09/06/2024
The Disability News Service reports that disability campaigners, including LGBTQIA disabled activists, have reacted with horror at the news that the charity Scope has partnered with the transphobic and anti-asylum seeker right wing rag the Daily Express for its Disability Equality Awards Ceremony. Yen Godden, a disability advocate said: “I am shocked that Scope has chosen to partner with the Daily Express, especially after the last Scope awards white-out scandal and their public commitments to do better and listen to those who are multiply marginalised." Yen continued "the Express consistently villainises marginalised groups such as refugees, the LGBTQIA+ community, especially trans people” to sell newspapers and generate clickbait. She said: “In my family, my grandmother’s generation were refugees. It’s painful and distressing to hear the fear and vitriol whipped up against asylum-seekers by tabloids like the Daily Express repeated to me by people in my daily life.” Disability advocate Sara Westrop said that, as a disabled non-binary person, they were surprised to hear of the partnership, “considering the numerous ways they have contributed towards the increasingly hostile environment in the UK directed towards disabled people and trans people. “The Express regularly shares articles painting disabled people as drains on society, resources and money. They have hundreds of articles which paint trans people as dangerous, and they’re full of misinformation on trans healthcare. Recent ones that come to mind are showing support for Sunak’s barbaric reformation of disability benefits and the celebration of the biased and poorly researched Cass review that led to the banning of puberty blockers for trans children.” She added: “The intersectionality of the disabled community is vast and genuinely diverse. We strive for collective liberation." The government, which the Daily Express backs to the hilt, has, according to many disability campaigners, caused the deaths of many people who rely on benefits with their rhetoric about a supposed "sick note culture" in the UK. For their part, Scope said that they did disagree with the scurrilous right wing papers assault on disabled people. In a statement issued after government plans for welfare reform were announced, the charity's CEO said "This feels like a full-on assault on disabled people. These proposals are dangerous and risk leaving disabled people destitute. In a cost of living crisis, looking to slash disabled people’s income by hitting PIP is a horrific proposal. Calls are pouring into our helpline from concerned disabled people. Life costs more for disabled people. Threatening to take away the low amount of income PIP provides to disabled people who face £975 a month extra costs isn’t going to solve the problem of economic inactivity. Sanctions and ending claims will only heap more misery on people at the sharp end of our cost of living crisis. Much of the current record levels of inactivity are because our public services are crumbling, the quality of jobs is poor and the rate of poverty amongst disabled households is growing."
https://www.disabilitynewsservice.com/activists-shock-as-scope-sacrifice...
