Latest news with #EllenClifford
The Guardian
02-07-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
‘This isn't a U-turn': disabled people react to passing of watered-down welfare bill
When Tim Boxall went to the protest outside Westminster on the eve of the welfare reform vote, he knew the 32 degree heat would exacerbate his multiple sclerosis. But he felt he had to be there. 'The hour train here and the heat will cause me spasms, pain, fatigue, and set off motor and vocal tics,' he says. 'It'll take days bedbound to recover, but if we don't fight our own corner, who will?' Boxall, 50, has received the personal independence payment (Pip) for a decade and calls it a 'lifeline', particularly since he had to give up work as a credit controller for a high street bank. The benefit bought the wheelchair he's using today. 'It pays for care but also things that give me a life, not just an existence.' When news of the government's win off the back of a major climbdown on Pip reached him, Boxall felt 'disappointed' but 'not disheartened'. 'The patchwork of desperate, last-minute face-saving concessions, legislating on the fly is an absolute embarrassment,' he says. 'This isn't a U-turn. It's more smoke and mirrors,' according to Ellen Clifford from the campaign group Disabled People Against Cuts. 'They might have bought votes with promises of co-producing the Pip review but how can we trust a government like this?' 'Let's not forget that the huge universal credit cut for new claimants remained in the bill unchanged,' she added. 'It makes a mockery of any claims to be protecting vulnerable people.' Sarah Finnegan, housebound with severe ME, has been watching the chaos leading up to the vote at home after 'months of intense fears' over losing her benefits. The 44-year-old, who asked to use a pseudonym out of worry people might not believe her illness, relies on Pip to pay carers who cook, clean and shop for her alongside her elderly parents. She's a single mother to her five-year-old daughter and is 'desperate' to be well enough to go back to work as a counsellor. 'Without [Pip], I genuinely don't know how I'd survive – how I'd keep my child warm and fed,' she says. 'I'm housebound and can't physically access a food bank.' With the Pip changes now delayed and contingent on a major review in autumn 2026, Finnegan is suspicious of the claim disabled people's input will be genuinely taken on board. Charlotte Hughes says: 'If the main aim of the government is to cut costs to 'put disability benefits on a more sustainable footing' then what are the chances of disabled people being really listened to when the Pip criteria are rewritten? The cruelty [of this legislation] is unlike any I've seen in recent history.' The 52-year-old, who is unable to work due to fluid on the brain as well as anxiety and depression, has to get by on the health component of universal credit. 'As a disabled person, it's already difficult to survive. We've already cut back on everything that we can and we can't cut back any more.' Despite the government's last-minute changes, Hughes says 'it's a dark day' for the disabled community. 'We expected it from the Tory party. But Labour were elected because of their promises to make positive changes. I didn't vote Labour for cruelty and the continuation of Tory party policy. It's unforgivable.' As he heads home, Boxall is 'drained' and 'resentful' of the months of stress he and other disabled and sick people have faced. 'As a community, we've been put through a mental and physical wringer,' he says. 'My health is at the worst I've known them. But we carry on fighting because it's our lifeline at stake. Now, I start days of recuperation.'
Western Telegraph
17-05-2025
- Business
- Western Telegraph
Rachel Reeves faces call from her local Labour party to abandon welfare cuts
The Leeds West and Pudsey Constituency Labour Party (CLP), which campaigned to return Ms Reeves to Parliament in the general election as its local MP, has agreed to write to her 'as soon as possible' to make clear it does not support the cuts. The local party branch passed a motion opposing the cuts, seen by the PA news agency, when it met this week. The Government's plans, set out in a Green Paper earlier this year, would tighten the eligibility criteria for the main disability benefit in England, the personal independence payment (Pip). Restricting Pip would cut benefits for around 800,000 people, while the sickness-related element of universal credit also set to be cut. The package of measures are aimed at reducing the number of working-age people on sickness benefits, which grew during the pandemic and has remained high since. The Government hopes the proposals can save £5 billion a year by the end of the decade. In its motion opposing the plans, the Leeds West and Pudsey CLP said disabled people 'are not responsible for the state of the national finances and should not be made to pay the price for Tory economic mismanagement'. The CLP also acknowledged welfare reform is important, but urged the Government to 'focus on reducing the taper' – the rate at which benefits fall off once someone has found work. The scale of the proposed cuts is horrific and will destroy communities, break public services through additional pressures and could well negatively impact the economy Ellen Clifford, Disabled People Against Cuts The local Labour group resolved to write to both Chancellor Ms Reeves and Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall to 'articulate our proposed cuts to disability benefits – whether by reducing rates, implementing higher thresholds, poor quality assessments or increased conditionality – as soon as possible'. Opposition on Ms Reeves's patch comes as the Government appears at risk of a major rebellion from its backbenchers over the plans. Some 100 Labour MPs – more than a quarter of the party's parliamentary numbers – are reported to have signed a letter urging ministers to scale back welfare cuts under consideration, according to media reports. The private letter to Labour's chief whip is separate from a similar one last week, in which 42 MPs said the cuts were 'impossible to support'. Speaking during a recent Westminster Hall debate, Ian Byrne, the Labour MP for Liverpool West Derby, said he was willing to 'swim through vomit' to vote against the cuts. Others including Richard Burgon (Leeds East), Rachael Maskell (York Central), and Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough and Thornaby East) also confirmed they would vote against the plans when they spoke during the debate. Ellen Clifford, from Disabled People Against Cuts, said the campaign group supports the Leeds West and Pudsey CLP's move. She added: 'We hope that the Chancellor takes note of the contents. The scale of the proposed cuts is horrific and will destroy communities, break public services through additional pressures and could well negatively impact the economy. 'They are cruel, badly thought through and entirely performative. Voters will not forget or forgive politicians who back these cuts.' The Chancellor's team, approached for comment, pointed to her previous messages to Labour MPs on the welfare cut proposals. When asked last week what her message to concerned Labour backbenchers was, Ms Reeves said: 'I don't think anybody, including Labour MPs and members, think that the current welfare system created by the Conservative Party is working today. 'They know that the system needs reform. We do need to reform how the welfare system works if we're going to grow our economy.'
