Latest news with #FrancesRyan
The Guardian
10 hours ago
- Politics
- The Guardian
'It'll push disabled people into poverty': Labour's controversial welfare bill
Labour has been in turmoil over the most controversial piece of legislation of Keir Starmer's premiership: a major overhaul of the benefits system. The government says the welfare bill is out of control – largely because of the huge rise in people claiming personal independence payments (Pip). More than 120 Labour MPs were poised to rebel, and yesterday Starmer was promising to make concessions. But for the 3.7 million people who rely on Pip to pay the extra costs associated with having a disability, it has been an incredibly worrying time, says the Guardian columnist Frances Ryan. Pip is essential for the extra costs incurred by disabled people, she says. 'It's about being able to afford to pay the care fees so that you can wash your hair. It's about having enough money to charge your electric wheelchair so you're not housebound.' She says the 'toxic' rhetoric around disability that the political debate inspires is also hugely damaging. Ryan has just written a book, Who Wants Normal? The Disabled Girls' Guide to Life, and has spoken to 70 well-known women living with a disability. In her interviews, one thing came across clearly: the message given to disabled people by society is that they do not have a right to be included, whether that is at school, in the workplace or at university. And, she says, the government's 'quick fix' attitude to reducing the benefits bill, rather than looking at the barriers people with disability face while trying to work, is part of the problem.
The Guardian
15-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Guardian writer Frances Ryan named one of Vogue's 25 women ‘defining Britain'
Guardian writer Frances Ryan has been named one of Vogue magazine's 25 women 'defining Britain', stating her work covering the rights of disabled people had become 'essential reading'. The publication said Ryan's efforts to spotlight the lives of disabled people were 'needed more than ever', with official statistics suggesting that a quarter of people in the UK report some kind of disability. It has been an increasing proportion of the population since 2014. Vogue, which has run the list since 2018, pointed to Ryan's work 'lifting the lid on the government's cuts to disability benefits or giving insight into highly emotive topics such as the assisted dying bill'. It also praised her recent book, Who Wants Normal?. Ryan said: 'It's ironic – or just very fitting – that I made the list in part because of a book I wrote this year arguing disabled women deserve a place in British culture. 'I'm really touched to be included and I hope it's another step in the climb to see many more women that look like me (and a lot that don't).' Her recent work has included coverage of a letter signed by more than 100 of the UK's most high-profile disabled people calling on Keir Starmer to abandon 'inhumane and catastrophic plans to cut disability benefits'. The Vogue 25 also recognised Amal Clooney, the human rights barrister. She was recognised for her work defending 'those who have suffered systemic abuse, particularly women and girls who have been victims of sexual violence'. It also included England footballer Lucy Bronze, whose aunt once threatened to sue the FA over a rule that meant Bronze was no longer allowed to play with boys' teams at the age of 12. The current Chelsea full-back has played for Liverpool, Manchester City, Lyon and Barcelona. Sign up to First Edition Our morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters after newsletter promotion Others in the list include Labour's Rachel Reeves, the first female chancellor, Pamela Maynard, Microsoft's first chief AI transformation officer, Nicola Packer, who was acquitted of having an illegal abortion, theatre impresario Sonia Friedman and Princess Anne.
