Forum Home → Discussion → Access to justice and advice sector issues → Thread
More responsible, well crafted and accurate reporting
“Motability was launched in 1978 with a handful of specially modified cars, such as motorised blue three-wheel trikes and Mini Clubman Estates with a ramp at the back for a wheelchair.”
I think they meant this was the scheme Motability replaced in place since the 50’s?
“To get the mobility element, families of sufferers must prove they need ‘guidance or supervision most of the time from another person when walking out of doors in unfamiliar places’. They can either spend it themselves on transport, or have it paid direct to Motability to provide a lease car.”
Hmmmm. Good luck with your appeal on that one.
“Mike Betts, its chief executive, earns £1.17?million a year. Its website openly advises claimants how to use the benefit to get luxury cars such as a £30,000 Audi A6, a £35,000 BMW X3 or a £37,000 Toyota Land Cruiser.”
No mention that the four major banks own Motability a NFP company and if they were unhappy (or not) at the salary structure. And no mention that the cars are sold on the open market after leasing to buyers who will need a bank loan to buy a 3yr old Audi A6 if one was ever leased on Motability (deposit is POA). Probably.
“Last night a senior Whitehall source said: ‘We are determined to crack down on the spiralling disability benefit bill, stamp out abuses and increase the transparency of the system.’ “
BTW A BMW X3 requires a £9500 deposit and I have no idea why one would put down a deposit on a ve-hicle that says “sorry I cannot afford an X5 .”
[ Edited: 10 Oct 2011 at 09:24 am by John Birks ]For more on the original Motability Scheme mainstay, the Invacar (because Mark my colleaugue can’t remember them.)
http://www.3wheelers.com/invacar.html
http://www.3wheelers.com/endinva.html
http://petrolblog.com/2010/05/20/what-ever-happened-to-the-ac-invacar/
My goodness, that takes me back. Haven’t seen one in years. I wonder if there are any still out there? They were the car equivalent of NHS glasses I always thought.
As for the Daily Mail report… they really are the pits aren’t they? Trouble is, people genuinely believe the rubbish they read in the tabloid press.
Well, if the Mail has its way they’ll be bringing back the three-wheelers (steady on that corner now). And after the Work Programme, I’m waiting for the Work House to make a comeback too. Three strikes and you’re in. I’ve got a lot of rocks in my back garden that need breaking up…
Agreed!
From http://fullfact.org/factchecks/disability_benefits_motability_ADHD_Mail-3025
The Mail claims that it sourced its figures - after some ‘persistence’ - from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). We therefore followed suit and contacted them for some clarification.
They pointed us in the direction of this document, which breaks down those receiving the mobility component of the DLA by main disabling condition and mobility rate in May 2010.
There are 39,500 people receiving the mobility component of DLA for whom ADHD - referred to by the DWP as Hyperkinetic Syndrome (HS) - is their main disabling condition.
Of these however, only 100 are in the Higher Mobility Component of the DLA and therefore eligible for the Motability scheme.
This would seem to wholly refute the claim that there are 3,200 people with ADHD/HS who use the Motability Car Scheme. It should also be noted that these figures have been rounded to the nearest hundred, so the figure may be even lower.
Indeed the DWP itself warns that figures under 500 are “subject to a high degree of sampling error and should only be used as a guide.”
So where is the 3,200 figure coming from?
In another part of the article the Daily Mail refers to all behavioural disorders as ‘ADHD-related’.
The number of people whose main disabling factor is a behaviour disorder in the HMC category is 3,100. Added with the 100 people who have HS, this comes to 3,200, the same figure as the Daily Mail puts forward. It would therefore seem likely that this is the source of the Daily Mail’s claim.
To describe all behaviour disorders as ‘ADHD-related’ is highly misleading and in conflict with the information provided in ‘The Disability Handbook’. While the handbook deals with the HS and other behaviour disorders in the same chapter, it also gives two different judgements on the effect of the these disabilities on mobility.
Good heavens, doesnt the Daily mail ever check anything properly- as someone who has to deal with the despair caused by some of the more ill considered decisions of the DWP and the fallout from ill informed press coment I wish there was some central body that would routinely challenge such poorly researched articles.
I suppose we can all look forward to a glut of appeals for HR Mob on SMI grounds in about three months time, what a lovely way to start 2012.
Disgusted of Truro
The Mail don’t need to research this stuff properly - they know EXACTLY what they are doing. If they did they would not be able to report this tripe and therefore be unable to whip up their readership into a benefit based hysteria. Its the old chestnut : tell people a lie often enough and then it will become truth. Some Austrian guy said this, Adolf someone (his surname escapes me).
The government were also asked to tell certain newspaper editors to stop this type of inaccurate reporting as it was inflammatory. The response was that they were unable to intefere with editorial policy as long as we have a “free” press. Disgusting.
There is someone who regularly and forensically destroys the shoddy journalism of the Daily Mail, and others. See here.
The Mail don’t need to research this stuff properly - they know EXACTLY what they are doing. If they did they would not be able to report this tripe and therefore be unable to whip up their readership into a benefit based hysteria. Its the old chestnut : tell people a lie often enough and then it will become truth. Some Austrian guy said this, Adolf someone (his surname escapes me).
