• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • About DNS
  • Subscribe to DNS
  • Advertise with DNS
  • Support DNS
  • Contact DNS

Disability News Service

the country's only news agency specialising in disability issues

  • Home
  • Independent Living
    • Arts, Culture and Sport
    • Crime
    • Education
    • Employment
    • Housing
    • Transport
  • Activism & Campaigning
  • Benefits & Poverty
  • Politics
  • Human Rights
You are here: Home / News Archive / EU commissioner criticises coalition for causing ‘social damage’

EU commissioner criticises coalition for causing ‘social damage’

By John Pring on 27th September 2013 Category: News Archive

Listen

theweeksubA European commissioner has told Disability News Service (DNS) that the UK government should have done more to “minimise the social damage” caused to disabled people and other disadvantaged groups by its austerity measures.

Dr Laszlo Andor, the Hungarian economist who is commissioner for employment, social affairs and inclusion – the equivalent of a cabinet minister for the European Union – suggested that the coalition had not done enough to avoid the “collateral damage” caused by its programme of spending cuts.

His comments are likely to infuriate work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith, ahead of this week’s annual Conservative party conference in Manchester.

They come only weeks after another leading international figure, the United Nations special rapporteur on housing, Raquel Rolnik, called on the government to suspend its controversial “bedroom tax” because of its impact on disabled people and other “vulnerable” groups.

Speaking to DNS at Labour’s annual conference in Brighton, Dr Andor said: “The question is whether you can pursue fiscal consolidation [reducing the deficit] without collateral damage.

“In order to minimise the social damage, this is sometimes the point when government… makes investment in people.

“Welfare reform should not simply be a function of fiscal consolidation, it should [also] ask what kind of investment is needed in human resources.”

He said very few countries had managed to “remain very forward-looking” and continue to sustain “social investment”, particularly by ensuring “you do not open big doors for a lost generation”.

He said: “Austria and Netherlands managed to prevent this very well. The UK definitely did not. The UK has much higher youth unemployment than would be justified by its strength. It is one of the wealthiest countries on earth.

“A lot more could be done. The commitment could be much stronger.”

He said there had been experiments with “many things” by the UK government, and he suggested that “some of those experimental approaches” should have been subject to a “much stronger” assessment before they began.

Asked about the impact of the government’s reforms and cuts to disability benefits, he said: “There has been a very robust policy to transform the system to make sure that more and more people with disabilities work instead of being on benefits.

“Overall it is important that those who have a limited capacity to work still remain part of the society and remain part of working society if it is possible… It hasn’t happened in the way we would have been satisfied with.”

He said the European Commission had “followed this development with some concern” but had “very little direct competencies in this area”.

26 September 2013

Share this post:

Share on TwitterShare on FacebookShare on WhatsAppShare on Reddit
Groundhog Day at the Old Vic, access performances, with icons for audio description, captions, relaxed performances and British Sign Language, and a picture of a groundhog

Related

‘Muddled’ blue badge reforms ‘are to blame for renewal delays’
6th February 2015
UN debate will be reminder of true inclusive education
6th February 2015
IDS breaks pledge on PIP waiting-times, as tens of thousands still queue for months
30th January 2015

Primary Sidebar

Access

Latest Stories

DWP hands hundreds of millions more to firms linked to claimant deaths… but not Atos

Review finds multiple agencies failed over Whorlton Hall abuse scandal

Regulator tells government’s access advisers to act on unlawful secrecy

Government breaks pledge to consult on improvements to housing adaptations

Broadcaster’s silence over ‘rabblerouser’ tweet on disability benefits

Met’s mental health emergency warning ‘risks creating serious harm’

Call for direct action protests to build support for ‘radical’ social care reform

Disabled mum took her own life after actions of DWP and Capita ‘magnified’ anxiety

Public inquiry on inaccessible footbridge will be ‘line in the sand’, say activists

Thousands of disabled people tell MPs: Cost-of-living crisis is affecting our health

Advice and Information

Groundhog Day at the Old Vic, access performances, with icons for audio description, captions, relaxed performances and British Sign Language, and a picture of a groundhog
Readspeaker

Footer

The International Standard Serial Number for Disability News Service is: ISSN 2398-8924

  • Accessibility Statement
  • Privacy Policy
  • Site map
  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Copyright © 2023 Disability News Service

Site development by A Bright Clear Web