Tuesday, June 17, 2014

Trade Unionists plan to oust McVey over disability rights


TRADE unionists in Merseyside plan to “depose” a government minister they accuse of making disabled people’s lives a misery by ensuring she loses her seat at next year’s general election.


They say Tory Employment Minister Esther McVey has helped condemn hundreds of thousands of jobless and disabled people to a life of penury, misery and uncertainty.

They have launched a campaign to overthrow the 2,436 majority which won her Wirral West Parliamentary seat in 2010.

The campaign has been launched by Wirral Trades Union Council.

Wirral TUC secretary Alec McFadden said: “We have already printed the first 1,000 ‘Sack McVey’ stickers.”

Ms McVey’s constituency includes the mansions of multi-millionaire footballers as well as working-class council estates and communities such as Woodchurch and Arrow Park.

Ms McVey was to her job at the Department for Work and Pensions in early 2013.

Mr McFadden said: “The number of sanctions against benefit claimants since she became Employment Minister has increased both in Wirral and across the UK and now stands at a record level.”

Sanctions deny jobless people benefits if they miss or are late for an appointment, refuse unpaid work, don’t apply for enough jobs — even if they are non-existent — and being too ill to attend an interview.

Mr McFadden said there were increasing reports of people committing suicide after their benefits were withdrawn.

Annette Francis, 30, a single-parent with an 11-year-old son, was found dead at her home in Garston in Liverpool in May. Her benefits had been stopped for six months by the Department of Work and Pensions.