The Minister for Disabled People, Maria Miller, has said that the Government's vision for a "big society" would put disabled people's organisations (DPOs) in a stronger position to support disabled people. But Stephen Lee Hodgkins tells Sunil Peck that it's too soon to know whether that will happen or not
The director of Disability LIB, the Big Lottery funded organisation set up to encourage capacity building in DPOs has a split view on David Cameron’s big idea.
“‘Big society’ is a double-edged sword”, he says with reference to the devolution of state power to community groups and volunteers.
“I was talking to a DPO representative in Sutton, one of the areas which is a pilot for “big society”. He shrugged his shoulders and said ‘I haven’t heard anything about that, let alone seen any of the benefits’.”
Hodgkins is concerned that the success of some existing services could be used against them and turn out to have an adverse effect on resources and service provision for disabled people under a “big society” banner .
“I went to meet some people at Brighton and Hove federation in their Shopmobility unit. It’s a great service in a disused storage room in a car park that they get rent free. My fear is that while that is a good use of space and resources, the Government could use examples like that to justify investing less in crucial services for disabled people.“
But with many other DPOs struggling to survive, how realistic is it to expect them to be in a position to play an active role in “big society?” Hodgkins says that capacity building could be crucial in their ability to do so.
“One brilliant example is Building Our Futures, a project managed by the grassroots organisation Disability Action in Islington, which identified employment issues undermining the ability of DPOs to survive. Another example is Disability Equality North West’s information service that provides rights and benefits advice by training up disabled people to run it.”
Disability LIB, he says, also has a valuable role to play in ensuring DPOs are not edged out in the competition to access funding to provide services.
Hodgkins says that DPOs also have an important role to play by ensuring that inclusion and diversity do not fall by the wayside as other community groups clamour for influence in “big society”.
“Groups should value and shout about what they’ve done and the difference that they’ve made, confidently believing in their unique value and role as facilitators of the often unheard voices of disabled people. They should never undersell themselves, or do things for free where disabled people do or should have a right to resources. They need to think about how to build on the work they have done to promote greater inclusion, showing how inclusion is a benefit to all.
DPOs should remain proud of their achievements, and their radical history, and continue to articulate moments of discrimination as and when they happen to make sure disability is never ignored, and inclusive living is something we all just do.”
