Can compassionate reform survive in the face of the riots?

The riots and looting of recent days have shocked the whole country, shaken it to the core. In response there has been what seems like a race to be most strident in condemning the rioters. Whilst their actions are certainly utterly unacceptable it is not for the compassionate reform group to look to their punishment under the law.


The question for us is whether compassionate reform has a role to play here as well. The answer is of course yes. The responses to these incidents have been - with a few honourable exceptions - notable for the lack of consideration and understanding of the wider political and social context.

We live in a society in which - to quote a famous film of the 80s - greed is good. We have placed the pursuit of wealth above almost all other considerations. Of course not everybody has bought into this consumerist dream/nightmare.

But whatever our actions as individuals we must recognise our shared responsibility as members of society. We must recognise that these people are a part of our society also and question how our society came to raise people who consider this awful behaviour acceptable. We must try to find what little common ground we may have in order to understand their actions in the wider context and work to ensure this doesn't happen again.

We must offer our society's youth hope and education and opportunities to better themselves so that they can take pride in themselves and their communities. Our political system must be opened up so that everybody has a say.

Above all we must remodel our society to get back the values that made it great to begin with - compassion, respect, tolerance, love, community. We must place these things before and above the urge to consume and accumulate.

Only then can we truly and compassionately reform our society and only then can we hope never to see dark days such as these again.

The Condem Coalition.. 1 year in power.

At the DRP we believe in being inclusive. This blog is no exception and so we invite people and organisations from outside the party to contribute their knowledge and perspectives. Our first piece in this vein comes from Adam Lotun of WORKPLACE DISABILITY ADJUSTMENTS.

It provides, as the title suggests, a scathing review of the performance of the coalition on matters pertaining to the disabled and others most vulnerable in society.

When the ConDem Coalition took over the seat of power at Downing Street in 2010, there was a sense of foreboding as to what was to come from the Disabled Community. These fears and apprehensions have been well founded and justified, following the attacks against the Disabled Community with the policy of cutting 20% from the Department of Works and Pensions Budget and the published intent to remove millions of disabled claimants from the Incapacity Benefit and Disability Living Allowance Benefit figures. In bringing their plans to fruition, the Coalition Government has taken steps to harass and victimise the Disabled Community and create a of hate against one of the most vulnerable groups within UK Society. At the outset, there was a sustained agenda of misinformation to the public via the media by Government Ministers and Senior Civil Servants to portray people claiming these benefits as workshy scrounging layabouts and the pariah of the decent and honest citizens of our communities. Day after day, there would be soundbites and press releases giving details of benefit claimants being accused of fraudulently claiming disability benefits, which had an effect, over a period of time, to create a sense of anger and distrust specifically against disabled people to stigmatise them and their families.

The next step in the Coalition Government’s continued harassment and victimisation of the Disabled Community came about through the introduction of the Work Capability Assessment, carried out by their preferred contractors ATOS Healthcare. The Work Capability Assessment had been designed in such a way as to be so biased in the way it captured data, to ensure that not just possible fraudulent claimants were weeded out of the system, but also to capture honest claimants and move them from the Disability Living Allowance to Jobseekers Allowance and Employment Support Allowance and to remove support and gateway benefits that they were entitled to through the eligibility of Disability Living Allowance. The Work Capability Assessment has been labelled as “unfit for purpose” by Disability Charities and Organisations and also identified as being “flawed” by Professor Harrington to the Works and Pensions select Committee. However, despite these damning criticisms of the Work Capability Assessment, it has continued to be used by ATOS Healthcare, on behalf of the Department of Works and Pensions to deny much needed benefits, resources and specialist services to disabled claimants. Disabled Charities and Organisations, under the lead of the Disability Alliance, have now taken legal action against the Coalition Government about the use of the Work Capability Assessment in its current set-up. Complaints have also been made by the Equalities & Human Rights Commission and their counterparts in Scotland, Wales & N.Ireland, to the Joint Committee on Human Rights, as to the fact that the Coalition Government’s Workfare Policies, which include the use of the Work Capability assessment to identify disability claimants as being ‘fit for work’, failing under the Human Rights Act 1998 under Articles that prevent “Forced Labour”. The current Workfare Policies have also been claimed to fall foul of existing Disability Discrimination Act 1995/2005, the Equality act 2010, European Equal Treatment Framework Directives and the United Nations Convention of Rights of Disabled People that was ratified by the UK in 2009.

