There’s been a right old push recently to present disabled people as a smallish group of The Truly Disabled (TTDs) and the rest, a bunch of scrounging bastards (BSBs).  The proposed Welfare Reform Bill is currently being deliberated in the Lords. In response to measured, well informed authoritative arguments by several Lords and Baronesses, the Welfare Minister, Lord Freud, mumbles and fumbles his way through a load of ill informed guff. This guff is underpinned by a version of the ‘biopsychosocial model of health and illness’. I can’t be bothered to unpack this pseudo scientific model  but basically, the government seem to be arguing that a lot of disabled people/people with long term conditions think (or pretend) they’re sick/disabled but they ain’t really. They just need a bit of a push to get ‘em off their backsides and back into the workplace. The ideal push is to overhaul the benefits system, remove the large numbers of people (BSBs) receiving lower rate of benefits and give TTDs a (slightly) bigger slice of the pie.

Sadly, it seems like a lot of the great British public are more than happy to swallow the ‘country is being dragged to its knees by this army of work-shy, thieving bastards’ line. Why that is, isn’t clear to me. But I bet anyone £1.20 that they’ve heard a version of the story “My next door neighbour is off sick… sick my arse” or “That toe rag from round the corner just got an enormous plasma tv and she ain’t worked for years” type stories on the bus, in the pub, at work, or pretty much anywhere. Any sign of flagging support for this thesis is quickly dealt with by sensational stories, such as Liddle’s ‘Pretend disabled really ARE sick’ (26/1/12, The Sun) or Dellingpole’s ‘The fake disabled are crippling our economy’ (Daily Telegraph blog, 26/1/12).

I’m sure some people do claim benefits/allowances when they shouldn’t. But I think it’s a very small number of people. We are social beings, after all. Work (whether paid or unpaid) is of central importance to our everyday lives. Not being able to work, through ill health or lack of jobs, is demoralising, depressing, frustrating, dissatisfying and can lead to feelings of meaningless.  Here’s an extract from an interview with a man diagnosed with Asperger syndrome*;

I could go on and on, chucking out stats, referencing the Spartacus report (funded, researched and written by disabled people)  that lays bare the deceitful spin operated by the government in relation to the Welfare Reform Bill,  ask how the BSBs will be distinguished from TTDs in practice, demand to know how a cabinet made up of 23 millionaires (and probably 3 ‘pretty damn rich too’ ministers) can possibly have any understanding of the lives of  disabled/ill people, etc etc etc. But I won’t. I’ll just have a little thinky about how this will all pan out in the end.

According to Freud, getting back into the workplace (cough cough.. I know, I know… but let’s just pretend there are jobs for now, eh?) will ‘cure’ this group (AND help them bring up less feral children AND maintain their relationships). In practice of course, it will lead to (even more?) grinding, heartless, miserable, impoverished lives for a lot of people (and their families) and increasing health, social and economic inequalities between the rich and the poor.

And what about TTD? This gleamingly innocent, honest, worthy, hugely dependent group who will get a (well deserved) rise in their benefits? Well as far as I can see, they will be on a fast track to being patronised and pushed even further to the edges of society. After a few sensational, pathetic, heart wrenching stories are splashed across the media to make everyone feel better, of course.

*Interview extract from the Life on the Autism Spectrum section on Healthtalkonline.