DLA reform: coalition is exaggerating benefit fraud for its own benefit

The Guardian reports today that paralympian, Lady Tanni Grey-Thompson, has warned that disability benefit cuts will affect the development of top athletes and undermine the Games’ key legacy aim of widening access to sport for disabled people.

Grey-Thompson, who won 11 Paralympic gold medals as a wheelchair athlete, said disability living allowance (DLA) had been crucial in enabling her and many other disabled athletes to participate and compete. “It’s important to recognise that the cuts will affect Paralympians, who have higher living costs as a result of their impairment.”

Tanni Grey-Thompson warns that Paralympic legacy is threatened by cuts

Sue Marsh, of Spartacus report fame, has a piece in the Guardian today.

Byrne’s speech was significant. He promised to “talk to disabled people up and down the country”. He wanted to make “rights a reality” for sick and disabled people. As a disability campaigner, I care that he broke the political consensus. He talked about us as though we were human beings. He promised to listen.

Did he do so out of a profound sense of right and wrong? Almost certainly not. He did it because sick and disabled people have become organised, vocal and credible. He did it because, politically, it started to make sense. But he did it. And perhaps, just perhaps, the darkest days for our most vulnerable turned a corner.

Disabled people have become a political force to be reckoned with