Adult Social Care Charges:
Some of you may know about the petition I set up (Link: https://c.org/qgNTyzdCtp ) in 2024, against the proposals of Sutton Council to increase social care charges (specifically targeting the higher-needs-income of their most disabled residents) in order to shore-up council-budgets.
A local news-outlet also picked up the story, at the time Link: https://www.mylondon.news/news/south-london-news/ex-marine-alzheimers-faces-extra-30227390
On the 5th of December 2024, Sutton’s Lib-Dem council, ignoring escalating strength of feeling on their proposals and seemingly indifferent to the many highly emotional testimonies shared at consultation events (notably absent from the anodyne consultation outcome document produced) voted their proposals in anyway.
Please see the petition body for details and background.
The struggle continues though, as the charging structure continues to detrimentally affect Sutton’s profoundly disabled and their families/carers (in other areas too, where the same charging applies) with ever more biting Financial Assessments.
The impact is not just financial. I have spoken with a number of carers, who are broken by the pressing, seemingly never ending need to justify their loved one’s disability, providing ever more intrusive, distressing detail of their lived reality. These are people’s lives, it should be remembered, not just numbers, in a cost-saving agenda.
The petition therefore continues, as a measure of the many voices still protesting about this charging structure.
Thank you for your ongoing support, please keep sharing, signing and commenting. This will not only highlight the impact these changes are still having, it will also galvanise dented spirits and remind people that this current trend, towards targeting disability is wrong.
Thank you.