The War on Disabled People

Capitalism, Welfare and the Making of a Human Catastrophe

By: Ellen Clifford

Narrated by: Nadia Albina

Bloomsbury presents The War on Disabled People by Ellen Clifford, read by Nadia Albina.

Winner of the Bread and Roses Award for Radical Publishing Award 2021

In 2016, a United Nations report found the UK government culpable for ‘grave and systematic violations’ of disabled people’s rights. Since then, driven by the Tory government’s obsessive drive to slash public spending whilst scapegoating the most disadvantaged in society, the situation for disabled people in Britain has continued to deteriorate. Punitive welfare regimes, the removal of essential support and services, and an ideological regime that seeks to deny disability has resulted in a situation described by the UN as a ‘human catastrophe’.

In this searing account, Ellen Clifford – an activist who has been at the heart of resistance against the war on disabled people – reveals precisely how and why this state of affairs has come about. From spineless political opposition to self-interested disability charities, rightwing ideological myopia to the media demonization of benefits claimants, a shocking picture emerges of how the government of the fifth-richest country in the world has been able to marginalize disabled people with near-impunity. Even so, and despite austerity biting ever deeper, the fightback has begun, with a vibrant movement of disabled activists and their supporters determined to hold the government to account – the slogan ‘Nothing About Us Without Us’ has never been so apt. As this book so powerfully demonstrates, if Britain is to stand any chance of being a just and equitable society, their battle is one we should all be fighting.

©2020 Ellen Clifford (P)2022 Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

Great Book!

I highly recommend this book to any other disabled activists out there. It’s a fantastic exploration of the intersections of disability oppressions and class oppressions within a context of British austerity cuts.