The Guardian
13-04-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Who Wants Normal? The Disabled Girls' Guide to Life by Frances Ryan review
When Frances Ryan began writing her second book she could hardly have guessed that it would acquire a supercharged degree of relevance by being published in the immediate wake of another programme of brutal cuts to disability benefits, this time by a Labour government. Ryan's acclaimed 2019 debut, Crippled: Austerity and the Demonisation of Disabled People, was a piece of political reportage documenting the effects of austerity measures by coalition and Conservative governments, through a combination of research and first-hand interviews with disabled people whose experiences illustrated the human cost behind the statistics. Who Wants Normal? takes a more conversational approach. A hybrid memoir-polemic-advice-manual, the book examines more personal topics such as body image, dating and relationships, specifically as these relate to disabled women. But if the personal is always political for women, this goes tenfold for women living with disabilities; as Ryan shows, even something as ordinary as going to the pub with friends can be a minefield for anyone who has limited mobility, sensory challenges or who uses a wheelchair. Almost every aspect of life for disabled women is affected by societal attitudes and basic infrastructure that can combine to deny access, from the intimate matters of sex and clothing, to more obviously structural issues of healthcare, education and representation, all of which she tackles here with robust analysis and wry humour. In recent years, Ryan has become one of the most authoritative voices on representation and policy as they relate to disabled people in the UK, though she bridles at the fact that she is frequently described as the Guardian's 'disability columnist', 'despite this role not existing at the paper and my work focusing on politics'. As a wheelchair user from childhood, who now also lives with the effects of chronic illness, Ryan writes from a perspective still all-too-rare in mainstream publications – as she notes in her chapter on representation, 'disabled women working in the media are essentially like Superman and Clark Kent: you never see them in a room at the same time'. She takes a broad definition of her subject, citing the statistic that almost a quarter of people in the UK say they have some form of disability; among her high-profile interviewees she includes not only women with visible physical impairments, but those living with 'hidden' disabilities such as Crohn's, ME or endometriosis, as well as bipolar disorder, depression and neurodivergence. 'No one really talks about what it is to be a disabled woman, especially a young one,' she writes, and in the chapter on relationships she discusses the importance of finding a community with whom you can discuss – and laugh about – shared experiences. This book is a way of offering that community to readers, who will find here stories to inspire, enrage and encourage from women with a range of disabilities who have successfully navigated careers in politics, sport, entertainment, medicine, psychology and media, often in spite of significant barriers. But it would be a shame if the subtitle deterred non-disabled readers, because there are so many accounts here that highlight issues that remain largely invisible to those who have not experienced them, and which need to be solved collectively. Perhaps the most striking aspect of the book, though, is its frequently celebratory tone. There is plenty to be angry about in the way disabled women are treated, as Ryan's blistering columns since the recent welfare cuts have shown, but Who Wants Normal? is also a defiant call to embrace what she calls 'disabled joy', to show disabled women living full and happy lives as a counter to the stereotypes. Non-disabled women could learn valuable lessons about self-acceptance and the radical rejection of beauty standards from her chapter on body image, and the women she has chosen to interview are the kind of role models Ryan says she wishes she had had growing up: a final chapter consists of pithy life advice from each of her main contributors, who include Jameela Jamil, Katie Piper, and Tanni Grey-Thompson, among many others. At a time when disability continues to be misunderstood, questioned and vilified, Ryan offers a vision of how much disabled women already contribute to society, and how much more might be possible with a more imaginative shift in perspective, both individually and politically. Who Wants Normal? by Frances Ryan is published by Fig Tree (£18.99). To support the Guardian and Observer order your copy at Delivery charges may apply. The audiobook, read by Ruth Madeley, is also out now
The Guardian
27-03-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Shameless welfare cuts are a betrayal of Labour voters
