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			by  Paul
                18 Jan 2011                    No Comments »     Filed under: disability news
Social care self-funders need help making choices
 People who pay for their social care are often disadvantaged by a lack of guidance, says research published today Growing numbers of people are paying for social care from their own (often modest) savings, either through personal choice or because they have assets above the mean-testing threshold for public funds. There should be some advantages to this. Surely “self-funders” are better able to exercise consumer power and get the support that they need, rather than simply accepting what is on offer? 
 Tags: a-lonely-and, a-wide-range, guardian.co.uk, life, local, options, people, social

			by  Paul
                13 Jan 2011                    No Comments »     Filed under: disability news, finance, lifestyle, sport
Come out of your comfort zone, disability living allowance cuts are relevant to all
 Disabled people must be creative in the ways we protest. That includes reminding people seemingly unaffected by cuts that their time will come, says Kaliya Franklin While Millbank swarmed with student protestors and Mumsnet buzzed angrily about the reductions to child benefit, away from the glare of publicity, disabled people and carers mourned alone. The cuts to benefits and services affecting us really are a matter of life and death, so why the wider silence? 
 Tags: benefit, benefits, easiest, finance, kaliya-franklin, poverty, society, time

			by  Paul
                3 Jan 2011                    No Comments »     Filed under: disability news, lifestyle
Up to 500,000 wrongly denied incapacity benefit, figures show
 Survey by Compass, which used official DWP statistics, says 300,000 claimants won their tribunals when they appealed Up to 500,000 people have been wrongly judged fit for work and disallowed incapacity benefit over the past 15 years, according to a study for Compass, the leftwing campaign group. In the first attempt to quantify the numbers refused incapacity benefit only to have it restored, Steve Griffiths, a former government consultant, says the figures are “at least half a million” during that period. Griffiths used official statistics gleaned from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), the tribunal service and social security statistics to get to “at least” 500,000 wrongly barred from incapacity benefit since 1996. 
 Tags: a-possible-rate, a-search-for, backbencher, country, disability, feeds, lifestyle, media-limited, news, numbers, over-the-past, politics, society, the guardian, uk news

			by  Paul
                26 Dec 2010                    No Comments »     Filed under: disability news, finance
Legal aid cuts will hit women the hardest, says justice department
 Ethnic minorities and disabled people will also miss out after £600m cut to family law and divorce funding Women will bear the brunt of plans to strip back legal aid as funding for family law and divorce cases is cut, according to the justice department’s own assessment of the impact of reforms. Of the people who will no longer qualify for legal aid under the changes announced by the government in November, women outnumber men by nearly six to four. Ethnic minorities and people with disabilities are also more likely to be denied legal aid after the reforms, which will also end most funding for welfare and education disputes
 Tags: divorce, domestic-violence, feeds, finance, impact, legal, news, people, purely-economic, redefinition, rights

			by  Paul
                26 Dec 2010                    No Comments »     Filed under: disability news, features, sport, the arts
Philip French: my life as a stammerer
 The Observer’s film critic reflects on The King’s Speech – and how his own speech impediment has contributed to his life and character From as early as I can remember until 1952, when I left home at the age of 18 to go into the army, there was an annual ritual on the afternoon of Christmas Day. Dinner, which meant turkey and all the trimmings followed by plum pudding, began around two o’clock and was carefully timed to end so that everyone could sit there beneath the paper decorations, wearing the hats that came out of the crackers, and earnestly, reverently listen to the king’s Christmas message on the radio. This hallowed national tradition, initiated by Sir John Reith in 1932, was not five years old when George V, who’d given four of them, died
 Tags: books, britain, career, colonel, disability, features, french, memory, office, tormentor, traffic, wife

			by  Paul
                13 Dec 2010                    No Comments »     Filed under: disability news
ILF Closed Permanently, but Existing Payments ‘Safeguarded’The Independent Living Fund (ILF), which stopped accepting new applications earlier this year, is to be closed permanently, but the Government has promised to ‘fully protect the programme budget for existing recipients, according to the Minister for Disabled People, Maria Miller. Stephen Jack, Chair of the ILF Trustees said: “The ILF board of Trustees has [...]
 Tags: benefits, ILF, Maria Miller

			by  Paul
                13 Dec 2010                    No Comments »     Filed under: disability news
Challenging Times for Charity’s New LeadershipNational disability charity Vitalise has appointed a new leadership team to prepare the organisation for the challenge of some of the biggest spending cuts and most radical changes to public services since the Second World War. New Chair Mindy Sawhney and Chief Executive Chris Simmonds take up their positions at a time when the Coalition [...]
 Tags: charity, holidays, respite

			by  Paul
                13 Dec 2010                    No Comments »     Filed under: disability news
Aviator’s Ball Raises £82,000A glamorous Aviator’s Ball raised a remarkable £82,000 for Aerobility, the UK charity that owns and operates customised aircraft and equipment enabling disabled and terminally ill people to learn to fly. The annual event, held at the Sofitel Hotel at Heathrow’s Terminal 5, attracted more than 400 guests, including Gerald Howarth, Minister for International Security [...]
 Tags: aerobility, charity, flying

			by  Paul
                13 Dec 2010                    No Comments »     Filed under: disability news
Disabled People Get Right to Control ServicesToday (Monday 13 December) sees the start of a radical shake-up of the way disabled people use state funding, according to the Coalition Government. For the first time, disabled people in five ‘Trailblazer’ areas will be able to buy their own support services or equipment through the Right to Control, combing money from different state [...]
 Tags: benefits, education, employment, support

			by  Paul
                13 Dec 2010                    No Comments »     Filed under: disability news
£800 Million for Short BreaksThe Coalition Government has announced the highest ever investment in short breaks for families with disabled children. Children’s Minister Sarah Teather MP announced that the Government will provide local authorities with £800 million over the next four years to fund short breaks for families with disabled children, an increase of some £22 million a year [...]
 Tags: benefits, children, funding, short breaks

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