Whilst in the middle of writing this, I was taken to hospital. The paramedics who came were kind, calming, professional. One white, two black. All British.
Arriving in A&E I was taken to ‘Majors’. A sobering reality was that the cubicles were filled with older overwhelmingly white people, while, as has been the case for years, the staff were not. The place was noisy and there was an observable rise in anger, and a loosening of the ‘permission’ to hurl racial abuse.
And here we are in a dismal place. Along with the racially motivated slurs in A&E, I’m hearing from some disabled people, we should, ‘Let this bunch Reform have a go – they can’t be worse than the last lot’, as the local council elections in May loom ever closer (I’ve received my postal vote already).
The Green Party winning in Gorton and Denton and, more recently, another council seat in Cliftonville (replacing a disgraced Reform councillor jailed for abusing his wife), can offer some hope. Yet we need to face the repulsive reality of right-wing populism, and how it is possible, as social justice activist groups know, that some disabled people may end up as a type of juicy voting fodder for those, such as Reform, who would exploit their vulnerability.
In general, the disabled community scarcely registers with mainstream parties as having any relevance, until we are cynically rendered useful (and face the reality that Labour have betrayed us). Does anyone remember DPAC’s post-general election ‘We Demand’ campaign?
To suffer such a Labour sell out, is sickening, as we flounder in the wreckage of those broken promises – PIP attacked, hypocrisy high in the failures of ATW and the increasing breakdown of social care. Is this the reason that, according to a 2025 poll ordered by the allegedly, indisputably honest GB News, for a claim that 29% of disabled people support Reform? A more down to earth view follows the general consensus that this was likely a backlash sentiment ironically caused by Labour’s attacks against changes to PIP.
After all, this is the same Reform who recently declared they want to repeal the Equalities Act 2010, which currently underpins many disabled people’s (and others’) rights across many services. This announcement sent shockwaves through disabled rights organisations and grassroots groups, who remain united in opposition.
Reform UK continue to make their usual lightweight, highly contradictory – yet dangerous – statements. On the one hand, there’s a ‘tough-on-fraud’ stance; on the other, they promise ‘exceptions’ for those who are deemed as having ‘severe disabilities or serious long-term illnesses’ – no clarity on who defines such groups. And let’s not forget the farce when Reform called for a return to the ‘invalid cars’ while
proposing billions of cuts on welfare.
For me, on a personal and professional level, this is all terrifying. Those who are rarely encouraged to engage in, or supported to join in political debate – and who are often the first to be discarded by the state – are often the easiest to draw in.
Disabled people are in desperate need of genuine optimism – from someone, some party, that recognises our legitimate battles. Meaning I am sadly not surprised to hear random disabled people spouting fallacies: ‘all the housing’s going to immigrants, that’s why we’re on waiting lists for so long’, and ‘the NHS is clogged up with these boat people, that’s why I can’t get an appointment with my GP’.
Calling on my trusted networks within the disability community, it is evident there are edges of conflicting opinions. Some people have absorbed the current inclination to believe the far right’s headlines and hearsay. Others vaguely paraphrase Reform-style rhetoric, stuck in ongoing hopelessness.
Many respondents recognised the dilemma we face – that this is an exercise in divide and conquer of the most repellent kind that plays on vulnerability.
One response was that ‘... Nigel [Farage] appears to speak the truth… actually answers the questions [sic]! Watching Newsnight…the pirouettes, twists and turns… [that] MPs do simply to avoid answering a question.’ This links to another point made: ‘hearing Reform using emotive angry language (however misplaced) can feel like a validation.’
The truth is, disabled people really do face struggles around housing, in a crisis caused not by immigrants but, to paraphrase, decades of under investment in building up accessible social housing stock. I’m angry, too, that I’m stuck on the rehousing list, living in inappropriate, dangerous accommodation. Across the board, disabled people face challenges to find appropriate social care, a fact we’ve campaigned about for years. These issues have affected us for too long – before we pick open any party politics.
As successive governments fail, their disgraced ministers paid off and living handsomely out of the spotlight, the beleaguered NHS staggers on, covertly transformed to wrestle with sly profit-making models and private health partnerships. So, yet again, it’s disabled people who are at the bottom of this shambles. We will be easy targets for the likes of Reform and other right-wing forces should they creep further up the ladder.
