Reduction of Compulsory Up-Rating of Certain Benefits

Part of Orders of the Day — SOCIAL SECURITY (No. 2) BILL – in the House of Commons at 4:30 pm on 21 May 1980.

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Photo of Mr Jack Ashley Mr Jack Ashley , Stoke-on-Trent South 4:30, 21 May 1980

I shall make a brief speech, lasting no longer than three or four minutes. I joined the debate a little late, through no fault of mine. I could not believe the intervention during the speech of my right hon. Friend the Member for Salford, West (Mr. Orme) by a Conservative Member who asked whether there was any evidence that disabled people were the poorest in our society. I nearly fell over the Bench. I could not believe it. It was one of the most staggering questions I have ever heard.

I constantly move among disabled people. A sad feature is that they do not complain about their poverty to people who are well off and comfortable, because they have a great deal of dignity and the disabled do not go begging. Understandably, it is people who do not know the disabled or who are not disabled who ask such stupid questions. As the Secretary of State and the Minister with responsibility for the disabled know, the reason why disabled people are being hit is that they are powerless. That is why this action is so disgusting. The disabled are powerless. They have no one to speak for them.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Norwich, North (Mr. Ennals) who did such a splendid job when he was Secretary of State for Social Services, spoke about the previous Labour Government's record. He spoke about the doctors receiving a 30 per cent. increase in salary. In the next few months trade unionists will fight for increases of 20 per cent., 21½ per cent. or 25 per cent.—or whatever is the rate of inflation. They will get it, because this Government simply cannot walk on trade unionists. But they can walk on the disabled without a fight. They know that, and they should be ashamed of themselves. People who cannot struggle or fight come to Members of Parliament in the most rational, dignified and restrained way. When the Minister with responsibility for the disabled said in an intervention a few moments ago that he was applauded at a RADAR conference, what did he mean? Did it mean that the people at that conference supported what the right hon. Gentleman said? What it meant is that disabled people are courteous people. It meant not only that they are courteous but that they lack confidence—the confidence to fight for themselves. They therefore lean over backwards to be agreeable. This lack of confidence is caused by their disability and by their poverty.

I do not like people asking for the resignation of Ministers, because that is often a cheap political gimmick. However, I want to ask the Minister responsible for the disabled whether he really feels that he should stay on in his job, given this cut—and it is a cut; he has used the word himself—in the living standards of disabled people. I am not making a personal attack. I would not do so. But, in terms of the Minister's job of looking after disabled people, I do not feel that he can stay on the Front Bench and condone the measures in this Bill.

The Minister's boss, the Secretary of State, is an honourable man, and he helped the disabled when he was out of office. In fact, I have worked with him. He must think again, because he simply cannot damage the living standards of disabled people who are living in acute poverty and hold his head high in this House. I beg him to change his mind.