The government were also asked to tell certain newspaper editors to stop this type of inaccurate reporting as it was inflammatory. The response was that they were unable to intefere with editorial policy as long as we have a “free” press. Disgusting.
I seem to remember reading a first edition of a newspaper, reproduced to celebrate its 100th year anniversary. From the inaugral edition I found that the problems affecting Her Majesty’s United Kingdom at the time were foreign types sneaking into the country aboard ships and lax immigration controls.
Hmmmmmm.
100yrs plus out of that chestnut? Good going.
[ Edited: 11 Oct 2011 at 01:59 pm by John Birks ]Just to let people know that Disability Benefits Consortium has written a letter of complaint to the Daily Mail about their inaccurate reporting in this article, as well as copying the letter to the Press Complaints Commission.
Dear Simon Walters and Glen Owen,
We were very disappointed to read your misleading and inaccurate article on DLA and access to Motability. We believe your piece fails to meet the Editors’ Code of Practice on Accuracy as it is extremely unlikely that there are 99,000 people with ‘ADHD’ accessing Motability vehicles, or parents abusing the system to claim £10,000 a year in disability benefits. These figures are not upheld by evidence. We also suspect your article breaches the Code’s Discrimination clause through pejorative references to disability (‘naughty child syndrome’ being an example).
We have previously requested to collectively meet with Editors to discuss welfare issues in the context of the Government’s welfare reform plans which will see hundreds of thousands of disabled people lose support. This request has been ignored and another article has appeared which uses misleading and inaccurate figures, potentially discriminatory language and fails to air concerns in a legitimate or proportionate manner.
Apparently the paper in question is launching a corrections and clarifications column on page2 from next week.
I presume this means they’ll be moving to a broad page format?
The website I cite has finally responded
“Richard Littlejohn repeats lies about Motability scheme
October 11, 2011 – 9:45 pm
Richard Littlejohn bases his main drivel today on the Daily Mail article that claimed 3,200 parents of ADHD children are receiving taxpayer-funded cars via the Motability scheme. Littlejohn adds in his own embellishment – he claims to have had a conversation with a local BMW dealer who claimed that they would be out of business without it and that most of the BMW 1 Series they sold went to Motability customers. Hmm… nothing like the age-old technique of relying on a conversation that you may or may not have had to form the thrust of your argument, is there?
Anyway, Full Fact had already taken issue with the original Mail article and concluded:
The Daily Mail’s claim that 3,200 people with ADHD have used the Motability Car Scheme is inaccurate.
The number eligible for higher rate DLA – and therefore Motability vehicles – is recoded as 100 by the DWP, some way short of the figure given by the Mail.
However even if we conflate behavioural disorders with ADHD, as the Mail appears to have done, it is likely that the number using the scheme would fail to top the 3,200 claimed, as only 30 per cent of those eligible end up using the scheme.
To cap it all off, the article also downplays the severity of the disability that is needed to qualify for the Motability Scheme.
Richard Littlejohn, for his part, also downplays this aspect by claiming that:
Even naughty schoolboys diagnosed with the make-believe disease ‘Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder’ (ADHD) are classified as disabled.
And, as for Littlejohn’s claim that:
The Motability scheme started with the best of intentions…
But Motability was never designed to supply free BMWs to the perfectly-fit families of little boys who can’t sit still in class.
Which seems to contradict his earlier claim that such a car could only be leased with a ‘modest top-up payment’ – which means: ‘not free’. As for the ‘modest top-up payment’ and ‘free BMWs’ claims made by Littlejohn, Full Fact dealt with this rubbish back in June when the ‘free BMWs to Motability users!’ stories first started doing the rounds:
The use of a BMW as an example of a ‘free’ car is particularly misleading, as DLA claimants wishing to have use of one through the scheme must actually put forward several thousands of pounds of their own money to qualify.
Just another wonderful day of fact-free journalism.”
Apparently the paper in question is launching a corrections and clarifications column on page2 from next week.
I presume this means they’ll be moving to a broad page format?
Here’s the Mail’s correction as published on their website now.
Last Sunday we said some 3,200 families of children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder were believed to have been given cars under the Motability scheme. In fact that total is the combined figure for two categories of recipients of the Higher Mobility component of the Disability Living Allowance and includes other behavioural disorders. Recipients choose whether or not to spend their allowance on a Motability car; generally about 30 per cent do so. Also, we described the qualification for the Lower Mobility component, rather than the Higher Mobility component required to claim a car, for which individuals must be declared virtually unable to walk.
[ Edited: 17 Oct 2011 at 03:18 pm by Paul Treloar ]That’s a result!
I wonder if there are a few parents who would personally like to demonstrate to the Mail, what it’s like to care for children with severe behavioural problems?
I should think so. Nothing to do, I suppose, with the ongoing Levenson enquiry and Paul Dacre’s spirited but ultimately unconvincing attempt to defend the widely criticized Press Complaints Commission.
Motability have now put a statement out: