13 July update on Disability News Service top stories

The Kwug Blog editor knows that today is 14 July, but the actual publication day of Disability News Service was Thursday 13 July and Thursday is that publication's regular publication date.

Latest Stories

• 
  July 13, 2017 0 Activists set for ‘David and Goliath’ fight to defeat assisted suicide court bid
• 
  July 13, 2017 0 Government’s UN response ‘exposes failings on disability convention’
• 
  July 13, 2017 0 Inclusion London set to test social model job support, after £775k grant
• 
  July 13, 2017 0 Osborne shares ‘discriminatory’ cartoon ‘that breaches his own code of conduct’
• 
  July 13, 2017 0 Project aims for inclusion and a collective voice for ‘spoonies’
• 
  July 13, 2017 0 Labour silent on access for disabled MP excluded from debates
• 
  July 13, 2017 0 DPAC set for week of protests over social care, Atos and access to transport
• 
  July 13, 2017 0 Purple boss raises concerns over Disability Confident accreditation
• 
  July 6, 2017 0 New disabled MP accuses government of ‘eugenics’

GCHQ says Universal Credit poses serious security risks

A Kwuggie (Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group activist) has sent in the following by e-mail:

I wish I had the facility to scan news paper items.  Yesterday the 6th, The Times had a lovely piece on Universal Credit poses serious security risk, spies tell No 10.(1)  Experts working for GCHQ the government listening agency contacted  Downing Street in alarm after being "fobbed off" by the DWP over security  flaws in the benefits program. millions of people could be hacked  The system will not be operational until 2022 at the earliest. GCHQ  involvement on delaying UC  is revealed in a report by the Institute for Government into how the welfare reform program went disastrously wrong. The report says that it still remains to be seen if UC will eventually work.

Blazing rows between George Osborne and Iain Duncan Smith in front of civil servants.  "I have not seen two grown adults  have such a row for a long time ," one official said.

IDS  allegedly told one civil servant  that he would  not back down even when the plan was failing. There is a reference to a small number of jobcentres where UC is in operation major problems have emerged . A quarter of claimants face "significant issues" with the system. Councils  had to take on extra staff as CAB couldn't cope.

The report reveals the GCHQ officials went to No.10 after being repeatedly "fobbed off '. as they tried to establish what security measures were in place. After which the Cabinet Office ordered  an independent review. The review team  interviewed staff , assuring them that what they said would not be traced back to them.  The report said that under every stone was chaos. People burst into tears.  One of the suppliers said " just don't put this thing online.".  It is a complete security disaster. There was no way this could be launched as digital service.

IDS was ordered to put back the launch. Nick Thimmins , who wrote the report, said that. "There are elements of the policy that are still not entirely  clear.  Huge challenges remain."

Related link address

1. http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/universal-credit-poses-a-major-security-risk-spies-tell-no-10-m87rs8qq5
2. See also http://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/news/latest/universal-credit-way-recovery and http://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/blog/14592/universal-credit-a-programme-in-recovery/

What the Welfare Reform & Work Act has in store for us — and the BBC rarely, if ever, mentions

Voting on the then Welfare Reform & Work Bill — now an Act of Parliament — occurred on Monday 20 July 2015, almost exactly a year ago today. As previously stated on this blog, a majority of Labour MPs abstained while 48 Labour MPs including Hampstead & Kilburn MP Tulip Siddiq and Brent Central MP Dawn Butler defied the Labour Whip to vote against that legislation.(1)

Green Party MP Caroline Lucas outlined her opposition to that legislation, saying that that legislation was aimed at "dismantling" the welfare state. She said that George Osborne was 'playing politics with poverty', and said that the legislation would "lock in child poverty' and 'leave ministers significantly less accountable for their policies."(2) The diminished 'accountability' is linked to use of 'statutory instruments', by which new measures can be brought through without an obligation for them to be debated in Parliament.(3)

