Imagine the uproar if a new (male) Minister for Women's
first press article said 'well, we all know that they are all sluts', or if a
new (white) Minister for Racial Equality's first article said 'well, we all
know that they're all terrorists', but the (non-disabled) Minister for Disabled
People fronts an article saying 'well, we all know that disabled people are all frauds
and scroungers' and no one bats an eye.
Yes, with DLA fraud at 0.3% the lowest of any benefit, new
DWP Minister of State for Disabled People Mike Penning's first public act was
to star in the latest* in the Hate Mail's ongoing demonisation of all disabled
people as frauds and scroungers by claiming that DLA is riddled with people put
there by Labour in an attempt to defraud the unemployment figures (apparently
he's a bit hazy on the fact DLA is an In Work benefit) and that 94% have
never had a medical assessment. As Sue Marsh eloquently points out, that might just be because in 94% of cases a DWP decision maker has
decided there's really not much point in checking that an amputated limb has
grown back, cerebral palsy has vanished overnight, or whatever.
Unfortunately as disabled people we're growing used to this.
You wait years for justice and then along come three Ministers Against
Disabled People in a row. First we had Miller, Miller the Cripple Killer, then
the odious 'they get better' McVey, and now Penning, whose only prior contact
with disability from a quick scout of Hansard appears to have been questions
about disabled shipping while Undersecretary of State for Transport. If you
look at his c.v. in more detail it doesn't get any more promising - squaddie in
the Grenadier Guards (and IDS is an ex-Guards officer), fireman, junior
minister at Transport, junior minister at Northern Ireland, and now us. We can
be charitable and assume that he didn't come by his disablist views
independently, but nothing in his background suggests anything likely to have
generated an informed or remotely empowering attitude to disability. He was
Shadow Minister for Health, but that's more likely to have driven him into the
'they're broken' Medical Model camp, amply reinforced by his coming of age in
the relentlessly physical Army and Fire Service. Whatever his own views, it's
clear that the institutional disablism of the Department of Work and Pensions
(or maybe just IDS's SpAd), have thoroughly nobbled him in his first week in
the job.
So once again disability advocates and activists are faced
with dragging another Minister kicking and screaming into the 20th Century, and
god forbid we manage to get one to understand the Social Model before they are
moved on. It is clear the DWP's Unum-trained advocates of the perverted Bio-Psycho-Social-Model (aka 'the scroungers have only got themselves blame if they're too lazy to recover from a
spinal cord injury') have already gotten their claws into Penning, but note
that both Miller and McVey were promoted for what they did as Minister Against
Disabled People, so clearly vilifying us in the media equals a job well done in
Cameron's eyes. I'm not sure that even Miller or McVey started their
ministerial stint with such an open attack on disabled people as frauds and
scroungers, and neither were exactly slouches at that, so keep your eye on
Penning, he may be the coming man.
Disablism, the one form of hate that's growing ever more
popular, now with extra Ministerial approval....
*I'm not going to link to it, that just drives up their
advertising revenue and convinces them that attacking disabled people gets
plenty of page hits.
Edited to add: I may have been unreasonably positive about Penning, I've just seen his interview with Disability News Service: Spending on DLA and PIP will be cut next year, says new disability minister and apparently he knows all about disability because he's friends with Simon Weston and knows some disabled ex-rugby players *headdesk* *headdesk* *headdesk*
