Category Archives: disability

Anger and fear over change from DLA to PIP

February 25, 2013   Carers, disability

Paralympics stars express concern over losing disability allowance

Medal-winning British athletes say benefit provided them with vital support during training for Paralympic Games

 

Sophie Christiansen celebrates winning one of her three gold medals for dressage at last summer’s Paralympic Games.

British Paralympic stars have voiced anger about the imminent disappearance of the Disability Living Allowance, a benefit they say provided them with vital support during training.

The athletes have expressed concern that they may not be eligible for its replacement – the Personal Independence Payment (PIP) – which will be available to fewer claimants when it is introduced in April with tightened qualification criteria.

Disability Living Allowance (DLA), worth between £20 and £131.50 a week, is designed to help disabled people meet the extra costs of disability-related care and mobility. It is not means-tested and is available to those in or out of work.

The new system is designed to cut payments by £2.24bn annually by 2015-16, resulting in 500,000 fewer claimants. More than 2 million people will begin to be reassessed from this April to gauge their eligibility for PIP.

Sophie Christiansen, who has cerebral palsy, won three gold medals at the Games in dressage. She is worried that under the new criteria, she may find herself no longer eligible for the benefit, depending on how assessors judge her ability to get around.

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Tax on carers and the disabled is not fair!

February 21, 2013   Carers, disability

A tax on carers: Charities say 420,000 disabled people will be hit by bedroom tax

 

Spare rooms are essential for many households with disabled people as they give a carer a space of their own

Thousands of disabled people could lose their homes and be plunged into debt thanks to the bedroom tax, charities say.

Anyone in a council or housing ­association property will have their housing benefit cut by 14% if they have a spare room and by 25% if they have two or more spare rooms.

But campaigners say 420,000 disabled people, their families and carers will be hit harder by the changes in April.

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What happens when a lover becomes a carer?

February 14, 2013   Carers, disability

Reviewed: It’s My Story: My Lover, My Carer on Radio 4

Sex in the afternoon.

By Antonia Quirke Published 14 February 2013

What happens when a lover becomes a carer?

It’s My Story: My Lover, My Carer
Radio 4

A one-off programme talked about sex in a way never heard on Radio 4 – the channel usually being sweetly prudish, with the very occasional exception of Woman’s Hour when one can sometimes hear Jenni Murray rather fruitily adjusting her bifocals if the subject descends, like a brass bed quietly creaking in a distant room. Which happens far less than you’d think. I’ve heard whole come-into-my- brown-study Woman’s Hour shows devoted to the menopause or cystitis without sex really being mentioned at all, as though to allow more would be seriously unwise or overwhelming, like trying to drain the Serpentine through a straw. It can come over very weird, especially when moments later someone is always banging on about delphiniums, or Lady Jacintha’s curious devotion to Dick Francis, with intense and detailed passion. Priorities ladies, please!

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