National disability charity, Sense, has responded to the news that the Labour Party intends to launch an early years taskforce looking into childcare provision and early-years learning.

The taskforce, announced by shadow education secretary, Angela Rayner, as part of this year’s Labour Party Conference, will aim to ensure that all children and parents have access to quality, affordable childcare.

Sense, a charity which supports and campaigns on behalf of children and adults with sensory impairments and complex needs, has been calling on the Government to ensure better access to specialist early years support for disabled children. Earlier this year, Sense led an inquiry into play provision for children with multiple needs, which highlighted a number of barriers currently preventing disabled children from accessing vital early years and play settings.

Kate Fitch, Head of Public Policy for national disability charity, Sense, said:

“We welcome the news that the Labour Party intends to set up a taskforce specifically looking at access to childcare and early years provision, as it signals a recognition of the important role that these factors play in ensuring that children have the best start in life.

“Access to good quality early education plays a vital role in the development of children with complex needs; however as our Play Inquiry earlier this year revealed, all too often disabled children are missing out on the opportunities they need due to insufficient funding or a lack of appropriate settings.

“With the arrival of the new 30 hours free childcare initiative, without careful Governmental consideration and funding, families of disabled children could find themselves further side-lined as providers struggle to meet the additional costs of offering places to children with complex needs.

“In order to ensure that disabled children are not left unable to access opportunities to develop and learn, Sense is calling for a nationwide policy of early education funding for children with special education needs, that includes notional funding to help providers meet the costs of staff training or making premises accessible.

“With a new funding formula for early years set to be announced, it is imperative that both the Government and opposition urgently start working towards levelling the playing field for disabled children, which is why we look forward to working with Labour’s early years taskforce to ensure that all children have the chance to fulfil their potential.”

In a major speech at the think tank Demos, the shadow work and pensions secretary, Liam Byrne, will call for radical reform of social security for disabled people, which will free them from the debilitating rounds of testing that currently bedevil the benefits regime.

Instead Bryne will promote a “tell us once” policy and propose a single assessment for disabled people for all their social care and health needs, their disability payments and employment and support allowance. Currently each system has its own testing regime – which has fuelled anger among people with disabilities.

The Labour shadow cabinet member will argue that the coalition is “comprehensively” failing disabled people. Since 2010, poverty levels among disabled people have been rising – with 30% now living in penury.

Byrne will also point out that the government’s flagship welfare-to-work scheme – the Work Programme – was supposed to get one in six sick and disabled people into a job for a least three months. In fact, the actual performance, two years since the start of the scheme, is more like one in 20.

With the autumn statement expected to bring forward more tough benefit measures, Labour will argue that there should be a report into how the government’s actions so far have affected the disabled before ministers continue with their policy agenda .

Most important for campaigners is that Byrne says that the work capability assessment (WCA), the test used to see whether people claiming disability benefits are fit to work, will be reformed. He points out that disabled people taking the WCA are eight times more likely to end up in a tribunal than in a job.

Bryne told the Guardian that a key part of the test used to decide whether a person needed support to get a job, rather than simply saying people are ready to find employment would be reinstated by a future Labour administration.

The new system is modelled on the Australian National Disability Insurance Scheme – which integrates back-to-work support, social care, and disability benefits in a single personal budget. Signed into law this year it is regarded as the most important change in social services in Australia since the introduction of universal health insurance.

Bryne will point out that “today, someone in our country is registered as disabled every three minutes. Disability can affect any of us and therefore it affects all of us. I think it’s time Britain should explore lessons from Australia … to help give disabled people the support they need to get on, and lead to a more fulfilling life.”

The Guardian

And it seems despite the success of the likes of Jack Ashley and David Blunkett, the political representation of disabled people hasn’t really improved substantially in recent years.

Perhaps it’s asking too much to expect one in six MPs to have some form of disability, but surely it would be better if the commons chamber looked a bit more like the society it governs?

Disabled people might also wonder whether the policies that affect them might be drawn a little differently if they had more of a say.

The experience of one disabled councillor in York might not encourage others to enter politics though.

Lynn Jeffries has been a well-known campaigner on disability issues for more than 20 years.

In fact she was so well-known that in 2010, Labour approached her to join the party and stand for the council.

After some hesitation, she decided that she might be able to achieve even more inside the political machine.

Two years on, although she remains a councillor, she has resigned from the Labour group after finding it hard to get her voice heard.

“There was quite a lot of being patronised, and a lot of believing that disabled people are people you do things for”

She said: “There was quite a lot of being patronised, and a lot of believing that disabled people are people you do things for.

“That’s such a shame because what councils miss is that experience of being a disabled person.

“It’s so valuable to them in terms of policy-making as disabled people bring solutions to their own difficulties.

“Not to get that and not to engage with disabled people is quite a loss really.”

Party system

At the time of her resignation York’s Labour group leader accused Ms Jeffries of walking out after failing to win the arguments within the group.