Yet outside of fascist hyperbole, it is a relief to know that many disabled people remain alert to attempts to draw us into this repugnant arena. Across all age groups – and backgrounds – we recognise, as one respondent commented, that ‘... people genuinely do not know what Reform is… [while some know]...linking it to 1930s politics, and the Holocaust...others know nothing,’. Considering Farage’s past comments on Hitler being ‘right’, and the fact that disabled people were some of the earliest victims of the Nazis, it’s no wonder this came up. Another commented that: ‘learning…eugenics-based policies stemmed from Nazi politics is something everyone should know. Disabled lives are on the line with Reform.’
Many echoed the belief that Reform’s divisive suggestion that ‘mass immigration… [is] driving the housing crisis and threatens collapsing the NHS’, are false. Reform brazenly use a ‘leverage tool with which they will probably gain lots of votes…’ on the ‘illegal immigration’ issue and alleged ‘foreign sex offenders’.
While falsehoods are largely recognised as ‘nonsense’ and that ‘our amazing NHS immigrants… bust their asses keeping… [us] alive on a regular basis,’ there’s genuine fear at the prospect of Reform having control over us and the services we need. Some disabled people talk of how they fight within their own families to resist giving the Right more power, reminding relatives ‘how much… NHS treatment [could]… cost and [that they] would have to pay for it, if [Reform] gets in’.
Others admitted that rebutting Reform and rising fascism was exhausting. Internal family strife was acknowledged: ‘...I know at least one family member was UKIP…[now] Reform. The problem is the propaganda is constant.’ I sympathise and echo that any helpful discussions begun may end if there’s no persistence – but who has the energy when every-day survival is exhausting enough?
Many who answered my call, did see beyond headline-grabbing hype, firm in knowing that Reform won’t offer ongoing or authentic support for the disabled community. ‘Reform wants to cut £9bn from PIP – that isn’t fraudsters, that’s people like you and me. If they take away that, how do we pay for our heating or transport?’
Reflecting on my recent NHS experience, as I lay unwell on my trolley, surrounded by diverse individuals working together with a day-to-day camaraderie and kindness that too often goes unheard, I know fears about the NHS are prominent: ‘I imagine the NHS as we know it, collapsing…[if Reform had power].’ And many disabled activists know the realities in the statistics: ‘20% of the NHS workforce are non-UK nationals. Without their involvement eventually the NHS wouldn’t function at all.’ After 40 years on the receiving end of social care, this is my own lived experience.
Yet to pull disabled people back from the repellent fake allure of Reform, we must recognise the validity of disabled people’s anger, fear and exhaustion. There is a sense of unity that understanding and recognising the realities of these feelings is to be encouraged, otherwise alienation and a further splintering of ‘them and us’ is inevitable. We can have shared conversations about how there aren’t enough people entering (poorly paid) social care employment, and that those people who’ve filled in many of the gaps we face are often foreign nationals. The doctors we see, and have ongoing connections with, will include many from migrant communities. Do we really want to stop this essential support?
As one respondent said powerfully, ‘[while] not validating their [right wing] misinformation…when people try to survive…we have to respond with empathy. And facts.’ Alternatives are needed, which means even weak and imperfect views suggest a way to agitate. ‘Easier to blame migrants than the real systemic underfunding of local government services over decades… Reform are claiming the welfare system is broken, which [we can agree], but their narrative [that it’s] because of scrounging disabled people and public services clogged up by mass immigration doesn’t hold up to evidence and facts’.
For Reform, and far-right groups, money, ‘meritocracy’ and profit are above all else. Their reality is never a place where disabled people, social justice and equality can sit comfortably. We must resist involvement in heated debates of opposing ‘sides’, but show authentic anger at the betrayal of a system where politicians are gleeful when we fight against each other, resulting in governments able to shrug off accountability for their own breakdowns in the overlapping failing infrastructures of NHS and social care.
This quote states the reality in relation to turning disabled voters away from Reform: ‘No one should be sitting hoping this is going to get better. We have to act now.’
It’s obvious we must work together to listen and validate the genuine concerns of all disabled people, before we glibly condemn some. To avoid the latest disturbing round of divide and conquer – suffer and struggle – yet again. Which is exactly what the Right are hoping for.
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This piece was originally commissioned by Byline Times, who have given permission for me to share here.
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