This should have been published last night, but my connection has been down since around midnight and not long come back.
Lord Freud of Mendacity has been bitching and whining about disabled people having a “lifestyle” funded by the state. A tad ironic as the prick gets £300 a day just for showing up at the Lords.
But, hey, I’m disabled, and I have a lifestyle on the state.
(With apologies to “Sixteen Tons” – an American folk song)
I wrote what follows on January 20, 2009. Seems uncomfortably prescient now, except for the change of focus to smartcards.
In the Guardian, today, George Monbiot floats the idea that privately-issued currency, in the form of time-limited private scrip (i.e. the money is for spending – if you hoard it, it becomes worthless – and thus the economy remains buoyant), is one potential solution to the present crisis. This would operate alongside sterling, not instead of it.
This idea does have historical precedent Continue reading
People are getting wound up, and rightly so, by Osborne’s lumping of ESA in with unemployment benefits, not with disability benefits, thus allowing it to be effectively cut by the imposing of a 1% increase (disability benefits aren’t affected).
However, the government has been referring to ESA as Continue reading
I’ve been writing more than usual about food of late, which seems to be well received, especially as it’s brought my blog some new followers, and based on the Likes, and comments, but every time I write, I wonder – just how high is the risk to my DLA?
I cannot – hand on heart – if provided with the ingredients, cook a meal, a fact which Continue reading
I wrote the following just prior to the 2010 spending review – interesting, and depressing, to compare what was promised with what’s happened since and what’s going to happen.
I would draw your attention to the section on the loss of DLA, near the end – the ramifications of which extend well beyond just DLA.
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Spending cuts are coming – are you worried?
October 13, 2010 by Ron
Before we Continue reading
I’ve debated at length whether or not to publish this post, and I think I have to have one last attempt at making people understand.
As I’ve explained at great length, in several blog posts, starting over two years ago, plus even a permanent page, and I’ve done so politely, three times, and angrily once (and still my wishes are ignored), I cannot answer questions on whether or not you are entitled to a particular benefit – so there is no point in dropping your medical history in my lap.
Nor can I explain why you didn’t Continue reading
For the first time in a while, a question from my search-engine slush pile “will the DLA know if I start a part time job?”
Whether they know or not doesn’t matter – they don’t care.
Contrary to what the cretins at the Daily Mail and the Torygraph seem to think, DLA is Continue reading
For those of you seduced by the seemingly endless torrent of benefit-related lies from the Daily Mail, from free BMWs for the disabled to today’s crock of shit that DLA is available just for the asking, I recommend the Twitter hashtag #MyDLA, and the document that @LucyTweeting has created from the contributions. Continue reading
I keep saying this but there are still people who don’t bloody well pay attention, despite the fact that I have explained why, at length, several times – I am far too ill to be able to offer benefits advice beyond what has already been published; everything Continue reading
A note for Atos.
Nobody is libelling you here but, equally, we, in the disabled community, have every right to criticise and question what we perceive to be a deeply defective system, and one which has a staggeringly malign influence on our lives. Atos – you are NOT exempt from criticism. Nobody is. Continue reading
Ron's Rants... 