How do we break down barriers for disabled people?
To begin with let's hold rogue employers to account.
Strengthen, or better still, actually use current legislation to its full
extent. Years ago I recall Margaret Hodge claiming that disabled people
shouldn't rush to litigation when confronted with discrimination, but rather
they should negotiate.
The days for negotiation are long gone. Successive
governments tell us that employers need education not legislation. I don't see
this applied anywhere else. Why can't we educate benefits claimants rather than
using sanctions against them? Why not educate 'debtors' instead of evicting
them?
No, let's use legislation as a blunt instrument to bash
recalcitrant employers over the head, in the same manner the Tories are
planning with their vicious anti trade union laws.
Tom Shakespeare, in every other area of civil life there are
laws and rules by which we live. If and when we stray across the boundaries
within which these laws and rules are set, we are punished.
In attempting to make a case for the use of law I am also
aware that this government and its predecessor have ensured that millions of us
are denied access to the law by placing, often insurmountable, financial
barriers. As we are left with fewer 'legitimate' avenues from which to fight
our corner alternatives such as taking to the streets and civil disobedience
are all that remain.
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