Review Disabled Children’s Support

Ministers are being encouraged to reconsider care provided for children with disabilities following an investigation into the adequacy of support for families.

The conclusions were heart rending and disturbing and, indicated that some families were unable to bear the expense of basic essentials to live a dignified life.

A study, carried out by the University of Central Lancaster (UClan) for the children’s commissioner, found evidence that poverty signified that some disabled children were not living lives that converged with international human rights standards.

This is about the voiceless and the helpless, as well as making ends meet and, some of these stories that we’re informed about are extremely touching and very distressing.

Money matters are extremely real and very demanding and,  parents are equally saying they have little or no say in the methods that services are organised and provided, from transport to access to youth, or play or leisure which is properly modified for one’s disability.

The research was founded on talks and group discussions with 78 disabled children and young people and 17 parents.  It was co led by a group of 11 disabled children and young people working with the university.

A spokesman for the Department of Work and Pensions rebuffed some of the conclusions.

“In fact, independent reports show how we are world leaders in support for disabled people with the UK’s spending on disability-related benefits a fifth higher than the EU average.

“The UK is also acknowledged as a world leader in supporting independent living for disabled people, having the best overall rating of 55 countries.

“We continue to spend around £50bn a year on disabled people and their services and our reforms will make sure the billions spent give more targeted support to those who need it most.”

Nonetheless, some of those intimate stories coloured a much different picture and, those officials who have no doubt composed that statement should go and meet some of those young people, who will tell them the true story of living with a disability on an extremely low income.

There is a mum cited in the survey, who because her child required a modified home, incorporating a multi sensory setting, was coerced to make sure that was available, she will be paying for it until November 2022.

There was as well a young woman going through everything that adolescence carries with it, who needs incontinence pads.  Benefits pay for four a day; she needs 10.  That is not human respect and, it’s not human rights either.

In spite of the condemnation, researchers found numerous examples of disabled children being given good care and services which they said give a demonstration on how low income doesn’t have to be an obstacle.

Nonetheless, proof was as well established of insufficient services, compounding the difficulties of some low income families and, even though families with disabled children often have rights to welfare payments and practical support, their basic incomes frequently don’t deal with the additional costs of raising and caring for a disabled child.

The team analysed three United Nations treaty documents: the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Convention on Persons with Disabilities and the International Covenant on Economic and Social Rights.

Between them these treaties state an individuals’ rights to food, clothes and heating, to live on one’s own, to be able to settle on where to live, to live in their local communities and, to the provisions and amenities they need to be able to do that.

It was found that the lives lived by some disabled children and young people did not fulfil these fundamental rights.  There were accounts of some disabled children, young people and their parents not being able to heat their homes properly, or pay for sufficient clothing or food.

Some were not notified or involved in decisions about changes to where they lived.  Some experienced delays in alterations being made to their homes and, some didn’t have enough room nor support for independent living.

It appears that because the government has no emotional bond to these people they can then be narrow-minded in the way that they look at the disabled.

If they were more unprejudiced with their views, their response with regard to the disabled might be different and, their reaction towards them would be looked at to a larger degree, but there’s no support, plainly because they don’t have to raise them, consequently it’s easier to throw them to one side like a commodity.

As well it’s not just the young that need assistance, it’s adults similarly, because they’re the selfsame, they’re no different.  Their individuality might be somewhat different, but at the end of the day, they’re as well disabled and need support.

They’re as well unable to pay for basic essentials for a dignified life, or is it because they’re adults that they no longer need that support, because it appears that after a certain age people that are adults and disabled no longer appear to be a viable commodity.

Nonetheless, if we’re no longer viable, then as far as the government are interested we’re no longer worth retaining and, as a result, of no real significance.

If we can’t labour and, we’re not making money for them, then they may as well pull the plug on us and, terminate us, since the only reason we’re here in the first place is so that the government can make us into serfs, but what they fail to remember, if there were no slaves, there would be no government!

When people start believing that they need us more than we need them, then maybe it may be better understood that this country doesn’t need to run with a government, it can stand on its own two feet because WE ARE the spine of this government, the government ARE NOT the spine of us!