• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Advice/Information
  • 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 / Archives for Catherine Hale

Catherine Hale

Report makes ‘compelling case’ for work flexibility

By John Pring on 9th November 2023 Category: Employment

Report makes ‘compelling case’ for work flexibility
Listen

New research has made “a compelling case” that providing flexible working can enable employers to increase their recruitment and retention of disabled people with energy-limiting health conditions. The Making Employment Work for People with Long-Term Conditions report, due to be published […]

Chronic illness community faces culture of disbelief and rigid jobs policies, says report

By John Pring on 29th April 2021 Category: Employment

Chronic illness community faces culture of disbelief and rigid jobs policies, says report
Listen

Millions of people with energy-limiting chronic illness (ELCI) are being failed by both employers and the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), according to a new user-led report. The study found that the flaws within the disability benefits system create a […]

Disabled activists call for a refreshed social model to ‘bring it back to life’

By John Pring on 9th July 2020 Category: Activism and Campaigning

Disabled activists call for a refreshed social model to ‘bring it back to life’
Listen

Disabled activists have called for a re-examination of the social model of disability to produce a “reinvigorated” version that will bring together disabled, Deaf and autistic people to challenge the oppression they face. The call came at an online meeting hosted […]

‘People with chronic illness face hostility and isolation’, says pioneering report

By John Pring on 30th April 2020 Category: Activism and Campaigning

‘People with chronic illness face hostility and isolation’, says pioneering report
Listen

People with chronic illness face hostility and isolation because of society’s failure to understand how their impairment affects their lives, according to the results of a ground-breaking piece of user-led research. The research concluded that the most “fundamental oppression” experienced by […]

Ideas to replace WCA with new assessment framework win some support

By John Pring on 13th December 2018 Category: Activism and Campaigning

Ideas to replace WCA with new assessment framework win some support
Listen

Disabled activists have delivered a generally positive response to fresh ideas on how to replace the hated fitness for work test with a new assessment framework that would restore “dignity and respect” to those unable to work full-time. The ideas were […]

Project offers new bridge between chronic illness community and disability movement

By John Pring on 5th July 2018 Category: Activism and Campaigning

Project offers new bridge between chronic illness community and disability movement
Listen

A disabled researcher has suggested a way to bring the hundreds of thousands of people with chronic illness under the umbrella of the disabled people’s movement. Catherine Hale (pictured), who has lived with a diagnosis of ME for nearly 30 years, […]

Benefit sanctions regime discriminates against disabled claimants, new research shows

By John Pring on 22nd February 2018 Category: Benefits and Poverty

Benefit sanctions regime discriminates against disabled claimants, new research shows
Listen

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) is facing claims that it has been running a discriminatory benefit sanctions regime, following the publication of new research. Academic Ben Baumberg Geiger has found that more than 900,000 disabled claimants of the mainstream […]

ESA figures show ‘very disturbing’ drop in number placed in support group

By John Pring on 15th September 2016 Category: Benefits and Poverty

ESA figures show ‘very disturbing’ drop in number placed in support group
Listen

“Very disturbing” new government figures show a steep fall in the proportion of disabled people being found eligible for out-of-work disability benefits. Disabled campaigners fear the figures show the government is cutting spending on disability benefits “below the radar”, after being […]

IDS announces ‘fitness for work’ U-turn that was five years in the making

By John Pring on 28th August 2015 Category: Benefits and Poverty

IDS announces ‘fitness for work’ U-turn that was five years in the making
Listen

Work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith appears set to scrap the “fitness for work” test championed by successive Labour, coalition and Conservative governments, but there are fears that its replacement could prove even more damaging to disabled people. Duncan Smith […]

Ministers ‘considering scrapping WRAG top-up’

By John Pring on 3rd July 2015 Category: Benefits and Poverty

Ministers ‘considering scrapping WRAG top-up’
Listen

Ministers are considering plans to slash benefit payments to hundreds of thousands of disabled people, by scrapping a key part of the main out-of-work disability benefit, employment and support allowance (ESA), according to the BBC. The BBC reports that a leaked […]

Primary Sidebar

On the left of the image are multiple heads of different colours - white, aqua, red, light brown, and dark green - all grouped together, then the words ‘Join our campaign for a decent life for Disabled people. Campaign for Disability Justice’
Image of front cover of The Department, showing a crinkled memo with the words 'Restricted - Policy. The Department. How a Violent Government Bureaucracy Killed Hundreds and Hid the Evidence. John Pring.' Next to the image is a red box with the following words in white: 'A very interesting book... a very important contribution to this whole debate' - Sir Stephen Timms, minister for social security and disability. plutobooks.com and the Pluto Press logo.

Access

Latest Stories

Scores of DWP failings linked to deaths were kept from MPs voting on benefit cuts, secret reports reveal

DWP staff ignored rules on how to respond to claimants who report suicidal thoughts, secret reports reveal

New official figures disprove claims that social security spending is ‘spiralling out of control’

Changes to energy bill discount scheme will discriminate against many disabled people, campaigners warn

Disabled peer hits back at claims of ‘filibustering’ over ‘vague’ and ‘poorly drafted’ assisted suicide bill

Government-owned train company has been failing on disability awareness training for more than four years

Government’s ‘generational’ SEND reforms will leave more children in segregated settings

SEND reforms ‘are a missed opportunity’ to dismantle the barriers driving disabled pupils from mainstream

Disabled activists call on Clooney to abandon movie that is set to paint Alzheimer’s as ‘fate worse than death’

Government’s advisers warn DWP minister he may need to ‘shift entrenched concerns’ over work reforms

Readspeaker
Image of front cover of The Department, showing a crinkled memo with the words 'Restricted - Policy. The Department. How a Violent Government Bureaucracy Killed Hundreds and Hid the Evidence. John Pring.' Next to the image is a red box with the following words in white: 'A very interesting book... a very important contribution to this whole debate' - Sir Stephen Timms, minister for social security and disability. plutobooks.com and the Pluto Press logo.

Footer

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

  • Accessibility Statement
  • Privacy Policy
  • Site map
  • Bluesky
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Threads
  • Twitter

Copyright © 2026 Disability News Service

Site development by A Bright Clear Web