Contempt for the disabled

Most decent people would never have thought they'd see the day when an organisation set up to provide sustainable employment for disabled people would be cynically shut down by the state.

But this is what is happening with the proposed closure of 36 of the 54 remaining Remploy factories.

In early March the minister responsible for Remploy Maria Miller stood uneasily at the despatch box and explained the government's intentions.

She announced that 1,752 Remploy workers will face compulsory redundancy. Some 1,518 of these workers are disabled.

Miller also envisaged that the complete closure of all 54 factories will take place before the end of 2013.

No wonder she looked uncomfortable given the consequences to peoples' lives.

This attack on the most vulnerable in society shows the true face of this discredited coalition. Thousands of disabled workers will now lose their jobs and livelihoods and many of them may never work again.

With the government's so-called austerity programme meaning fewer employment rights for workers while those earning millions a year pay less tax, questions must surely be asked as to what sort of society the coalition is moulding.

The government proclaims that this is a good deal for disabled people, but those who are disabled and live in the real world of work know differently.

This government believes that privatising disabled people's workplaces and turning them into fodder for private companies to make profit is the way forward - the Remploy Consortium of Trade Unions says it is the way backwards.

Remploy has not been without its problems, but the reasons behind those problems are simple.

The workers have not had a proper and meaningful role in the company. Too many decisions have been taken by an unfocused management which is not disabled itself and therefore do not understand disabled peoples requirements.

As a result a chasm has developed over many years in the relationship between workers on the shop floor and management.

However, the Remploy unions knew that it was in trouble when the coalition government asked Liz Sayce from the Royal Association for Disability Rights (Radar) to produce a report on Remploy.

Sayce's involvement immediately compromised the report's independence. Radar has long since declared its opposition to supported employment on the basis that its advisers can find work for disabled people.

Miller had previously confirmed in Parliament that Radar had been paid to write the report. And Radar's former CEO Kate Nash is also on the board of Remploy.

So the struggle for Remploy must continue - and it is a just struggle to pursue. It is a struggle for vulnerable people, some of whom have given the best part of their lives working for Remploy and are now going to be kicked out of employment by this abysmal government.

Questions that must be asked on Remploy:

1 It was Parliament in 2007 and 2008 that agreed the modernisation plan which should be reviewed in 2013. Why has the government decided to withdraw that commitment early in July 2012?

2 Why has the £550 million agreed by the last government been reallocated to enable Remploy Employment Services to remain open until April 2014? This will enable this part of Remploy to stay open just long enough to complete contracts and then be sold off. To do this, Tim Matthews has confirmed that the saving from the closure of the 36 factory sites will be used to pay for the extension to Employment Services.

3 Why has the government breached the agreement reached with the last government that no disabled person would be made compulsory redundant?

4Why have those disabled Remploy employees who were told when their factory closed in 2008 that they would have a job until normal retirement age (65 years) now been put at risk of redundancy and are being told that the company will withdraw funding in July 2012? Most of these employees work in companies that will not pay more than 20 per cent towards the employment cost. There are 204 of these disabled people.

5Why is the government prepared to close the pension fund with an estimated cost of between £400m and £700m?

6 Why has the government not allowed the five year modernisation plan to run the full five years?

7 Why has the government allowed the company's management structure to continue to grow and increase in costs?

8 What will happen to the trainees who last year numbered 2,500 and the plans for 4,000 which will go if eventually there are no Remploy factory sites for them to train in?

9 What will the estimated cost be to the NHS because these people will see a decline in health?

10 No-one in government has said what the overall benefits bill will be. The company's equality officer has given us figures of between £10,200 and £27,000 per year per person.

Our estimate is that it will cost around £38m per year if you add the lost revenue to the government from tax and insurance. This is nonsense when you take into consideration that it only costs £35m now to run 54 factory sites. The trade unions are confident that this could be reduced to £20m per year or, put another way, £1 per year per taxpayer or, if trade union targets are achieved, 60p per taxpayer per year.

MPs need to understand that the British public is willing to pay these costs and would not vote for any government that is not prepared to allocate such meagre amounts to keep 2,500 people with disabilities in work.