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Access to Work Scheme Hit by Review

02 December 2015 | Updated 01 January 1970
 

Chancellor George Osborne has claimed he is going to help an additional 25,000 disabled people on to the Access to Work (AtW) scheme, bringing the number up to nearly 60,000, yet this does not seem possible following the recent spending review.

The Disability News Service (DNS) confirms that most disabled people are having their support cut.

 

Going backwards for some time

This isn't the first time a move forward was promised that led to a falling back of help for the disabled in work. In 2009-10, under the last Labour government, AtW had over 37,000 disabled people but this declined to to 30,780 in 2011-12.

 

Smoke and mirrors

"Anecdotally we are hearing that deaf and disabled people are continuing to experience difficulties with Access to Work, including pressure from advisers to cut support packages, regardless of the impact of that on the individual’s ability to stay in employment, explained Tracey Lazard, CEO, Inclusion London, a charity supporting 78 deaf and disabled organisations in the capital. “The minister for disabled people has been clear that his intention is to increase numbers using AtW within existing resources and to cut ‘high value’ packages in order to reach more people. That means cutting existing packages.”

Picture: Access to Work? The seems to be going backwards

Article written by Mike Gannon | Published 02 December 2015

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