It is with a heavy heart that I watched Prime Minister’s Questions last week.  

As the fiasco of Lord Freud’s comments unfolded under the glare of Westminster and the ensuing tsunami of media and public outrage, it is important to remember this is more than an offensive, off-the-cuff comment.

Although it is clear as welfare minister Freud’s position is untenable, getting rid of Freud won’t solve the problem.

The truth is the Tories don’t give two hoots about a fair and equal society. In fact their alma mater the Iron Lady famously claimed that there was no such thing as society.

Freud’s comments are echoed by fellow Tory colleagues Andrew Selous and Philip Davies — the latter brushing off criticism as left-wing hysteria. Oh, how I wish it was.

When Ed Miliband challenged David Cameron about Freud’s comments on whether or not it was fair to expect disabled people to work for £2 an hour, the Prime Minister, clearly enraged, fired off rhetoric about not needing to be lectured on disability and wanting to talk about the economy instead — as if disability and the economy are mutually exclusive.

Disability is not some niche charitable interest for Rotary Club dinners, disabled people contribute to the economy too.

Disabled people’s existence isn’t merely defined by their disability — they are mothers, brothers, husbands, wives, sisters, train drivers, doctors, teachers, postmen, lawyers... they are everything and anything. And here lies the problem — deep-seated misconception from the very top, opposing equality in society and indeed preventing even entering a meaningful debate.  

Cameron may be uncomfortable talking about disabled people, the hardest hit, the most vulnerable, but blinkered determination to focus on the economy and the economy alone is a grave mistake.

Trying to dodge the question and get back to talking about the economy just exposes everything that is wrong with the Tories.
The economy won’t fix everything. Society is the mortar that binds together a nation. The point of government is to be there for citizens, not shrug its shoulders, let market forces do their thing and chirp “survival of the fittest.”

There are 11 million disabled people in Britain, accounting for 16 per cent of working age adults (DWP figures January 2014).
In the 2010 general election there were 650 parliamentary constituencies across Britain.

This would mean 104 candidates with disabilities would be needed across the country to proportionally reflect the disabled community. To describe the actual figure as an underachievement is putting it mildly. It’s an absolute disaster.

Presently there are only two known unelected disabled Labour Party candidates going forward to fight the 2015 general election — Emily Brothers from Sutton and Cheam and yours truly from Dwyfor Meirionnydd.

Already elected MPs include Anne Begg, (Lab, Aberdeen South) Paul Reynard (Con, Blackpool North and Cleveleys) and Gordon Brown (Lab, Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath).

David Blunkett (Lab, Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough) is stepping down in 2015.

I’m sure there are more candidates with disabilities but these are not declared. It’s generally accepted that if you want to get on in politics, declaring a disability is probably the worst thing you can do for your career.

Politics is no different from so many other sectors where disability is perceived as a weakness associated with ineffectiveness and inability, rather than difference.

This needs to change radically if we are to have more disabled people in politics and more generally in the workplace. Disability should not be a dirty word and difference should be celebrated, not demonised. Diversity is a strength. By being inclusive you support understanding, innovation and are better able to develop policies that work.

In order to achieve this in government we need more disabled elected representatives. Measures are being taken to combat other equality barriers — it’s high time disability is taken as seriously.

This needs to be considered across the board. Although the Local Government Association’s “be a councillor” campaign is welcome, it doesn’t address the barriers once someone actually wins a seat.

At the moment it is a postcode lottery. Support once in office is determined by the council and this differs enormously across Britain.
Access to Work is meant to help disabled people in work, but only in Scotland are councillors paid a salary rather than an allowance and meet the qualifying criteria.

In England and Wales most councillors only get paid a travel and food allowance, which exempts them from Access to Work as it’s deemed voluntary work. The only exemption is if someone has additional councillor responsibilities — Access to Work will only pay for this element.

In short it’s a really big headache and many disabled people will look into the process and say: “Forget it.”

While the 2.6 million Access to Elected Office fund is welcome, it doesn’t go nearly far enough. Where is the mentoring? Where is the training? Where is flexibility in running a campaign if you can’t manage the doorstep? What about a job share? What about the unmet financial barriers? What about attitude barriers?

Contempt and patronising attitudes are the worst offenders in keeping disabled people away from putting their name on the ballot paper.

There are just so many unanswered questions and no solutions on the horizon. Access to Elected Office is due to wind up in May 2015 with no plans to replace it. What then? It’s difficult enough as it is, but come May, it will be nigh on impossible unless something is done now to keep the fund going.

Disability Labour is committed to reaching out and challenging the status quo. We need to do more than just talk the talk, we need to walk the walk. We need to encourage mentoring and training for wannabe disabled candidates, we need to be rolling out disability training and talks amongst our Labour colleagues to better empower them in their professional roles.

We need to be reaching out to people in constituencies through a framework of disability officers to achieve our goals and more and most importantly we need to encourage everyday people to join Disability Labour and be part of this change. It’s about time a political force started to root for disabled people.

There are 11 million people out there counting on it.

Please sign here to call upon the government to do the right thing and keep the fund going.

Mary Griffiths Clarke is prospective parliamentary candidate for Dwyfor Meirionnydd and co-chair of Disability Labour.