Stop the Abolition of DLA

[Glitterknickaz]

The government are proposing to get rid of DLA in favour of PIP. full consultation here

Riven started a fantastic thread in Chat with the very pertinent point that this applies to everyone, that every one of us could be just one step from disability themselves.

There is NOTHING in the media about this. These proposals could mean poverty for the disabled and their families in this country. It could leave some in residential care completely isolated from their families and support networks through the removal of the mobility component.

My family has already been hit three times through the NHS, education and aiming high, via the cuts, if they now remove the money from our pockets we are going to be in a heat or eat situation.

Please MNHQ do something, as many are oblivious to these proposals and what they will mean, including those who themselves already claim DLA.

Nothing in wales again I note.

What with EDCM etc I am begining to think we do not exist- at least glasgow got one this time LOL

mouseface my point exactly

I am a mum with 3 children going through higher education, who all have p/t jobs as well, & was dismissed from my job which I loved on the grounds incapability due long term ill health,I have CFS/ME which can be incredibly debilitating. My employer wouldn't consider my eligibility for ill health retirement so I had to make a claim for ESA, the employment & support allowance which has replaced incapacity benefit. This is the first time that I have been out of work & ever claimed any benefit. Much to my amazement, but thanks to a very helpful website,I was awarded ESA,a benefit which is incredibly difficult to get for CFS/ME. To be awarded ESA a claimant has to be scored with 15 points or more, I scored 36.
My husband was medically retired from his job 16 yrs ago & since then I have been the only breadwinner. However, his pension just takes our income over the threshold for income ESA. This means that I don't qualify for help with travel costs for hospital visits & free prescriptions. The Govt has decided that from April 2011 ESA (CB) recipients who are placed in what is called the Work Related Activity Group will only be able to receive this for a maximum of 1 year; the expectation is that the claimant will have either recovered from their illness/condition/disability within that time. After that if a claimant is still deemed to have limited capacity for work they will be able to claim ESA (IR) but only if you're household income is below a certain amount. If it's over the threshold, for me because of my husband's pension then there is nothing. The only other benefit available is DLA which I am about to apply for.

However, the medical assessment criteria for both ESA & DLA entitlement is already incredibly harsh; people with terminal illnesses have been turned down for one or both. The Govt are introducing an even harsher medical assessment criteria for both ESA & DLA which will mean thousands more with debilitating/progressive/degenerative/ terminal illnesses/conditions/disabilities will be denied these benefits. The replacement of DLA with PIP is a cruel deception by the Govt - they say those with "genuine" illnesses/conditions resulting in disabilities will not lose out in this change. Given the criteria for the PIP will be even harsher than those in place for the current DLA the PIP isn't fit for purpose. The company carrying out the medical assessments for the DWP, Atos healthcare consistently scores would be claimants with serous conditions with points from 0 to under 15 every year only for the Tribunals to find in favour of the turned down claimants. Claimants at Tribunals often go from a score of 0 up to 30 or more points.
This whole ESA/DLA/PIP area is one that could affect anyone & everyone at some point in their lives; mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, children etc etc when we least expect it. I am not a benefits scrounger/fraudster as the Govt & the ConDems & the media would have the public believe; yes, there have been some fraudlulent claims but they are a tiny number. Contrary to the demonising ppoliticians & media, it is incredibly difficult to access ESA & DLA & quite frankly I & many like me are only claiming it because we are too ill to work & not that we don't want or are too lazy to work.
Please mumsnet do all that you can to publicise & challenge the appalling treatment that claimants already face & which will only be worse when DLA is replaced by PIP.

yes politics should be left out of it and if it was labour that was doing it I would be fighting them. But what we have to face is if we get the condems out of power there is a very good chance these changes will not happen. But then who knows what any of them are thinking these day's long gone are the days that labour was "common" people for the people now they all seem to have more money then common sense :) Lets all just stay focused and stopping them from doing this to the disabled and care givers.

bristolian
have you spoke to anyone about help with the costs of Prescription some medical conditions are exempt from payment and there is also an HC1 or HC2 that can help cover the costs. to find out more you can www.nhs.uk/NHSEngland/Healthcosts/Pages/Prescriptioncosts.aspx My parents have the same kind of problem because of my dads military pension and my mum gets help with the costs of dental treatment and other stuff. Ifs worth a try every penny counts :)

Janvier
your totally right last time my dad got a mobility car it was £1000 that he had to put down and this time its going to be £700. Its been very stressful because he put that money down then with whats going on he might loss that money when he losses his mobility. This is all totally stupid how can they expect a man with parkinsons disease get around with just a wheelchair or a walking stick. You know before now he has fallen over and people have been stood there saying get up you drunk etc etc etc just because he is younger then most with parkinsons disease people don't see it :( he was 48 when he was diagnosed :( but he is still my hero :)

lisa1cares
thank you for having taken the time to read my post & your suggestion re prescription costs. I currently have a prepayment card & am going to have another try to get exemption so I don't have to pay out the instalments for the pp card. Unfortunately, ME hasn't been classed as an automatically exempt condition. The previous govt published plans to automatically exempt some other chronic conditions from prescription charges including asthma which I also have, but unfortunately the plans were never enacted.
best wishes to you & your mum & dad.

I know that it is hard for lots of us to attend protest so thought it might help to protest online www.facebook.com/pages/Say-No-to-Dla-Disability-Living-Allowance-Reforms/121044281301982?v=info

ReclaimingMyInnerPeachy

Just to clarify, the name The Broken of Britain isn't about calling disabled people broken/ Pre-election. David Cameron's mantra was 'Broken Britain' - now he's going to break us with this threat to DLA and other disability services.