Link addresses

1. http://wembleymatters.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/brent-labour-mps-2-1-against-welfare.html
2. https://www.carolinelucas.com/latest/the-welfare-bill-caroline-stands-against-dismantling-of-the-welfare-state
3. https://uk.search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=A9mSs2uKN4ZXqaEABA5LBQx.;_ylc=X1MDMjExNDcxNzAwMwRfcgMyBGZyA3lmcC10LTQyMy1zBGdwcmlkA2l2MXY5b2dxUU9DSjJseXF6MGY5N0EEbl9yc2x0AzAEbl9zdWdnAzAEb3JpZ2luA3VrLnNlYXJjaC55YWhvby5jb20EcG9zAzAEcHFzdHIDBHBxc3RybAMEcXN0cmwDMTE5BHF1ZXJ5AyUyMnN0YXR1dG9yeSUyMGluc3RydW1lbnRzJTIyJTIwd2VsZmFyZSUyMHJlZm9ybSUyMGFuZCUyMHdvcmslMjBiaWxsJTIwc2l0ZSUzQSUyMGh0dHAlM0ElMkYlMkZ3d3cuYmVuZWZpdHNhbmR3b3JrLmNvLnVrBHRfc3RtcAMxNDY4NDEzOTk1?p="statutory+instruments"+welfare+reform+and+work+bill+site%3A+http%3A%2F%2Fwww.benefitsandwork.co.uk&fr2=sb-top-uk.search&fr=yfp-t-423-s

Psycho-coercion and workfare — a talk by Lynne Friedli of Boycott Workfare

This talk by Lynne Friedli of Boycott Workfare was given to a Scottish Unemployed Workers Network (SUWN) public meeting in Dundee on 7 June.  You can watch it here on youtube. (Duration: 43:27 ) (1)

Continue reading on Scottish Unemployed Workers Network website.(2)

Link addresses

1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCVy3JzpV5A&feature=youtu.be
2. https://scottishunemployedworkers.net/2016/06/22/psycho-coercion-and-workfare-fighting-back/

Iain Duncan Smith's limits in 'defending the indefensible'

Today my TV woke to the BBC Breakfast news announcement that Work & Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith has resigned over 'indefensible changes to disability benefits'. And BBC Breakfast interviewed Labour's Work & Pensions Secretary over the matter.

Yet as the BBC did not interview any other Shadow Work & Pensions Secretary today, here I republish a youtube 'liarpoliticians2' clip from the BBC's coverage of the 2015 General Election in which Green Party Work & Pensions Spokesperson Jonathan Bartley challenged IDS over what might be best described as 'death in DWP custody'.



It really does seem to me that IDS' resignation raises more questions than answers. Eg, 
Is this Tory Government so shaky that David Cameron will not last a full second term as Prime Minister? 
Who would the Bullingdon Club Boys Cameron and Osborne have replace IDS as Work & Pensions Secretary?
If IDS has been reviled by benefit claimants as critics as to have been labelled a 'psychopathic murdering wanker', what might they say of Gideon 'George' Osborne?


Dude Swheatie of Kwug, declaring possible lack of 'neutrality' in that I am a Green Party member

See also
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/who-replace-iain-duncan-smith-7588014

BBC News: Stephen Crabb named as Iain Duncan Smith's replacement http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-35850932 

Country Joe McDonald song 'Tricky Dicky' based on an marketing manager Joe McGinnis' 'kiss and tell' book 'The Selling of the President' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wmp9gRsncuY

Reverend Paul Nicolson of Taxpayers Against Poverty on IDS' 'legacy' http://www.taxpayersagainstpoverty.org.uk/duncan-smith-no-hero-he-cut-housing-benefit-and-increased-punitive-benefit-sacntions-creating-evictions-and-misery/

IDS resignation letter in full http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/mar/18/iain-duncan-smith-resignation-letter-in-full

New Stateman: http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk/2016/03/best-reactions-iain-duncan-smiths-resignation

Ekklesia | Transforming Politics & Belief: 

Iain Duncan Smith resigns from key ministerial post http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/node/22868

http://londongreenleft.blogspot.co.uk/2016/03/is-duncan-smiths-resignation-beginning.html 

Is Duncan Smith’s Resignation the Beginning of the End for Cameron?

                                                                         

Stop Press:

Received by email: Iain Duncan Smith resignation party

Tomorrow (Saturday) at 17.00, Parliament Square

Join DPAC in celebrating the resignation of one of the chief architects of the brutal Tory welfare policy that has caused so much suffering and harm.

