the definitions of who will be eligible (in particular, how
their disability affects them) will be changed from 2013 with the aim of
cutting 20% off the bill.

Kudos to your son for being independent – but he may not always be
able to be so and a system should be there to help him IF he needs
it.

john77
September 3, 2012 at 22:38

“Real Life” is just plain wrong. DLA is *not*
contribution-based.
FYI my son does not get ESA.
I agree that
the ATOS test for IB is wrong but that does NOT justify “Real Life”
telling me that I am wrong when he is lying and I am telling the
truth.
My elder son has repeatedly said that he is sure that I
shall work till I drop but he clearly expects to inherit a liability
to provide for his younger brother when any inheritance runs out. You
seem to think that he should not and that No 2 son is not my
responsibility: he is. In what alternate universe is no 2 son *not* my
responsibility?

gladiolys
September 4, 2012 at 07:45

Hmmm.. I’m not taking sides between you and Real Life but trying to
clarify where any confusion arises. I believe I supported you in
saying DLA is not contributions based.

I think a family who chooses to care for a chronically ill/disabled
member without recourse to the state is admirable and to be applauded
and you have my support. Where have I indicated otherwise? I have no
opinion about what you think is your “responsibility”, or not. That is
your decision. I do, however, bridle at the concept of such a person
being a “liability” as that implies “burden” and “resentment”. Now I
may be completely wrong (it’s not unknown…) and you may have not used
the word in that way.

But I would ask you what would happen, if you died and your eldest
son suddenly met a tragic accident, if the state were not there to
catch your second son and help him pick up the pieces? Would your
second son be able to cope alone (I would hope he can), but if not,
would he be able to navigate the benefits system or would he be
discarded?

I sometimes think these conversations get more heated than
necessary when a person’s mistakes or misconceptions are regarded as
lying. Everyone should be able to argue their corner without
necessarily seeing ill-intent in opposing posts.