At Green Party Autumn Conference in Brighton, Alan Wheatley, the party's disability spokesperson, will address the Green Party Trade Union Group fringe meeting on Saturday 5th September, to talk of his experience and reactions to Labour and Conservative welfare reform machinations.
Alan Wheatley said today: "I am the only Disability Spokesperson for a major political party who now receives the new Employment & Support Allowance. Mind you, I was recently denied ESA when an 'Examining Medical Practitioner' from Atos Medical Services awarded myself and untold number of others "0 points on all eligibility criteria."
"Labour and Tory politicians are at war with claimants of disability related benefits and with single parents. Too many disability charities are also colluding with government[1]. In that war, disinformation is a major weapon that promotes the interests of corporate capital rather than the rights of vulnerable people," he says[2].
"While President Obama is countering the stranglehold private health insurance has over American society, the changes to UK disability benefits are modelled on the American health insurance industry and promoted by its major players as 'consultants' to the UK Government."[3]
"Against that backdrop, it is refreshing that the British Library has accepted the Green Party's response to the welfare reform debate for its 'Welfare Reform on the Web' portal."[4]
Labour and Conservative plans to take people off out-of-paid-work benefits do not address the real issues of our time.[5]
The focus of Green Party follow-through to 'Writing Off Workfare: for a Green New Deal, not the flexible New Deal' (2008) has yet to be decided. Come and join in the informed decision-making that the GPTU Group fringe event will help.stir up. As Thomas Jefferson said, "Democracy presupposes knowledge."
--
Notes to Editors:
[1] www.benefitsandwork.co.uk/news/latest-news/1096-naive-and-complacent-charities-threaten-aa-a-dla
[2] carerwatchdotcom.myfineforum.org/ftopic711-120.php
[3] www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jun/22/welfare-reform-bill-mental-health
[4] Copies of 'Writing Off Workfare: for a Green New Deal, not the flexible New Deal' were sent out from Green Party Press Office to major national news media outlets in October 2008, but it has been buried by those outlets. However, by attending a British Sociological Association 'Early Careers Forum' event at the British Library in late July 2009, mature Sociology graduate Alan heard of the Welfare Reform on the Web portal and thus managed to get the work that he co-authored with Anne Gray mentioned at . 'Writing Off Workfare' can be downloaded from . Twelve years after graduation, Alan's volunteering as Green Party Disability Spokesperson has contributed more constructively to his career development than any government-mandated New Deal 'intensive activities period' could ever do.
[5] After economic meltdown that has led to calls for cuts in public spending, the service cuts that meet the least resistance are those affecting the most excluded members of society, including disabled people, single parents, and immigrant populations with limited grasp of English. ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) course funding is being cut, leading to severe job losses. (See University and College Union website . Adult learners of basic 21st Century communication skills -- including UK born with learning difficulties and adult learners from overseas -- are not supported in contributing to society or the big debates affecting their lives. That former welfare reform guru to New Labour, David Freud, has become an adviser to the Tories and is an investment banker says a lot about Labour and Tory agendas when global warming and fuel poverty are signs of our time.