As if all of this harassment and victimisation against the Disabled Community was not enough, the Coalition Government also embarked on further moves to penalise people for being disabled by making moves to abolish the Disability Living Allowance Benefit and replacing it with a Personal Independent Payment, that is supposed to ensure that disability focused benefits are used by disabled people for the correct needs and requirements as dictated by the Department of Works and Pensions. This move has been called discriminatory by Disabled Charities & Organisations and has also led to the formation of Disability Activist Pressure Groups to challenge this unfair and unjust move against Disability Living Allowance. Disability Living Allowance was introduced under the Thatcher Administration to ensure that disabled people were able to meet the high costs of specialist services and resources and support as it had finally been recognised that living with a disability was far more expensive and complicated than living without a disability. Disability Living Allowance was designed to meet two specific areas of life for disabled people, Care and Mobility, and these two components were awarded in specific levels, Low, Medium and High Rate Care Components and Low and High Rate Mobility Components. The new Personal Independent Payments will not recognise anyone receiving Low rate Care or Low Rate Mobility Components, leaving millions of disabled people without access to the specialist services, support and resources that they need in order to manage their disabling conditions on a day to day basis. The Minister for Disabled People – Maria Miller MP has released eligibility criteria of the proposed Personal Independence Payment and, although these are still under consultation, it is clear that the eligibility criteria have been moulded into a format that will make impossible for disabled claimants to again access those specialist services, support and resources that they need in order to manage their disabling conditions on a day to day basis. This move will not only have a direct impact on the lives of disabled people, but also on the specialist business services that were created and developed to meet these specific needs and requirements and also employ many individuals delivering highly specialised services and support via small and medium sized businesses. There have already been a number of closures of such businesses and this has led to disabled people having to undertake tasks that have directly impacted on their conditions, causing their disabilities to worsen, some people to acquire new disabling conditions and a huge increase in mental health issues in a vulnerable section of our community and a further call on already stretched NHS Services.

Far from being a Government that is fair and honest and one that is trying to promote a ‘Big Society’, this Coalition of ConDems have shown themselves to be one that has no respect for the Common Man and is responsible for a number of vulnerable people being targeted by ignorant bigots, brining about a steep rise in disability hate crime figures and also to the increase in suicide numbers within the Disabled Community. As Ahsley Skinner MP challenged the Prime Minister – David Cameron on 11^th May 2011 at Prime Miniters Question Time at the Palace of Westminster, why is it that there were groups of disabled people marching outside the House and demonstrating against loss of benefits and rights that they had been entitled to before the current Administration came into Power?

The new homelessness crisis

In the Guardian this week there was news of a letter recently leaked from the office of Eric Pickles, the communities secretary, to David Cameron. The letter tells how coalition plans to cap benefits at £500 per week per family risk making up to 40,000 families homeless.

The letter shows, perhaps once and for all, that coalition policies are actively harmful to the poorest and most vulnerable in society. This we already knew, but arguably the most shocking thing about this whole affair is that it is so unnecessary.

As the letter and the evidence shows, the likelihood is that this policy will actually result in higher costs overall to the taxpayer! To quote the article:

"An estimated £270m saving from the benefits cap will be wiped out by the need to divert resources to help the newly homeless and is likely to "generate a net cost"."

 

Surely then, the government must look again at this policy. The Compassionate Reform group - and the DRP as a whole - believes that these policies are morally wrong. But even those who believe that cuts are necessary must accept that the idea of cuts is to save money! Accounting tricks that take expenses 'off the books' for central government - and place the burden on local authorities already facing cuts of their own - are a poor substitute indeed for proper policy making. 

One of the essential ideas underpinning the notion of compassionate reform has to be that human cost must be considered at least as much as financial cost in policy making. 

 

In this instance, when human cost and financial cost are measured together this coalition policy clearly fails at every level. The CR group and the DRP intend to speak out against this flawed policy (and others like it) using a combination of evidence based policy and active campaigning.  

What compassionate reform means

Obviously compassionate reform is a broad title and, in the context of the Democratic Reform Party, it applies to several specific policy areas.

But perhaps we would be best served by actually going back to the definitions of the words themselves. So...

Compassion (from Latin: "co-suffering") is a virtue — one in which the emotional capacities of empathy and sympathy (for the suffering of others) are regarded as a part of love itself, and a cornerstone of greater social interconnection and humanism — foundational to the highest principles in philosophy, society, and personhood.

Highest principles - big claim I know! But actually the key phrase there is '...cornerstone of greater social interconnection...'

Humans are, at heart, a social species. That social instinct may manifest in either competitive or cooperative forms (or sometimes both, just for added confusion). But it is always there. So it should be clear to us that compassion - the empathy and sympathy for others is amongst the most fundamental parts of who we are. 

Now sympathy is all well and good as a part of the human condition but, in political terms, it doesn't serve all that much purpose to be honest. Empathy on the hand, is absolutely vital. The ability to understand the needs and feelings of others is central to political life and action. 

Reform:

1 a : to put or change into an improved form or condition  

b : to amend or improve by change of form or removal of faults or abuses

Fairly self explanatory really. So how do we tie the two together. 

Put simply we must improve the form of the system and remove its faults - but we must do so without ever forgetting that the system exists by the creation of and for the purposes of humans, with all their attendant faults. 

We must strive to understand the needs of the people. Where the DRP does something new here, is that it does this by taking the radical step of actually listening to the people and including them in it! This is true throughout the party but it is perhaps especially true within the CR group. 

