This isn’t the first line of a dystopian novel but a scandal quietly happening across swathes of England. For the past six months, myself and my colleague Patrick Butler have spoken to disabled people who have effectively been blocked from going abroad on a holiday or to a work event by their local care provider. There’s 38-year-old Lucy from Oxfordshire who needs to travel internationally as the president of the European Spinal Cord Injury Federation.
And Chelsea from Lancashire, a 25-year-old with cerebral palsy who dreams of swimming in Spain again. Then there’s 40-year-old Joel*, who has a muscle weakness and works for a global marketing brand but hasn’t been able to leave the UK for nine years. Some have live-in personal assistants (PAs) via NHS continuing healthcare, the non-means-tested home support for people with high needs.
Others have 24/7 social care through their local authority. But when they try to leave the country, all hit the same wall: they are told they are not allowed to use their care package abroad, sometimes even if they pay any extra costs themselves. Some areas of the country are permitting care users to go on holiday or travel for work – while disabled people just a few miles down the road can be stopped.
Others are told they can travel but have to pay any extra expenses – effectively still barring them financially from going – while some care boards offer to cover the cost. As there is limited to no national guidance on the issue, disabled people’s right to travel depends on a postcode lottery, with local care officials inspecting their plans for a trip away and having the power to rule “go” or “stay”. This week, MPs and peers called for national guidelines to end this injustice.
Figures such as the work and pensions select committee chair, Debbie Abrahams, the crossbench peer Jane Campbell and the former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn told the Guardian that the government must guarantee the rights of disabled people to travel and ensure they have the support they need to do so. You can practically hear the right preparing to oppose the move with a cry of “Free holidays on the NHS!” But care users going abroad doesn’t cost the taxpayer anything extra in care bills. Disabled people who need 24/7 support for everyday activities already have care funding in place, and in many cases use their own money to pay PAs’ travel expenses, such as accommodation and plane tickets (on top of the already extortionate price of accessible travel).
When Lucy was told by her care board she couldn’t take her PAs to a spinal cord conference in Germany this spring, her employer had already offered to pay any additional costs. The question, then, is why would authorities want to stop disabled people going abroad? If it’s not just about tight budgets, why should it matter to them how an adult chooses to use their care package?
Extract — continue reading at the source.
