Kirstein wrote:
> One thing
> academics can do within the kind of training relationships we tend
> to have with the arbiters of the state (the doctors, nurses, social
> workers, housing officers, benefits officers etc) is support disabled
> people in claiming their rights by removing one of the barriers they
> experience in accessing those rights - namely the ignorance of the
> existance of those rights.
Is the DDA itself not a hindrance in achieving this, because those "rights"
are still individual rights? The term "institutionally racist", largely as a
result of the MacPherson Report, is now an everyday occurrence in the media.
Institutional racism has always been covered by the Race Relations Act, but
it has taken a number of appalling atrocities against Black people for
people to start asking what it actually means. There have also been some
important cases relating to institutional sexism, most notably within the
academy to pick up Ozcan's point. Neither the DDA nor the ADA recognise
institutional disablism as a form of discrimination, and institutions,
including trade unions, will therefore continue to "renege on their
(collective) responsibilities" as you put it. The academy often targets jobs
at women and members of ethnic minorities because "these groups are
underrepresented in the work-force", but disabled people are not similarly
targeted except sometimes when a job is disability-related. Given this, I
would guess that most disabled employees in the UK academy are in part-time
jobs, on fixed term contracts and are not accommodated by flexible working
practices. How then can we begin to challenge institutional values?
>
> Not only do most disabled people not realise they
> have this right, and therefore find it difficult to assert, but most local
> authorities renege on their responsibilities.
>
Even when disabled people know their rights and are willing to assert them
as individuals (which is all we can do under the law), we still have
capitalism to contend with. To give an idea - a well-known firm specialising
in employment and anti-discriminatory law recently quoted an hourly charge
out rate of £240 plus VAT plus a down payment of £1,000 plus VAT on account
of legal costs - before the client had any indication of whether or not they
might have a case. The law is always reactive. I, for one, do not believe
that persuasion will ever work without legislation with teeth and proactive
social policy.
Best wishes
Mairian
________________End of message______________________
Archives and tools for the Disability-Research Discussion List
are now located at:
www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/disability-research.html
You can JOIN or LEAVE the list from this web page.
|