THERE was a BBC reporter in Trafalgar Square today, talking about - what else? - the Olympics. Not that anything was going on so far as I could see. But while both the Beeb and ITN were doing their best to arouse interest in the costly Games to come, something was happening around the corner and off camera, which perhaps we were not meant to see.
Disabled people, many of them in wheelchairs, blocked two busy road junctions around the square by chaining themselves and their chairs together in a line, with security locks. They were protesting the Con Dem government's welfare reforms, the use made of firms like Atos to declare people "fit for work" in order to deprive them of benefits, and the planned closure of Remploy factories which currently employ 2,000 people.
As a south London Remploy worker told a meeting of trade unionists recently "We won't go quietly into the night. We won't go quietly anywhere".
Planned cuts to the Disability Living Allowance could see 500,000 disabled people losing money, the charity Mencap has said.
Today's demonstration was organised by Disabled People Against the Cuts (Dpac). It lasted for two hours before police had to use bolt cutters to remove the chains. A BBC report had mentioned "traffic delays" in the vicinity without giving the reason.
... full story at Random Pottins.
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