When: 5pm tomorrow (Saturday 19th March – after the Stand Up to Racism demo)
Place: Parliament square
Bring your party gear!

Toward a Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group response to Osborne's 2016 Spring Budget

Placard statement: Benefit cuts = corporate homicide

When benefit claimants receive letters confirming their/our 'entitlement' letters, those letters state that the amount they will receive from the DWP is the amount that the law says they are entitled to, which also allegedly is how much the claimant needs to live on. These amounts have been in decline for decades as Revd Paul Nicolson has pointed out. Eg,
http://www.taxpayersagainstpoverty.org.uk/946/ and

 http://www.taxpayersagainstpoverty.org.uk/benefit-sanctions-are-state-sponsored-oppression-against-the-poorest-vulnerable-and-disabled-people-of-the-uk/

Those 'entitlement' letters also state that the claimant must inform them of any extra money they might receive, even as gifts from concerned friends and relatives who know more of the claimant's situation than distant 'decision makers'. The Government argument is that non-declaration of such income amounts to 'benefit fraud'.

Osborne etc in their 'upbringing' as millionaires remind me of military generals with sets of toy soldiers that they send off to the slaughter of war. WTF do they know about costs of living and dying?

Social workers, Social Care Act and benefit cuts

This is the current 'Spotlight' article link on Community Care (online) mag's home page:

‘To take our Care Act duties seriously, social workers must understand the impact of benefit cuts’

A social worker assesses the impact of the benefit changes announced in the Budget on people supported by adults' social services

 

"Now that's something I call 'joined up thinking'! " says Dude Swheatie of Kwug. And the Community Care 'Spotlight' article even contains a link to something reasonably sensible from The Spectator!

Impact of Osborne's 'market rents for social housing tenants on salaries over £40K'

By Dude Swheatie of Kwug

Beware of Osborne's 'end game'

This is the lead story in this week's Camden New Journal

http://www.camdennewjournal.com/marketrents

More than 2,000 council tenants in Camden face market rents as government classes them 'high earners'

A leading paragraph transferable to other boroughs is this one:

"In his budget announcements yesterday (Wednesday), Chancellor George Osborne said local authorities would be told to demand the extra rent from tenants earning more than £40,000 a year. Officials at the Town Hall were last night working out how they would set about investigating their tenants’ finances and the cost of such a task."

And a complementary online interactive source regarding what a person's income needs to be in order to be able to afford to pay commercial rents in London can be found at

http://www.londonrents.org.uk/

A publication by Darren Johnson, Green Party Member of the London Assembly.

Can your job pay the rent?

According to the Mayor's standard definition, your rent is affordable if it doesn't take up more than 35% of your take-home pay. For example, the average household in London earns an estimated £2,608 per month after tax, so an affordable rent for them would be anything up to £913pcm.

Most people, of course, just stretch to pay London's high rents. This means we can't save up for a deposit, spend money with local businesses, or even afford a basic quality of life. Amazingly, a young person working full time on the minimum wage doesn't earn enough for an affordable room in the average shared flat in any borough of London.

What can you afford?

You can use this map to pick the type of home you want and your income, and then find boroughs in London where average rents are affordable (less than 35% of take-home pay), slightly unaffordable (35-50% of take-home pay), extremely unaffordable (more than 50% of take-home pay) or completely impossible (rents cost more than you earn).

Maybe Osborne's directive regarding social housing tenants on salaries greater than £40K will act as an incentive for social housing tenants on over £40K salaries to collude with 'right-to-buy' that is heavily tax-payer-subsidised? As I said in one of my placard-based statements, BEWARE OF OSBORNE'S 'END GAME'.

Wed 8 July – join anti-austerity Budget Day protests

Guest blog post from WinVisible

Dear friends,

Tomorrow Wed 8 July -- oppose £12 billion more cuts while Osborne benefits the rich.
We’ll be at these important Budget Day protests.  Please spread the word and bring your friends.

We say the same as people in Greece: No to greedy banks and brutal austerity!

