Country Firing on All Cylinders – New Social Security for Disabled People – Liam Byrne MP's speech to Demos
In this speech Liam Byrne MP outlines a future approach to helping disabled people into work. One in five adults in Britain has a disability of some kind, which means we are only drawing on 80 per cent of our potential if we fail to give disabled adults the chance to contribute
Today disabled people are far less likely to:
- win the right to work – over half are economically inactive and twice as likely to be out of work than non-disabled people.
- go to university - Over 40 per cent of disabled people have qualifications below 5 A* – C at GCSE.
- run our major organisations - disabled people hold just 3.5 per cent of public appointments.
His speech suggests the way forward is to follow the Australian model of ‘universal disability insurance’ which combines back to work support, social care, and disability benefits in a single personal budget.
He sets out five principles:
- Principle 1: A personal plan for support, including employment
- Principle 2: Local partnerships
- Principle 3: “Tell us once” approach to assessments
- Principle 4: Empowering approach to assessments
- Principle 5: Root and branch review of employment support programmes for disabled people offered though a personal budget
To view the full speech go to http://liambyrne.co.uk/?p=4546