But the campaigner felt the party whip prevented her speaking when she disagreed with policies that affected disabled people.

And other campaigners also fear they would get lost in the party system.

Steve Wilkinson is well-known in Newcastle and beyond for his campaigning zeal on disability access. He’s clashed with councils over the years about their lack of action.

And the wheelchair user has been asked whether he would be interested in entering politics. But he says that’s not for him.

He said: “I think with the first past the post system you really have to be either Conservative, Labour, Liberal Democrat or perhaps UKIP.

Disabled people have protested about the impact of politicians’ decisions but few enter parliament

Disabled people have protested about the impact of politicians’ decisions but few enter parliament

“You could stand as an independent, but the chances are you wouldn’t get elected, so I don’t think I’d be able to champion the causes of the people I’d want to represent.”

Of course there are also other barriers as well. Not all of our council offices and ministries have great disabled access, and extra support might be needed.

But there is some help at hand with those issues.

Last year the government began offering grants to disabled people with aspirations to enter politics.

The Access to Elected Office for Disabled People fund has £2.6m available.

Individuals can apply for up to £20,000 to help them stand for office.

The government says it’s about levelling the playing field rather than giving disabled people an unfair advantage.

For example, the money could be used to support the extra transport costs of someone with mobility problems or provide sign language interpreters for deaf people.

Disabled Prime Minister?

“I do think over the years things will change and we will get more disabled people in politics”

Newcastle Disability Forum’s chair Alison Blackburn believes we could even have a disabled prime minister in the future.

She said: “Anything in politics is gruelling and the person has got to be supported with certain areas of their disability and in their home life.

“But I do think over the years things will change and we will get more disabled people in politics.”

But so far interest in that government access fund has been limited.

By February 2013, just £33,970 has been awarded to six applicants, with six more applications being considered.

If that sluggish pace continues only a fraction of the fund will be spent by the time it’s due to end in summer 2014.

Some then believe further change is needed. The campaign group Disability Politics UK wants the law changed to allow MPs to job share.

It believes that would allow more disabled people to enter parliament.

Labour MP John McDonnell has presented a private members bill to make it possible, but without government support it is unlikely to succeed.

But perhaps our political parties also need to look at their own attitudes.

Lynn Jeffries certainly believes the existing political elite needs to change its attitude to remove psychological as well as physical barriers.

She said: “Lots of the barriers start because councillors don’t engage properly with disabled people.

“To be honest, unless that changes I do not think we will get disabled people wanting to be councillors.”

By BBC News

Labour will call on Thursday for a “fast and fundamental” review of the test that determines who is eligible for sickness benefits, acknowledging that the policy the party introduced while in government is not working.  Launching a consultation with disability campaigners in Glasgow, the shadow work and pensions secretary, Liam Byrne, will defend his party’s decision to bring in the Work Capability Assessment, which was designed to reduce the benefits bill, but will argue that the system needs to be reformed.

Speaking on Wednesday, Byrne said: “We have to be brave enough to say that even with initiatives we produced that are not working, we need to change them.

“We are now confronted with very clear evidence that it is simply not working. Labour was right to introduce the test – and we were right to say we would change [it] in the hard, clear light of experience.

“That experience is telling us now that the test puts a bureaucracy against disabled people. It doesn’t put a team behind them, to help disabled people into work.”

The focus of Labour’s criticism is not on Atos, the private IT company initially contracted by Labour to carry out the test, Byrne said. “Our target has always been the government who we don’t think are managing the contract when the tests are going wrong. There are clearly questions to answer for Atos but the government that has to get reform in place.”

The party will call for reform that also looks at the barriers disabled people face when looking for work, rather than simply assessing whether someone is capable or not of working.

Large numbers of people found ineligible for the new employment and support allowance, which replaces incapacity benefit, are appealing against the decision to find them fit for work; about 41% of those refused support go to tribunal and 30% are subsequently granted the benefit. There have been more than 600,000 appeals since the WCA started, costing about £60m a year.

Byrne said he would also be highlighting the combined impact of cuts to disability benefits and services, and argue that they are higher than the new levies imposed on banks.

A discussion paper which will be released by the shadow work and pensions team on Thursday states: “We believe that this government is forcing disabled people to pay for its economic mistakes.” The party has calculated that cuts to social care and disability benefits will total £8.6bn over the course of this parliament.

“As a consequence of government decisions, disabled people are carrying a heavier load than bankers in bring down this debt. In the final year of this parliament, cuts to disability benefits will be 40% more than the amount taken off banks.”

A Department for Work and Pensions spokesman said a number of improvements had already been made to the Work Capability Assessment, and a major review of the process was ongoing.

“The Work Capability Assessment (WCA) inherited by this government was not entirely fit for purpose and that is why we have continuously reviewed and refined it,” the spokesperson said.

“Since 2010 we have considerably improved the WCA process. We have made progress in giving people a more tailored and personal service and as a result we are seeing an increase in the number of severely disabled people being given long-term unconditional support.”

The Guardian