HindleA wrote:"Fascistic intent" not a knee-jerk,nor used lightly;quite the opposite.Regretfully used,but no other description is adequate.The language,the deliberate targeting,continuance of policies which actively harm;differing treatments-family residential carer -non spare room penalised/capped/non residential overwhelmingly paid carer-exempt/builder of annexes-regardless of use-reduction in council tax.Encouragement/discouragement-not based on need but on preferred type,much largesse thrown/severe reduction so based.Full time carers.returning to work enough hours to exempt from cap=success;obvious harmful consequences not seen as.harmful because it is intended.
Agreed.
Ostensibly, the alleged ethos behind "welfare reform" was to save money. Most of us knew that wasn't the real reason; and as the increasing spending demonstrates, even if it were the real reason it hasn't worked.
Next up - "behavioural change". In other words, the "tough love" that is apparently necessary to save the poor from their alleged worklessness; again, a lie as it's working people who suffer along with those who cannot work or cannot find any.
Now, they don't care what anyone thinks. One of the most chilling things about the sanctions regime is the governments' own estimation of how the sanctions should be applied to people who have health problems - and those who don't.
The DWP's guidance on sanctions says this -
"It would be usual for a normal healthy adult to suffer some deterioration in their health if they were without: 1. essential items such as food, clothing, heating, and accommodation, or 2. sufficient money to buy essential items for a period of two weeks".
When applying a sanction to a person who has a health problem "The Decision Maker must decide if the health of a person with a medical condition would decline more than a normal healthy adult".
So DWP knows that fit healthy adults are likely to suffer "some" deterioration in their health if a 2-week disallowance is imposed.
Knowing this, they impose a minimum of 4 weeks, an average of 12 weeks, and a maximum of 156 weeks.
What does DWP imagine will happen to people on whom it is deliberately imposing health problems?
Then it goes on to say that if a person is NOT a fit and healthy adult, a DM has to ascertain - with no medical qualifications whatsoever - how much MORE the health of a claimant will deteriorate if sanctioned, already aware that it will do so.
I have been "Godwinned" on many occasions on CIF and elsewhere for this - but I make no apology for saying that this really isn't very different from what went on in Germany before the war. My mother survived it, and told me what it was like.
The same scrounging/skiving propaganda; the same misinformation on what "these people" cost the rest of us; the same isolation of certain sections of society and the removal of their rights, homes, support networks; the breaking up of communities.
You are right, A. I do not think it is hyperbole to call this fascism.
To knowingly and deliberately cause harm as a matter of official government policy is what is happening here.
And that's just one government department.