Many Labour supporters, including myself, have waited a decade and a half for Labour to return to government and bring about a sea change in the governance of the country. We are now beginning to wonder why we bothered. Labour in opposition promised to ensure that the public would see a significant improvement in essential public services and in their economic wellbeing, but there is a fundamental flaw and inherent dishonesty in this government pretending it can achieve this while adopting an economic policy clothed in a self-imposed straitjacket. Rachel Reeves's spring statement (Rachel Reeves accused of balancing books on back of UK's poorest, 26 March) further exacerbates the chasm between her party's ambitions in opposition and its achievements in government. A year ago, Frances Ryan asked: What's the point of Starmer's Labour if it won't stand up for poor, sick or disabled people? That is just one of the questions that many of us are beginning to RiddleWirksworth, Derbyshire 'Welfare savings from withdrawing or cutting incapacity benefits'; 'Thousands of public sector jobs to go'; 'Government departments facing major cuts to their budgets'. Sound familiar? Headlines from George Osborne's spending review in 2010. That went really well, didn't it? Good job Labour has learned lessons from that. Still, at least it saved money by copying and pasting from Loschi Oldham, Greater Manchester So all disabled people who want to work will be supported in obtaining secure and well-paid jobs as part of Labour's drive to reduce welfare costs and get Britain working. I recall a previous Labour government targeting disabled people by withdrawing financial support to some Remploy factories under the guise of helping those people affected to secure work in open employment. As feared at the time by disability groups, the reality was that the scheme was really about reducing welfare costs. The majority of people who lost their job at a Remploy factory faced long-term unemployment and loss of independence and self-worth. History will repeat itself with this Labour government's shameless attack on disabled MaherLiverpool I am sickened that a Labour chancellor, confronted with an unfavourable financial forecast, thinks the only course of action is to expect the poorest in society to have their income reduced to fill the gap. Our system is awash with tax breaks for the better-off. Rachel Reeves is behaving exactly as I would expect a Tory chancellor to, which is not what I, or the rest of those who voted Labour, wanted out of a new RennieGerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire Like Jon Burnell (Letters, 25 March), I too am appalled by this Labour government. As a member since 1960, I see a party that is led by a former human rights lawyer who cannot tolerate dissent, that echoes the cruelty of the last Conservative government, and that implements economic policies which seek to penalise the most needy and vulnerable. I have started to ask myself when does loyalty become an endorsement of the unacceptable? I am going to find it very difficult to renew my membership next RedmanNew Eltham, London Do you think Keir Starmer, Rachel Reeves and the rest of this welfare-cutting cabinet can wash the lower halves of their bodies themselves? I just cannot believe that it is a Labour government that is targeting disabled people in such a shameful way. We would have been a better society under another Rishi Sunak government – and I have been a Labour voter all my long life. I can't vote Labour now, not while this lot are in StaplesSouthampton I have been a Labour supporter all my life, but I am appalled by the spring statement. I know that Rachel Reeves loves savings, so I have today resigned my Labour membership and will be donating the money saved to Save the Children RozanskiLondon If that's not austerity, I'm a spring onion!Jol MiskinSheffield Do you have a photograph you'd like to share with Guardian readers? If so, please click here to upload it. A selection will be published in our Readers' best photographs galleries and in the print edition on Saturdays.
The Guardian
10-02-2025
- Health
- The Guardian
Benefits system should protect, not punish, vulnerable people
Frances Ryan underestimates the effect of repeated attacks on benefits claimants and the damage that the potential changes being floated would unleash (As Labour touts more brutal cuts to benefits, how is this different from life under the Tories?, 5 February). As a mental health clinician, I cannot emphasise enough how many relapses have been triggered by the relentless media drumbeat about 'cracking down' on benefits. This is not just political rhetoric; it lodges in the psyche, feeding precarity and self-doubt. When the government frames itself as the defender of the public purse at the expense of 'fraudulent' claimants, it makes nearly all claimants feel like frauds. To combine this with the terrifying reality of what these speculative reforms could mean – sanctions for those too unwell to comply with back-to-work schemes, and the appalling prospect of removing or gutting the limited capability for work and work-related activity (LCWRA) group that overwhelmingly consists of people at substantial risk of mental collapse – is unconscionable. There are countless reforms that could be pursued without targeting society's most vulnerable, starting with reducing the Department for Work and Pensions' appalling record of underpayments and wrongful accusations that push claimants into crisis. A system built on trust rather than suspicion would not only cost less but would also reaffirm Labour's founding values. It's not too late for it to prove that it still stands for dignity, not destitution – by protecting, not punishing, those who need support the Jay WattsLondon Thank you, Frances Ryan, for highlighting a phrase beloved of our government that deeply troubles me: 'working people'. Even worse, 'working families'. If you are unable to work by virtue of age, ill health or disability, and have the temerity to be single, you are not a priority. You will also be expected to bear the brunt of the nightmare fiscal inheritance from the last government while wealthy individuals and multinationals remain untroubled by suggestions of tax increases. Many who voted Labour will not do so again, myself included, because we are sickened by the expansion of gross inequality between the poorest and most vulnerable and the O'BrienLondon Have an opinion on anything you've read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section.
