As a
result of our pressure, we have already won significant
changes and can win more.
Please endorse
the letter and send it round to your networks.
Watch this space for more news about what people
are doing and how to be involved. You are welcome to send
us your experiences, and if you are already campaigning, or
want to, we would like to meet you to discuss it.
Sign to
defend our entitlement to Income Support and other benefits
Below: Defend our
entitlement to Income Support and other benefits
– it’s our money not the bankers’!
quotes from a wide range
of claimants with personal experience of “welfare reform”.
The
Welfare Reform Bill is back in Parliament and will have its
Third Reading in the Lords on 5 November. Members of the
House of Lords have a last chance to amend its worst
measures. We
are urging people opposed to the legislation to sign this
statement that we will publish on 29 October – please sign
below and return to us as soon as you can.
Many MPs, taking their lead
from the bankers, defiantly demand to keep the public funds
they helped themselves to. Now, both main parties are
blaming “incapacity benefit scroungers”, asylum seekers,
single mothers, and older people living longer, for the
economic crisis which politicians and the banks together
have created.
Our entitlements are being
taken away to pay for their bonuses, expenses and lavish
pensions, and their deadly wars. Public money has made
millionaires of company executives running “back to work”
schemes for profit. Low pay is driven down, affecting women
especially, while retirement age is raised. Our work
raising children and caring for older or disabled people is
dismissed, and those of us who live longer are considered a
burden. Benefits which save lives and families, and took
generations to establish, are treated as a waste of money.
The Welfare Reform Bill would:
·
Abolish Income Support
which acknowledges unwaged caring work, largely women’s.
Mothers and other carers will have to claim Jobseekers
Allowance, and do compulsory “work-related activity” as a
condition of benefit. Some carers may be exempt but many
won’t.
·
Deprive children as young as
three of a parent staying at home to care for them
full-time. All parents living on benefit will
have to “progress towards work” or risk being cut off
benefit. Already, breastfeeding mothers must attend a
work-focussed interview.
·
Women fleeing domestic
violence have only a three-month exemption from
jobseeking – barely enough time to find somewhere to live
and resettle children. Many will be discouraged into
returning to violent men.
·
Bring in “work for your
benefits” at £1.60 an hour for “long-term
unemployed” people. This attacks the minimum wage and drives
down wages. Those of us who already suffer discrimination in
employment – mothers, people of colour, young and older
people, people with mental health problems, drink or drug
problems, and other disabilities, are most likely to be
forced to work for these slave wages.
·
Bring in compulsory joint
registration of births. This would give violent
ex-partners greater rights over the child and dangerous
involvement with the mother. 30% of women have suffered
domestic violence, yet few have the official proof demanded
by the registrar to qualify for registering the birth as the
only parent.
As a result of our pressure, single mothers of children
under five won’t have
our benefit cut if we haven’t done “work-related activity”.
We can win more but could lose our entitlements if we allow
it.
Child Benefit may be next. It is already under threat in
Ireland
where similar measures are being introduced.
Some peers and MPs know very
well that we are dangerously near to a return to the
workhouse. We must pressure them to oppose this.
Asylum seekers were the first
to be made destitute. Many other people will lose our
entitlements if we allow it. Child Benefit will be next.
It is already under threat in Ireland where similar measures
are being introduced.
We the undersigned absolutely
oppose the abolition of Income Support and other changes
which affect and endanger women and children especially.
Keep benefit entitlement based on need.
Signed……………………………. Print
your name…………………............................……………
On behalf of (organisation if
applicable)…………………………………............................…………
……………………………………………………………………………..........................…………….
Email…………………………………..........................………….Tel………………………………….
Contact:
Global Women’s Strike, Legal Action for Women
&
Single Mothers’ Self-Defence
womenstrike8m@server101.com
centre@crossroadswomen.net
Tel: 020 7482 2496
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………............................................….
Defend our entitlement to Income
Support
and
other benefits – it’s our money not the bankers’!
How dare MPs, defiant about paying back “expenses”,
squeeze those of us with least during this economic crisis?
Both main
parties blame “incapacity benefit scroungers”, asylum
seekers, single mothers, and older people living longer, for
the economic crisis which politicians and bankers have
created.
In 2009, bankers’ bonuses
will top £6 billion -- up £2 billion from 2008 – taken from
£1 trillion taxpayers’ money. RBS’ Sir Fred Goodwin keeps
his
£342,500 pa pension. RBS’ current head gets £9.7m.
Our money is being cut to pay for bankers and politicians,
their deadly wars and extravagant lifestyle.
The Welfare
Reform Bill threatens us with destitution by abolishing
Income Support, the main benefit which
recognises unwaged caring work. It forces mothers and other
carers to be “available for work” and, if there are no jobs,
to work for our benefits i.e. £1.60 an hour. Traumatised
women fleeing domestic violence get only a three-month
respite from jobseeking. Asylum seekers, who are not allowed
to work, were the first to be made destitute. Some get a
subsistence amount; in October, this was reduced to £5 a
day.
