Lest you forget: A Letter to Liz Kendall & The Labour Party

Dear Liz,

As a disabled lone parent & carer, your announcement regarding the crackdown on disability benefits has chilled every disabled person & their carer’s marrow to the core, including me & my now 20 year old disabled son. My son lives with & currently depends on me. As he is no longer in education, employment or training, he is what the government terms “NEET”.

The proposed changes breach our human rights protecting us from poverty. Furthermore, the current rhetoric calling us “skivers” & “scroungers", compared to “hardworking families” will expose us to unlawful discrimination due to “othering.” You have ripped up the Labour Party rulebook. We are floundering in uncharted waters as compassion for people like us evaporates. I fear disability hate crime will increase as a consequence.

I have Degenerative Cervical Myelopathy, an incurable spinal cord injury due to a disc prolapsing in my neck during a morning stretch on the loo. It caused increasing paralysis from the neck down due to crushing my spinal cord. Despite spinal surgery in 2012 & 2020 to slow progression, I continue to lose function in my arms & hands. In addition, I also have one prolapsed & several bulging discs in my lower back which further impairs my mobility due to sciatica in my left leg & sacroiliac joint disease in my right hip. I take maximum doses of antidepressants, muscle relaxants & opioid analgesics just to get through every single day. Surgery is not an option (due to NICE* guidelines) unless I develop Cauda Equina Syndrome - a neurosurgical emergency.

I receive PIP, UC & Carers' Allowance & have light touch reviews every 10 years. But it took approximately 7 years to be granted the financial security I need to support me & raise my family. Previously, having to appeal each refusal & attend a total of 3 tribunals, despite overwhelming evidence, left me destitute & exacerbated living with chronic depression. It was a huge waste of the public purse insofar I’m never going to regain function, so more frequent assessment would be pointless.

My 20 year old son is neurodivergent with additional needs whose EHCP was rescinded as he left college. He was in receipt of DLA initially then transferred to PIP aged 16. Despite his difficulties, he desperately wants to work. He’s had a couple of temporary part time jobs but he was let go each time. He is due to be reviewed for PIP again in 2026 even though he has lifelong disabilities and will need ongoing support.

Should he be re-assessed for PIP & fall foul of the proposed 4 point minimum award per descriptor, a potential loss of £10 000 per annum looms. Should he lose entitlement to enhanced daily living & enhanced mobility, I would lose eligibility for Carers’ Allowance. We would not manage to survive.

He already lost his Motability car when his last PIP review in 2024 reduced his entitlement to enhanced mobility by 2 points. We successfully appealed the decision. In fact the DWP abandoned the appeal. But the loss of his car triggered an acute mental health crisis which took several months to overcome.

We both know he should claim UC, but his mental health has been so poor lately, I fear he’ll relapse while navigating the system. When he is in crisis, it’s unsafe to leave him alone, even in his room, so working, even part time, even if I could, would prove impossible.

It’s only right that the UK, the 6th richest nation on Earth, should support those who can least support themselves whether they can work or not. It is the hallmark of a civilised, compassionate society. For the Labour Party to stray so far from their inaugural socialist ideals following the formation of The Independent Labour Party in 1906, right here in the Bradford Metropolitan District where we reside, is an anathema to how you are currently behaving towards the disabled community. Keir Hardie, the first leader, would be ashamed.

You forget that we directly support the economy with the purchase of goods & services we need to enable us to participate in society. We also vote. Continue to mistreat us at your peril. I & my son will never vote for your party ever again. I suspect we won’t be the only ones.

That’s not a threat - it’s a promise.

Yours sincerely,

Shirley Widdop

*NICE - National Institute for Health & Care Excellence