Anyone interested in Disability Alliance's response to the latest welfare reform Green Paper 'No one written off: reforming welfare to reward responsibility' can find it here

Nyone interested in the response from the Welsh welfare rights adivsers, WRAC, can get a copy by emailing me.

and here's the Disability Benefits Consortium's ..

http://www.disabilityalliance.org/dbcnoone.pdf

'Secretary of State for Work and Pensions James Purnell today marked the end of the 13-week consultation on the Government's radical plans to reform the welfare system ...

... The initial feedback shows that many of the key planks of reform suggested in the green paper No one written off: reforming welfare to reward responsibility, have been broadly welcomed.'

http://www.dwp.gov.uk/mediacentre/pressreleases/2008/oct/drc105-241008.asp

Hmm, obviously haven't got to the TUC's response yet then....

The TUC has slammed Government proposals for workfare that force unemployed people to work on community service schemes in return for their benefits in its submission to the welfare reform Green Paper today (Wednesday). TUC website

ssac response in rightsnet news today ....

the link to the ssac response goes to the miscellaneous amendments link. is it gremlins again?

talking of little gremlins, it looks as if somebody has been feeding james purnell after midnight, and nobody, not even the sages of the ssac will move him...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2008/nov/02/children-welfare

Mmmmm he was mentioned in Saturdays Guardian, i.e. when he was Blair's special media advisor in 1998 when they were trying to be of help to Murdoch.

oh doOd... ! : ) i wish they wouldn't let foetal secretaries of state out consorting with oligarchs and plutocrats when they are at such an impressio9nable age...

oh well, plenty for the dartboard, but couldn't find any with murdoch, unsurprisingly...

http://bogusjourneys.blogspot.com/
http://www.dwp.gov.uk/pensionsreform/forum/photos/collection4/

I think I'm going to be sick!

hi jj ...

link to ssac news story works fine for me ... may have been because you clicked on it at the exact moment we were publishing a new story?

cheers shawn

SSAC expresses major reservations about welfare reform Green Paper proposals

thanks for this shawn. it certainly works fine now, but before i couldn't get it, i just don't know why...sob... i feel like such a failure...

anyway, isn't it funny how carefully something like the following has to be worded, in order to be truthful? -
"The initial feedback shows that many of the key planks of reform suggested in the green paper No one written off: reforming welfare to reward responsibility, have been broadly welcomed. These include:" - (6 help and support, and funding measures).

the heroic SSAC crack me up... they are severely disapproving in the most polite way possible, but the SoS can't be in any doubt what their well made points really mean, even though the word cack is not mentioned at all. here's a lovely example -

"We note that the Green Paper proposes (para 2.20) exploring giving
advisers the power to require full time activity at any stage of the claim
particularly focussing upon those who repeatedly claim JSA. The rationale for this is the suggestion that people leave benefit for paid employment in an attempt to rejoin the JSA regime at an earlier stage with weaker requirements on them (para 2.21). We can find no empirical evidence to suggest that this occurs and note that it would require a detailed knowledge of JSA regulations on the part of the customer."