As a result of our pressure, single mothers of children
under five won’t have our benefit cut if we haven’t done
“work-related activity”. We can win more, but could lose our
entitlements if we allow it. Child Benefit may be next. It
is already under threat in Ireland where similar measures
are being introduced.
“I was a
nervous wreck. You don’t know who you are anymore …. It took
me three months to find somewhere to live. No way could I
have got a job ... They would have looked at me like I was a
nutter.” Survivor of domestic violence,
M, Women Against Rape
‘Benefits
don’t cover the cost of gas, electric, water rates for me
and my daughter. That‘s why I go out now. If they cut our
benefits you’d find more of us out there working in more
out-of-the-way places. That’s terrifying.’
J,
English Collective of Prostitutes
“Asylum
seekers, some who only have supermarket vouchers, have
invisible disabilities, and are very ill with conditions
that you need to go to hospital for, but don’t have the
money to get there. To sign on at reporting centres you have
to walk very long distances and many mothers have babies
they have to carry with them.”
J, All African Women’s Group
“As a
mother on Income Support with an 11-month-old son, I am
being forced to attend a compulsory ‘Work Focused Group
Information Session’. If I don’t go I face losing my
benefits.”
JH, breastfeeding
mother
“When I
found the note from the Jobcentre under my door, it added to
my feelings of fear, panic and distress. It made me feel
that if the people I thought were there to help me worked
against me, there was no point in going on.’
X has mental health
problems and is on Employment and Support Allowance
(ex-incapacity benefit).
“If I was in waged work I would have to leave
suddenly when my daughter was ill – not a lot of jobs let
you do that. I’m already working caring for my child but now
they are asking me to do paid work on top, which is
devastating and exhausting. And how would my daughter feel
knowing that I was no longer able to be there for her?”
SM, carer for disabled
child
“It’s vital that the government are prevented
from committing this social atrocity.” Oliver
James, child psychologist, author of
Affluenza and
Guardian
columnist.
“The DWP
transferred me from Income Support to JSA when my youngest
became 12. I had no choice. The Council told me my Housing
Benefit and Council Tax Benefit ‘have been suspended . . .
as your circumstances have changed.’ They asked me to
provide proof of income to re-assess my claim, but I had
none – only that I was not entitled to Income
Support.”
Ms S, single mother
“Life is
very stressful. I live on cornmeal, biscuits, sugar, skimmed
milk and a little butter and cheap cheese. I am selling any
small personal belongings I can, and when I need money for
heating I must beg from people.”
J, seeking asylum
“Motherhood
is one of the most demanding and energy-consuming jobs there
is. The relationship between a child and a mother is the
root from which all human interaction springs.”
Sheila
Kitzinger,
childbirth expert
“They want to bring wages down by forcing more people to
chase scarce jobs and allow employers to by-pass the minimum
wage.”
Kim Sparrow, Single Mothers’ Self-Defence
“So much
for Minister Jim Murphy’s 2006 assurance that for disabled
people on ESA, job-seeking or training would remain
voluntary. Now we are being forced into unsuitable
training, low-paid jobs or back to begging.”
Claire Glasman,
WinVisible (women with visible and invisible disabilities)
“Our
supporters are using their child benefit to feed their
children, to pay for childcare, to pay the ‘voluntary’
contributions to schools, and thousands of other
child-related expenses from nappies to school books.”
Treasa Dovander,
PACUB
--
Protest Against Child Unfriendly Budget, Ireland
Government contracts have made the heads of “back to work”
companies rich. Multi-millionaire Emma Harrison of A4e pays
“adviser” David Blunkett MP up to £30,000 pa. In June 2009,
Channel 4 News
highlighted fraud by companies including Working Links and
A4e. Mark Serwotka, PCS
general secretary (Jobcentre staff union):
"The fraud uncovered is
scandalous and is a stark example of what happens when
profits rather than people are put at the heart of the
welfare state.”
What we can
do:
-
Give out this leaflet
outside your local Jobcentre.
-
Write letters/articles to
the local press saying how your family & community are
affected. Are there are any jobs that fit with your
caring responsibilities or your personal circumstances?
How do Jobcentre or “back to work” staff treat you? Will
you be worse off in work or no better off? What are the
hidden costs of going out to work? What is the childcare
like? How do you pay for it? How do employers treat you?
What do your children think?
-
Personal testimonies and
letters from mothers and other claimants have already
had a big influence in Parliament, winning concessions
in the Bill. Write to MPs, Ministers and Lords & tell
them what is happening.
-
Get professionals to raise
their concerns – health workers, teachers, social
workers, trade unionists, etc.
-
Defend your entitlement.
Single mothers and other claimants can say no. Know your
rights with all benefits and their conditions – complain
about requirements which don’t take account of your
situation.
If you want
to campaign against these cuts, or are already, we want to
meet you. Please get in touch with us – we can help to
spread your news. Contact:
Single
Mothers’ Self-Defence
centre@crossroadswomen.net
WinVisible
(women with visible and invisible disabilities)
winvisible@allwomencount.net
Global
Women’s Strike
womenstrike8m@server101.com
Legal
Action for Women
law@allwomencount.net
Tel: 020 7482 2496
www.allwomencount.net
www.globalwomenstrike.net