John Pring, who runs the Disability News Service, publishes his weekly news round-up of the happenings in the disability world the past week.
• Many of the country’s leading disabled people’s organisations and disabled activists have agreed to set up a new campaigning network in a bid to unite the disability movement.
• The government has refused to say which organisations it approached in advance about setting up a new “alliance” of disabled people’s organisations, charities, and private and public sector organisations.
• The organisers of London 2012 have been heavily criticised after admitting that only 37 of the 1,100 volunteers who performed in the Paralympic Games closing ceremony were disabled people.
• The Liberal Democrats have refused to rule out further government attacks on disability benefits, even though their president has suggested the party will not allow any more cuts.
• The chancellor, George Osborne, and his civil servants in the Treasury are to blame for the government’s failure to deliver vital reform of the funding of long-term care and support, according to the former Liberal Democrat care services minister.
• A disabled Liberal Democrat MP has insisted that the government is “moving in the right direction” with its programme of welfare reforms.
• The new Liberal Democrat care services minister has admitted he is not convinced that the necessary safeguards can be found that would allow assisted suicide to be legalised, despite backing calls for new laws.
• A disabled woman has told the Liberal Democrat conference how cuts to her benefits have reduced her to living on 50 pence a day and eating at soup kitchens.
• Liberal Democrats have voted overwhelmingly in favour of resisting any further cuts to welfare spending that would fall “disproportionately” on disabled people.
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.