The people we would look to represent and help have the most need. They need society to help them and it is our moral duty to listen and to act to do so. By including them in this group - along with appropriate experts, advocates and policy makers - we empower them to control their own lives and help each other. Along the way there is benefit to society and so everybody wins!

Simple really isn't it? So why is the DRP the only party doing it?! 

Join us, and be a part of the reform.

Policy areas...

So, as I said in the last post, there are a number of policy areas grouped together under the banner 'compassionate reform'. What this banner means for the party generally and for society at large we can cover in another post another time.

This post though is to look at some of the more important policy areas - to summarise what those areas mean and what the party policy is on them. Please bear in mind when reading these that the DRP is set up to reflect the views of its members. If you see anything you're not sure about or even disagree with - tell us! We want and need to know what you think. This party is about you!

So... There are 6 key policy areas to cover in this post. For ease I will quote from the party manifesto wherever possible. The policy areas are:

1. Homelessness:  the manifesto says:  "For one of the richest countries in the world it’s disgusting to know that 400,000 of us are homeless. We will do everything we can to end homelessness once and for all. This does not mean massive tax increases. It means giving a helping hand, and letting homeless people themselves get back on their feet. It means: working with charities and organisations; empowering the homeless to choose how they build a new life; tackling the causes with long term guidance, counselling, support, education and training; supporting effective ‘staging programs’, where continued support is provided for the homeless as they progress stage by stage towards a new life; tax relief schemes for construction companies who can provide low cost accommodation for the homeless and having the guts to do the plain obvious, like putting empty homes to use. Yet it also means wider reforms to the system. GDP is only one contributing factor to happiness and quality of life. Introducing more effective measures of welfare would insist that politicians act to help the most vulnerable within our society, and recognise how rising living costs are affecting people."
   
   
2. The disabled: The manifesto says:  "There are many chronic and degenerative medical conditions that are not officially recognised by the Department of Work and Pensions, despite being recognised by the majority of first world countries. We would accept, and formally recognise all medical conditions that have been documented by the medical community, and where these have not yet been recognised, but where evidence suggests their existence, the party would discuss their inclusion."
   
   
3. Modern day slaves: The manifesto says: "In 2006 Labour proposed to rescind the rights of migrant domestic workers, and refused to sign the Council of Europe Convention on Action Against Trafficking in Human Beings. In 2010 the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats refused to endorse an EU directive seeking to tackle sex slavery. Slavery is alive and well today, and we intend to fight for its abolition. There are 27 million slaves in the world today, more than at any time in human history, and 15,000 of those are in the UK!
   
   To abolish slavery we need to act together with other nations around the world (for example by endorsing the EU directive referred to above) to tackle trafficking, and we also need to ensure that more people know that this is an issue, and more police have the expertise to act."
   
   
4. Those living in poverty: The manifesto says: "Persistent poverty – defined as living at least three years out of the last four in poverty – is high in the UK compared to the rest of Europe. Between 1998 and 2001, 11% of UK citizens lived in persistent poverty, compared to 5 per cent in the Netherlands, 6% in Germany, and 9% across Europe as a whole. We aim to tackle this persistent poverty, and especially structural poverty that is passed down generations, through: job creation, micro‐credit programmes, giving more educational options to those with need, especially to adults willing to study in their spare time, creating a minimum pension through minor redistribution, developing a new system of child benefits that gives money not only to struggling parents, but also to the children when they enter adulthood, supporting ex‐offenders into work, improving community facilities, and improving infrastructure. Ending poverty will create wealth and increase economic productivity in the long term. But in the short term costs will be covered through changes in our tax system, cracking down on tax avoidance and evasion, and reducing the size of our bureaucracy through scrapping New Labour’s top down targets and decentralising power."
   
   
5. The mentally ill: The manifesto says: "Major depression is the number 1 psychological disorder in the western world. Alongside mounting levels of stress, it’s growing in all age groups, and will be the second most disabling condition in the world by 2020, behind heart disease. The cost to our society is already in the billions, so not only is it the moral thing to help; it’s also the best financial decision. This is why we favour: extra funding to tackle mental illnesses; a Government campaign to educate people about symptoms, and what they should do when they see the signs; and a long term plan to provide a support network that gives people in every workplace, and every educational institution, access to psychological support."
   
   
6. The physically ill/wounded: This policy is in development currently. We will update this accordingly when the policy is finalised.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
     
   

   
   

   
   

Hello and welcome!

Hi there!

I would like to take this opportunity to welcome one and all to this blog. We are a semi-autonomous group working within the Democratic Reform Party UK.

Our remit is to work across a number of policy areas grouped together under the heading 'compassionate reform'. There will be more to follow on what that means and the policies in question in later posts.

We will also use this blog to keep you up to date on what we are doing and when.

Please comment and get involved as much as you can! :)