Sarah Newton

Independent Living

Baroness Campbell head and shoulders at the committee hearing

September 20, 2018 0

Ministers quietly drop plans for ‘parallel process’ on working-age social care

Ministers have quietly decided to include the support needs of working-age disabled people in their new social care green paper, scrapping the idea of having a separate “parallel programme of work” as they try to address the social care funding crisis. The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) previously said it would focus

Independent Living

September 6, 2018 0

Anger over government’s ‘pathetic’ election access report

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The government’s response to a consultation on how to make voting more accessible to disabled people has sparked anger among disabled campaigners, after it failed to offer a single new measure to improve access. One disabled campaigner branded the government’s report “pathetic” while another said the failure to act had made him “really angry”.

Activism and Campaigning

Sarah Newton speaking in the House of Commons

August 23, 2018 0

Minister snubs DPOs – and ‘breaches UN convention’ – by refusing meeting

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The minister for disabled people is refusing to meet a coalition of disabled people’s organisations, in an apparent breach of the UN disability convention. The coalition wrote to Sarah Newton yesterday (Wednesday) to express its “deep disappointment and concern” about her refusal to meet them to discuss the UK’s failure to implement the UN

Independent Living

Mike Adams talking to a group of people in a retail setting

August 16, 2018 0

Retailers back UK’s first ‘accessible shopping day’

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Major retailers have backed the launch of the UK’s first “accessible shopping day”, which will see businesses promise to introduce new measures to benefit their disabled customers. Purple Tuesday, to be held on 13 November, is being led by Purple, the social enterprise formerly known as Essex Coalition of Disabled People. It has secured

Employment

August 9, 2018 0

DWP refuses to pay £125 to discover number of disabled people in full-time jobs

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Ministers are refusing to commission work that would cost just £125 and would show how many disabled people are in full-time paid employment, and how that number has changed under successive Tory-led governments. Ministers, including the current work and pensions secretary Esther McVey, have repeatedly boasted of how their policies have led to an

Politics

Penny Mordaunt speaking at a podium at the Global Disability Summit

July 26, 2018 0

Global Disability Summit: Mordaunt retreats from UK’s ‘global leader on rights’ claims

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The international development secretary, Penny Mordaunt, has been forced to retreat from her government’s repeated claims that the UK is a “global leader in disability rights”. Her government has faced anger from the UK disabled people’s movement at its decision to co-host a Global Disability Summit in east London less than a year after

Employment

Sarah Newton giving evidence to the committee as Esther McVey watches on beside her

July 12, 2018 0

Minister denies lying to MPs over Disability Confident history

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The minister for disabled people has denied lying to an influential committee of MPs about the government’s much-criticised disability employment scheme. Sarah Newton’s claims about Disability Confident were exposed yesterday (Wednesday) just as her boss, work and pensions secretary Esther McVey, was herself fighting off a Commons motion that would have censured her for

Employment

David Cameron launching Disability Confident

July 12, 2018 0

Disability Confident employers promise less than one job each on average

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Nearly 7,000 employers that signed up to the government’s much-criticised Disability Confident jobs scheme have promised to provide just 4,500 new jobs for disabled people between them, less than one per employer. The figures emerged as the minister for disabled people, Sarah Newton, and work and pensions secretary Esther McVey were giving evidence to

Independent Living

A group of people, including Sarah Newton, stand and sit around a large wooden table

July 5, 2018 0

Minister calls on her own government to act on ‘shared space’ street designs

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The minister for disabled people is calling on her own government to take “urgent action” to address concerns about the dangers of “shared space” street developments. Sarah Newton called for action in letters she wrote to both the minister for transport accessibility, Nusrat Ghani, and the housing, communities and local government secretary, James Brokenshire.

Benefits and Poverty

June 28, 2018 0

‘Failing’ DWP announces ‘sixth review’ of benefit records after latest foul-ups

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The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) looks set to have to carry out six separate trawls through the records of disabled people unfairly deprived of benefits because of serious errors by senior civil servants. The minister for disabled people, Sarah Newton (pictured), told MPs this week that she was “pleased” that her department

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