Eva

There are template letters to MPs, the Minister for Disabled People and the Prime Minister here thebrokenofbritain.blogspot.com/2010/12/stop-dla-reform-campaign-resource.html.

Feel free to e-mail me at [email protected] to discuss targets. To join in helping us submit a document to the consultation on DLA reform, go here.

ReclaimingMyInnerPeachy

Not sure what you mean by Wales andScotland. The Broken of Britain arranged this in the Assembly, and the same wording is about to be table in Scotland.

Protest against ATOS at 2pm Triton Square N1 near Euston Square

*Today is national Troll a Tory Day!

Taken from the Disabled People against the Cuts site:

disabledpeopleprotest.wordpress.com/

From Benefits Claimants Fight Back ? for those who cannot make it to Monday protests physically but still want to make an impact -
STOP PRESS ? don?t forget you can also troll atos origin direct

Email: [email protected]

Switchboard
?Tel: 020 7830 4444

The first National Troll A Tory Day on the 15th December led to an outpouring of righteous anger, much of it on the facebook pages of Nick Clegg and David Cameron. Spread the word now and let?s make this one bigger!

As part of the National Day of Cuts Against Benefit Claimants on the 24th January 2011 Tories and their Lib Dem lackys will be told exactly what the nation feels about their sham coalition.

For details of other events happening on the day please visit: www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=173084439389460

The obvious candidates are the Daily Mail, The Daily Telegraph and The Sun. All allow comments and in the Mail?s case these comments are sometimes unmoderated. Find a recent story about benefit claimants, or just dive in an interrupt the latest chat about X Factor.

In the event comments are removed or strictly moderated then why not switch to Tory/Lib Dem bloggers. Government supporting website Guido Fawkes is one of the most prominent. Again comment moderation may be turned on, but don?t let that put you off, make them work for their living for a change. Should you tire of these, then Iain Dale suspiciously retired from blogging on the first Troll a Tory Day however his blog still has a handy list of the top 100 Conservative blogs to get your teeth into. There?s a similar list of Lib Dem blogs on Libdemvoice.

iaindale.blogspot.com/2010/09/top-100-conservative-blogs.html

www.libdemvoice.org/top-75-lib-dem-blogs-the-total-politics-list-15984.html

Facebookers might want to pay a visit to the facebook pages of David Cameron, Nick Clegg or Vince Cable. Conservative Home, and conservatives.com also have the facility to leave comments. Lots of Tory councillors and MPs have blogs, use google to find them and give them a piece of your mind. If you have a blog yourself why not write a post about the upcoming benefit cuts or use facebook, twitter or any of the new fangled devices available to show your contempt.

You can write to your MP via theyworkforyou.com. Or how about a letter to your local paper explaining to them how the vicious benefit cuts are likely to impact on you or your family.

The internet gives us unprecedented opportunity to tell this spineless Government exactly what we think of them. Let?s come out in force on the 24th January and start the fight back against the welfare and housing benefit cuts set to devastate so many lives.

.

For links to all the above mentioned sites visit: benefitclaimantsfightback.wordpress.com/2010/12/09/national-troll-a-tory-day/

Thanks to all who are posting links.

Does anyone know how ThisIsANiceCage is today? She's going on a march as long as she's able to.

If you are out there Cage, go you!! xx

Bump indeed! To be honest, I think eerybody's said what they can now, without exploding emotionally - the only thing left to do is to act, no?

Have you seen this?
ATOS Kills

Rhydian- IIrC (sorry eysterday seems so far away LOL) my reference to Wales was a reference to both the lack of a march ehre and the fact that so much of the support raised has been taken up by EDCM who have zero to do with Wales (or the other non Englsih nations IIRC).

Seems I spent several days on here picking up people and trying to help only for a group with no remit to help those local to us to take over- slightly annoying tbh.

Howdy, back in, knackered but fine.

Well it wasn't exactly a march, more of a picnic - about 30 people ("What a good turn out," said one).

We were almost outnumbered by some very helpful and nice police, who made us a little pen partly under cover (it was a very nice cage).

Some lovely people taped my placard to the police barriers, and I lay down behind it on the roll mat, very cozy. The space was a little plaza between buildings by a coffee shop window. There weren't many passers by, but a lot of them did look at the "£9 billion cuts to disabled benefits" headline, and you guys looked fab in your pics.

I didn't see much else, with the lying down and all, but there didn't seem to be many placards. A few journalists from disability mags/freelance turned up so pics were taken of our placard. I only stayed about an hour - I left the placard with the rump, so I hope that's OK with everyone on it (it just has faces & first names).

Oh, and I scored 2 cabbies and a station assistant and a train manager on the way there, but was too tired to proselytise on the way home.

Well done, I only wish I could have joined you.

You were there by proxy, MissQue, and actually I think the pics were strangely effective. Will have to wait and see how any of this is written up.

FFS, this is all I came up with on Google

www.demotix.com/news/567201/disability-rights-campaigners-protest-outside-atos-origin-hq

No Sky, no BBC, no newspapers, what's wrong, didn't they go and smash up Tory HQ or cause riots? What are we meant to do???

Fuck me!

OK, they were doing noise-making stuff and crowding round for pics as I arrived and later while I was lying down. I'm in none of those pics but I recognise a couple of faces.

The number of police you see in those pics is smack on, as is the ratio of police to protesters. Fair does, they had no idea how many might turn up, and they were lovely. When a passer-by stopped to ask whether we were protesting against her gym (WTF?), copper by me nicely started telling her, and then supported us when we said, "Ask us, we can answer directly."

I didn't even see those placards about some dying after ATOS stuff.

There was a freelance journo who was planning to write up the demo and sell it around disability mags/sites (yes, but they're the CHOIR, ffs, THEY ALREADY KNOW!).

Will think more later, but haven't actually moved from sofa since getting in.