 

·         “Balls to the Budget!” 10.30am Downing St, 11.30 Houses of Parliament
Disabled People Against Cuts, Class War, Streets Kitchen, Black Dissidents, London Latinxs, Columbian Women in Action, Occupy, Brick Lane Debates & others
Meet 10.30 in Whitehall opposite Downing St, look out for our banners: Global Women’s Strike, Women of Colour GWS, WinVisible.

 

·         People’s Assembly. Protest Osborne's Emergency Budget – click on link to see local actions for National Day of Action
LONDON ACTION: Assemble at Parliament from 5:30pm. Mass "die-in," where
everyone will lie on the ground as if dead in front of Parliament to highlight the deaths caused by cuts to welfare services and benefits. Look out for our banners.

A Budget to eliminate the safety net?

Things cannot get any worse

 By Joan Grant of the KUWG

The Tories said that they would make £12bn of cuts to social security, but would not tell us how. The one measure that we were told about was freezing benefits for 2 years. That saves £1bn. Reducing the benefit cap from £26,000 to £23,000 will save £100m a year. So that left £10.5bn of savings still to be found.

The Budget is just days away now. We still have not been told what is planned but the press are starting to discuss different rumours.

One of the rumoured cuts is to make everyone claiming Housing Benefit pay 10% of their rent. They well know but probably do not care that there are thousands of people who get £73 in JSA but whose rent is £250 a week. No one can afford to pay a third of such a low income towards the rent on a long term basis. People will get into arrears very quickly and then be evicted. The lives of people in the private rented sector are insecure enough as it is, without this as well. In a borough like Brent 100 people a week apply as homeless to the Council. A plan like this will just make things much worse.

The way to reduce the housing benefit bill is to have more social housing so that people are paying lower rents. However, one of the first things the Coalition did back in 2010 was to reduce the amount of money allocated to building social housing. Another short sighted move. Selling off housing association flats (which will ultimately end up in the hands of buy to let landlords) is another very bad policy.

The other possible cut that I have seen mentioned is to reduce the amount that people in the ESA-WRAG get from £102 to the same as JSA, i.e. £73. People currently in the ESA-WRAG face seeing their benefit reduced by £30 a week. In addition they may have to pay 10 % of their rent which could be £25 or more each week. So they face a dramatic reduction in their incomes

The Tories also plan to take away Housing Benefit from young people aged 18-to-25 who are receiving JSA. This is another pointless, petty and vindictive policy. 

 

I have no wish to scare anyone as these proposals are just rumours at this stage. But there will be more cuts after the budget on Thursday, so we may as well be prepared.

I personally do not expect any meaningful opposition from Labour. They may even support these measures to show that they can take “tough decisions”. But I’d love to be proved wrong. Only Jeremy Corbyn was on the anti austerity march two weeks ago.

These cuts will affect millions of people. The only thing that we down at the bottom have is numbers. We have to find a way to make our voices heard.

And all of this is in stark contrast to the inheritance tax cuts for homeowners which will “cost” a £1bn.

I will do another blog next week after the budget, when we will know exactly what we are dealing with. 

Related post

Benefits for people in work cost 6x as much as for people out of work

 

Kate Belgrave on the realities of a daily trip to Wembley Jobcentre on 'accessible transport'

Kate Belgrave on the realities of a daily trip to Wembley Jobcentre on 'accessible transport'

This relates to the ConDems' 'help to work' scheme by which benefit long-term [over 2 years] claimants are obliged to attend the jobcentre on a daily basis, and the video in question was taken on the dubiously named 'accessible transport day'.

Kate Belgrave writes:

".... It was raining, which meant the bus was crowded. There were two buggies in the wheelchair space and nobody offered to fold theirs, so Angela had to sit in the doorway in her wheelchair – hardly ideal, as you’ll see. Then, things escalated – par for the course in a crowded bus with space taken up by buggies. One of the people with a buggy had to get off the bus before we got to our stop. Angela pushed the button to call for the ramp so that she could get off the bus, make room for one of the people with the buggies to get off and then get back on. Unfortunately, the driver didn’t realise all this was going on and he shut the doors on Angela’s foot as she tried to get back on. When she did get back on, he came over to remonstrate. ...."

Alan Wheatley