THE ASSISTED DYING BILL CLEARED THE HOUSE OF COMMONS IN THE SAME WEEK THE GOVERNMENT CONFIRMED ITS COMMITMENT TO SLASHING FINANCIAL SUPPORT FOR DISABLED AND CHRONICALLY-ILL PEOPLE ~ punkacademic ~ The Labour government’s commitment to finish the job started by its Tory and Liberal Democrat predecessors has taken vivid form in the proposed cuts to the health component of Universal Credit and restrictions to claims for Personal Independence Payment. The proposed cuts—to welfare support already cut to the bone—are savage. But the language used to couch the proposals is that of empowerment, of getting people back into work, of restoring dignity. To paraphrase Proudhon on Malthus, this is ‘the theory of political murder; of murder from motive of philanthropy and for love of God’. When Rachel Reeves said—more than a decade ago—that Labour would be ‘tougher on welfare’ than the Tories, it would have been wise to believe her. Starmer’s Labour sees citizens simply as human resources. As the HR department for the capitalist state, extractivism is the order of the day. Disquiet with Labour’s merciless attacks on the disabled has stretched even to the columns of Guardian journalists who had lambasted Corbyn for his mild social democracy. The government whip Vicky Foxcroft resigned her post rather than support the cuts. Foxcroft’s resignation, and the publication of the formal legislative proposals on the cuts, came the day before the Third Reading of Kim Leadbeater’s Assisted Dying Bill in the House of Commons, where it was approved with a majority of 23. Few anarchists would dispute someone’s right to end their lives on their own terms as they see fit. But equally, few anarchists would dispute the centrality of those most likely to be affected to any discussion of actions to be taken. As ever, means must prefigure ends and not be justified by them. Yet disabled voices were often marginalised in the ‘debate’ over the Assisted Dying Bill. Disability Rights UK and Disabled People Against the Cuts (DPAC) both came out steadfastly against it. They argued that, given our societal context and the gross devaluing of disabled lives, the Bill as currently constructed would pressure disabled and chronically ill people to choose death for fear of being a burden on their relatives or wider society. It’s important to note that disabled and chronically ill people do not speak with one voice. The late Debbie Purdy, a music journalist with progressive multiple sclerosis, fought for her partner’s right to assist her death without fear of prosecution. In the run-up to the votes in Parliament, however, stories such as Purdy’s were privileged to the exclusion of others; the campaign Dignity in Dying had greater resources and reach than DPAC, and newspaper and media outlets were keen to frame the ‘debate’ as one between rational individuals who wanted a peaceful and dignified death and religiously-motivated figures who appealed for them to ‘have faith’. The real concerns of representative bodies were not addressed; nor were those of sections of the medical profession, who—alarmed at the removal of safeguards at committee stage—withdrew their support for the legislation. As someone living with progressive multiple sclerosis, I can attest to the endless the casual indignities of living with disability under capitalism. As an anarchist, I also believe firmly that people should have the right to end their lives and if necessary have support to do so. But that doesn’t translate into support for legislation promoted by a state hell-bent on the eradication of disabled people through the withdrawal of vital support. In her book The War Against Disabled People, published on the eve of the COVID-19 pandemic, Ellen Clifford argues that since 2010, the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition’s austerity policies have led to casualties in the hundreds of thousands. As Clifford notes, in practical terms the most severe penalties for capitalism’s spectacular failures have been visited on those whom it deems less than human; disabled people. Clifford, who is herself disabled and active in DPAV, is unsparing in the horrors she chronicles. It is the story of a neoliberal politics of death, where disabled and chronically ill people become unwanted columns in a fiscal balance sheet that needs amending.  Through the introduction of a much harsher welfare regime, deaths mounted rapidly. The UN itself responded to a DPAC complaint in 2016 with the verdict that the UK government had engaged in “grave and systematic” violations of disabled people’s rights. One of the most powerful aspects of Clifford’s book is its clear elaboration of how these deaths were rendered invisible, how the disabled were compelled to die in the dark. When Jeremy Corbyn, as Labour Party leader, attempted to cite numbers of deaths due to the government’s austerity measures, he was roundly decried in the House and ridiculed by political correspondents who thought this a demonstration of his rhetorical incompetence. The COVID pandemic, which came after the publication of Clifford’s book, only made her points more strongly. Disabled and chronically ill people were disproportionately likely to die. The ominous use of the phrase ‘excluding Clinically Extremely Vulnerable’ in the context of death statistics rendered seemingly-neutral what was actually a eugenicist sleight of hand. Now, this Labour government seems committed to carry on with its Tory predecessors’ pathologisation and demonisation of disabled and chronically ill people, deeming ‘work’ as the only acceptable form of identity, and going so far as to deliberately mislead the public on the nature of their cuts—claiming that Personal Independence Payment is an out-of-work benefit (it isn’t) and talking about “pathways to work” for people who are often already in work but struggling to survive. Disabled people need to be enabled to live before they are assisted to die. Disability—rather than impairment—is caused by society, and specifically by capitalism, against which anarchism has waged war since its origins as a movement in the mid-nineteenth century. This is not just about benefit cuts or assisted dying; it is a foundational struggle over the definition of the true value of life, the possibility of cooperation over competition, and the role of mutual aid in constituting a society worth living in. The post Assisted Dying Bill: The neoliberal politics of death appeared first on Freedom News.

