John Pring, who runs the Disability News Service, publishes his weekly news round-up of the happenings in the disability world the past week.
• A disabled activist set to fight next month’s by-election in Corby has become the first candidate to be backed by a new political movement that wants to see non-career politicians elected to parliament.
• The chancellor has sparked an angry reaction after pledging to make another £10 billion worth of benefit cuts in the first year after the next general election.
• Local authorities have admitted that government plans to close the Independent Living Fund in 2015 will probably see a cut to the support received by most of its users, with some forced to rely on relatives or charities.
• David Cameron has been heavily criticised for appearing to use his disabled son and father in his main party conference speech in a bid to justify cuts to disability benefits.
• The new minister for disabled people has laid out three ways in which she hopes to support more disabled people into employment, less than a month into her new job.
• The new health secretary has suggested there could be further delays to reform of the funding of long-term care and support.
• A disability charity has supported and sponsored a trio of disabled activists to take their campaigning work to the three main party conferences.
• A disabled woman sacked by a council from her temporary post after taking time off with depression has won an employment tribunal case – after a three-year legal battle – that should help other agency workers fight discrimination.
• A disabled Conservative parliamentary candidate has admitted that comments by George Osborne in a speech to his party conference risked causing “collateral damage” to disabled benefits claimants.
For links to the full stories, please visit Disability News Service.
Disability News Service (DNS) is run by John Pring, an experienced journalist who has been reporting on disability issues for more than 15 years.
