Letter To Iain Duncan Smith

Dear IDS,
I want to register how angry and dismayed I am that you want to close down the Remploy factories.

I cannot believe that as work and pensions minister, with unemployment over 2.5 million, you are voluntarily throwing over a thousand people out of work - especially this group of disabled people, who you know have little chance of getting another job.

How can you justify closing British factories and putting disabled people on benefits like this? The people who work for Remploy are proud of being able to contribute to our economy and our society, and you will be ruining lives if you go ahead with this move.

The workers want you to meet them at their factory in Barking near your constituency, and I wanted to join the call to pass their message on. You can arrange a time with the factory manager John Severn. His email address is john.severn@remploy.co.uk, or his phone number is 0208 507 5820.

Vulnerable people should not be part of your Tory ideology of shrinking the state. There are business models and business opportunities that could be adopted to make Remploy profitable. One has to ask why you are so insistent in shutting Remploy down.

Yours sincerely
Maelo Manning

To readers: This letter can be found at http://www.uniteforoursociety.org/page/speakout/remploy-speakout?js=false&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&utm_campaign=20120529saveremployfb&source=20120529saveremployfb.
Please show your support as liberal democrats and sign it.

Postcards from the Land of the Disabled

The 1922 Committee is the REAL Bogeyman

I have been wondering who the Bogeyman is since I was little. All I knew is that he was a 'he' (BogeyMAN). As I grew up I started questioning who he was. Was he a single man, I mean was he operating on his own and not whether he was married, or did he have followers? Did they all travel the world scaring little children whose parents summoned them? Or was it one man who appeared simultaneously everywhere like God does? 

 

I think I have found the answer. It's the 1922 Conservative Backbench Committee and they reside in Westminster. If they are capable of scaring Tory MP's and the Prime Minister who, in turn, aren't scared of depriving the already deprived (Remploy, Children from poor homes whose parents are suffering further because of welfare cuts) then they must be the Bogeyman. This week the 1922 MP's fought between themselves. There was chaos in Bogeyman land because they couldn't decide whether they have the right to criticise the PM. It was that Nadine Dorries who started it all by calling the PM and George O 'posh boys'. Stewart Jackson, MP for Peterborough was told off (to put it midly)  for wanting the right to speak up against the PM. 

The 1922 Committee Executive has elections next week. Rumours are stalking the hallways of Westminster about the party leadership (I say Cameron and George O) putting forward MP's who will speak favourably about them. I used to imagine the Bogeyman lurking in the corridor outside my bedroom when I was little. The similarities are too much. I now know he does exist. We need Santa to fight him off. 

P/S. For those who are interested my mother also would scare me by telling me about the 'Curry Woman' who would force me to eat curries if I didn't go to bed on time etc. I hated curries till I was 10 years old.