To ask you to read this and help if you can

[Justlostitwithhim]

I've also posted this in SN but am so angry and concerned I have to ask for help from everywhere. Everyone needs to see this: www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2046924/Parent-child-ADHD-Have-free-car-1-5bn-taxpayer-funded-scheme.html

I'm so angry I can barely speak. Would anyone be prepared to join me in putting together some sort of pressure group to stop this? I could have cried when it mentioned naughty child syndrome. I think my son has ADHD and he gets overstimulated and is frightened. Why shouldn't such families be entitled to a car? SN, mental or physical massively impact on any family. I'm sure there are better brains than mine who can think of a way to make a stand. Please feel free to include any ideas or thoughts and perhaps we can consolidate them and try to fight this.

tabulah, any chance of a transcript of your complaint, an address link, etc?

Um, I posted it on the thread in SN, which I think has a link to the press complaints commission on it - but I can't copy anything over just now as I'm on my phone...

If anyone wants to copy it over from there they can

Thanks

Hi - just to clarify my point from last night - the family I know were very openly attempting to abuse the system purely to obtain a car. They took up a lot of other people's time and resources in order to attempt to do it. I have no idea if they've succeded or not but it's people like them who fuel this sort of crap and and devalue the entire motability system. I don't have any moral duty to report them as I fervently hope that their scam won't pass muster.

Fabulous! I'll do it now

Harriet, how would somebody who tries to cheat devalue the system? Unless they succeed in cheating, all they have proved is that the system is robust and working.

If I try to cheat on income tax and don't succeed, surely that has not devalued the tax system? If I get caught shop-lifting I have not devalued the shop's security system, quite the contrary.

There will always be criminals. But a working system is one that provides good service to those who deserve it and does not let criminals get away with it. To convince us that the current system is not working you would need to show us how many undeserving cases get away with it, not how many try and fail to get away with it.

Cassettetapeandpencil Sun 09-Oct-11 17:54:22
"It must be awful having people not understand your child's disability. I can understand why so many of you going through this would be so angry so I'm really not trying to pick a fight or make anyone feel bad but I have a genuine question.
Why would an ADHD sufferer need to use/have access to a car any more than than someone not suffering from ADHD?

I understand physical difficulties making walking etc difficult but why ADHD and the like?"

Because they may not be safe, may have meltdowns if exposed to too much sensory load, may try to escape and may have no sense of danger.

In fact, I can perfectly well imagine why a child with ADHD might need motability far more than my dd who has a painful chronic joint disorder (and who does not qualify). She can be trusted to sit still in her wheelchair when crossing the road, so there is no particular reason why I cannot push her to the shops or take her on the bus. She is not going to make a dash for it, she is not going to panic or start trying to fight her way out.

As I said earlier in the thread, ADHD type behaviours can be dangerous. My ASD daughter and son both have dangerous behaviours. DD2 has Aspergers and ADHD as well as other differences. She may run across a road if something distracts her. She may just do a runner if something distresses her. My son cannot use a bus to get to places. He wanders into roads and has been known to sit down in the middle of a road in a complete blind panic. If he has other things on his mind (chord progressions at the moment) he will not even realise he's in a road.
DD2 has many seriously dangerous behaviours. As stated earlier, you can't just 'teach' these people the right behaviour, in many cases they understand the theory but are incapable of applying said theory to the practical.
Some people with ADHD may be violent, I know my daughter isn't but she's damn strong and I wouldn't want to deal with her if she were having a meltdown/panic/paddy on a bus, in a road, whatever. A car can help ensure that someone with these difficulties, along with their appropriate carer, gets safely from a-b with minimal disruption to routines etc.

I think plenty of the posters on this thread have already answered that question cassette.

To summarise - if your child's condition affects their mobility (not just their physical ability to walk around, but their ability to do so safely without hurting themselves or others) then in some rare cases they may qualify for HRMC (higher rate mobility component) which can then be used to lease a car.

HRMC is very hard to qualify for - but if you have a child who needs to be restrained regularly or who is liable to panic & run onto a busy road, or attack someone else on public transport, this could literally be your only way of accessing services for them outside the home.

Personally, I think parents bringing up kids with these extremely debilitating conditions fucking deserve a medal. A subsidised leasing scheme which in turn helps keep our car manufacturing & retailing industries afloat doesn't seem like much.

Of course, we could just keep them and their children prisoners in their own homes. Then we wouldn't have to look at them or think about them. It seems that's the preferred option for the Daily Fail.

X-post

Cassette we don't get DLA at HRM (car level) but if we did it would be because the boys can be a danger to themselves and anyone caring for or with them; ds1 has been known to try and push a sibling under a car whilst I load the buggy, ds3 is just very toddler like and unaware- in car parks he is a risk as is ds4 who has a tendency to run away and due to sensory issues will bite, hit and pinch to avoid hand holding as it hurts his hands. We do use a buggy on occasion but find it doesn't leave enough ahnds free and he screams going into that anyway as well.

If you can imagine having to pick up a fighting 11 year old to get them into the car whilst they try and swing for you and another child simultaneoulsy- yes. That.

What a shameful thread.
Full of prejudice, ignorance and spite. (with exceptions, not every post is bile)
This place really isn't disability friendly is it?

Thanks cassette! have forwarded the complaint to the press complaints commission

PeneloPee sometimes that's true but I actually think generally it's OK- a lot of people here are willing to learn.

I must be reading a different thread, have most people not said that the article is wrong and awful?

No not everybody twinklytroll. MNHQ have thankfully deleted the most offensive post.

I read some pretty nasty stuff.
Good to see the Hate Mail being challenged.

I tell you what else annoys me, those entitled parents who push and push for a cancer diagnosis just to get a free trip to Disneyland.

'The number that seek a "label" from doctors does seem to have increased since their is a financial benefit from it. Perhaps it would be viewed differently if no benefits could be claimed for it.'

OR

the number of people seeking a label has risen concurrently with the numbers of children born prematurely or with congenital health difficulties surviving, a rise in survival rates for cancer and heart disorders, the improved diagnosis of certain disorders and with a regard to DLA as a whole (for which most of the published figures exist) with a rise in survival rates from previously fatal disorders and the elongated lifespan as a whole.

You'd have to be borderline sectionable to take on the assessment and DLA procedures lightly, and seeking a label is irrelevant anyway as others have said because certainly with ASD there are validated tests in abundance now to separate ASD from not ASD.

The headline is written to inflame - but the actual 'facts' in the article don't back up the inflamatory headline - as ever the DM are relying on people to froth and foam without actually engaging with the detail - and this thread appears to show how successful they are at it.

The headline suggests that all parents with children with ADHD could get a car, the actual article in fact proves that it is very rarely the case - 99 000 people with ADHD or ADHD related conditions but only 3200 qualified for cars under motability.

So just over 3% of children with ADHD have the condition severe enough to warrant a car - and that doesn't tell us how many of those have other conditions - possibly physical - just that ADHD forms part of their disability.

Yes, ADHD is commonly co-morbid with other disorders such as Autism.

Valid point.