WinVisible is among those supporting Joy Dove, mother of Jodey Whiting. On 10 June, DWP officials travelled to meet Jodey’s bereaved parents at the office of her MP, where they told her they have made many changes. They told her that Mind is providing training to staff. Read the Disability News Service report of the meeting here. Our comment: In our experience doing casework every day, critically vulnerable women claimants are still being cut off for “failure to attend” and have their good cause for it dismissed, like what happened to Jodey. When they are made … Read more
Ontario is a large province in Canada which borders the United States. Last month, their Basic Income (BI) pilot scheme was ended early. In April 2017, while the Liberal Party was in power in Ontario, they started a BI pilot scheme with about 4,000 people in the test communities of Hamilton-Brantford, Thunder Bay and Lindsay. It was supposed to run for three years but was cancelled by the incoming Tory premier, Doug Ford, who was elected in June 2018. We wanted to know more, and why a group of women, including disabled women, went to court to … Read more
Film director Ken Loach, who made “I, Daniel Blake” (2016) to expose the brutalities of the benefits system, has given his support to Joy Dove, mum of Jodey Whiting. Ken Loach said on Twitter: “The DWP is still failing people – it may be worse now than it was when we made I, Daniel Blake.” In 2016, Ken Loach invited bereaved relatives and disability campaigners to hold a vigil on the red carpet at the Leicester Square premiere of I, Daniel Blake. This was also supported by Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell MP (who … Read more
Support the petition to stop the dangerous merger of tests for PIP and ESA/Universal Credit On 5 March 2019, benefits Minister Amber Rudd announced at a Scope conference that the DWP would develop a single digital system – online like Universal Credit — for Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) and Personal Independence Payments (PIP), and have an integrated assessment for ESA and PIP from 2021. This means more destitution and deaths! We’re supporting Lisa Egan’s petition “Don’t merge the assessments for PIP and ESA” Please sign and circulate widely. Lisa says: “My concerns about merging the assessments … Read more
We’re supporting the petition to Amber Rudd to STOP the DWP telling GPs not to issue sick notes for patients who are wrongly found fit for work. Sign the petition here. See petition updates from Zacchaeus 2000 here. Sick and disabled people are being deprived of vital benefit while they appeal, leaving them destitute and risking their health and survival, because the DWP is telling the GPs not to issue the sick notes (“fit notes”) they need to get ESA payments on appeal. The petition is by anti-poverty charity Zacchaeus 2000 (Z2K) which upholds welfare rights and … Read more
We are supporting Joy Dove’s new petition, Justice for Jodey Whiting, her daughter – please sign here. A 42-year-old formerly married single mother of nine and grandmother in Stockton, North East England, Jodey Whiting took her own life in February 2017 after being cut off ESA. She had missed seeing a letter calling her in for an ESA face-to-face interview in January 2017, and knew nothing of the appointment, as she was in hospital being treated for pneumonia. She also had a brain cyst. She was cut off despite this and having a known history … Read more
Universal Basic Income is in the news again. Compass has today published a plan by economists Stewart Lansley and Howard Reed to reverse welfare cuts and end poverty, endorsed by Baroness Ruth Lister. We will need to look carefully at the proposals and try to understand them compared to the current welfare system and pay levels (we are claimants, not economists or academics). But we are worried that the Compass plan may limit rather than reinforce women’s case for benefits and undermine established benefits, leaving us with an income of £60 a week for adults, below even JSA or Carers … Read more