Andy, Rhiannon, Sam and Simon discuss the UK Supreme Court’s ruling, what it means legally and what it actually means for trans people, as well as the solidarity demonstrations that took place over the weekend. We also look at the evictions in Greece and the Brazilian government’s continued repression of native peoples. Finally finishing off with Kier Starmer’s Labour Government’s ongoing identity crisis and what anarchists might do in the face of continued government cuts and austerity. The post Anarchist News Review: Trans rights in court, evictions in Greece and Labour’s latest mess appeared first on Freedom News.

OR COULD THIS ALL BE AN UNDERCOVER ANARCHIST JOKE TO SHOW THE SYSTEM’S BANKRUPTCY? ~ Tabitha Troughton ~ Cheerily kicking kittens, earnestly pulling wings off flies, making the difficult choice to slam the freezer shut on next door’s puppies: has the government gone mad? We demand to know, but answer comes there none, unless it’s in the rictus of  ‘Liz’ Kendall’s face, or the staring eyes of ‘Wes’ Streeting, lit up from inside by an unholy glare, like a demonic pumpkin’s. True, very little this government has done has sounded sane, in the casual sense of the word, which it is why it is so easy and pleasant to memory-hole its short and pungent history. Every so often people still mutter “Peter Mandelson is the ambassador to the US”, but this is largely residual trauma. Straight off the blocks with an astonishingly snappy immiseration of our poorest children and pensioners, the government have shot through selling off the country to Blackrock, rejected attempts to ameliorate Brexit, consigned nature and wildlife to the devil, trashed local democracy, eviscerated struggling farmers, and almost every week thrown up a new spectacle to throw up to. If ‘Bojo’ perfected the art of the dead cat, this administration has perfected the exhumation and exhibition of its month old, now glutinous, corpse. Streeting and Kendall were spearheading, almost literally, the government’s latest actionable plan for the disabled: £5 billions worth of welfare cuts.  So Downing Street provides political and practical cover for genocidal war criminals, while the silence of the ever-increasing dead mingles with cries of desperation and incredulity from a UK where millions have already been mugged to their knees, hundreds of thousands have died prematurely thanks to slightly less terrible Conservative policies, and the rest are realising it’s only a matter of time before they can’t escape from the place either. The British public have always been for a ceasefire, against arms to Israel, against being used by these murderous freaks: it’s no good pointing out that what their ‘leaders’ can condone abroad is hardly likely to result in decency at home. They know. Nevertheless, the latest punishment aimed directly at the disabled is serving to repulse even the few government hacks who remain loyal. The proposals may be economically illiterate, but they’re also a mix of pettiness, stupidity, mindless exhortation, and casual cruelty. “You don’t necessarily get enough points to live on if you need help washing below the waist” and “If you’re under 22 and disabled, you’re probably screwed” are impossible to defend, but that didn’t stop the government from trying, by calling them ‘moral’, in an interesting example of manufactured contronym,. Meanwhile, propaganda viciously pumps out the message that disabled people are scroungers, shirkers, fraudsters. Calls to suicide helplines soar. At the same time Kim Leadbeater is, at Starmer’s behest, rushing through the Assisted Suicide Bill, which now, after the majority of safeguarding amendments have been discarded, or voted down by a stacked committee, has almost unlimited potential to provide a new income stream for Serco. Despised by the Reform supporters they are trying both feebly and cynically to attract, with this latest hit the government has now alienated even more of their own, apart from those who don’t object so very much to kitten kicking. And still they continue to fawn on the rich and the corporations, refusing (even against the pleas of ‘patriotic millionaires’) to introduce a wealth tax, which even in a feeble Spanish iteration recently raised enough to stop children plunging further into poverty; while bailing out Thames Water and arms dealers with more of our billions, as their polling continues to plummet. Is this, one could wonder, some kind of undercover anarchist joke? Are the malignant cult who’ve taken over Labour really there to demonstrate the utter bankruptcy of the system? Or, more realistically, are they now deliberately trying to throw the next election—and if that’s to Reform, so be it? Consider that they triumphantly stole power with no ideas, no care for the people, no conscience, no scruples, no understanding, and no plan. Eight months later they’re loathed across an impressive spectrum, and they all look terrible, like ghastly cut-outs of their former selves reflected in a Hall of Mirrors.  As the public waits for the next pointless, violent attack on our better natures, it’s difficult to avoid concluding that these people are not simply mad, bad, incompetent, corrupt, or hapless, but are now deliberately shooting themselves in the foot. And why wouldn’t you? If Starmer loses in 2029, he will, as is traditional, go straight to the Lords, which he has strangely failed to abolish. Reeves will spend her time lecturing lucky audiences across the US. Streeting—well, either heading up Reform’s deportation squads, or recanting and becoming a librarian. Anything is possible. Even that community organising and cohesion will surf the rising tide of fury at these injustices. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Image: House of Commons on Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 The post Welfare cuts: Labour’s political suicide appeared first on Freedom News.