scholarly journals Disability, Rights and Vulnerability in British Parliamentary Debate

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Evan Odell
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Government Policies ◽  
Disability Rights ◽  
House Of Commons ◽  
Disabled People ◽  
Members Of Parliament ◽  
Parliamentary Debate ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Disability Movement ◽  
The Welfare State

This paper examines discussion of disability and disabled people by Members of Parliament (MPs) in the UK House of Commons from 1979–2017. It examines general trends in the number of speeches mentioning disability, including the parties and MPs most likely to mention disability issues, and examines how disability is used in conjunction with two keywords: ‘rights’ and ‘vulnerable’. It uses these keywords to explore two conceptions of how the state should engage with disability and disabled people: a paternalistic conception (which post-2010 has become more common) and a rights-based conception (which has been in decline since the 1990s). I conclude with a discussion about how this reflects the disability movement in the UK, and what it means for the future of disability politics, the welfare state and how disabled people themselves might view paternalistic government policies.

scholarly journals The Development of Direct Payments in the UK: Implications for Social Justice

2005 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 75-85 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sheila Riddell ◽  
Charlotte Pearson ◽  
Debbie Jolly ◽  
Colin Barnes ◽  
Mark Priestley ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
Independent Living ◽  
Rapid Expansion ◽  
Disabled People ◽  
The Past ◽  
Funded Project ◽  
Important Means ◽  
Direct Payments ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Disability Movement

Direct payments have been heralded by the disability movement as an important means to achieving independent living and hence greater social justice for disabled people through enhanced recognition as well as financial redistribution. Drawing on data from the ESRC funded project Disabled People and Direct Payments: A UK Comparative Perspective, this paper presents an analysis of policy and official statistics on use of direct payments across the UK. It is argued that the potential of direct payments has only partly been realised as a result of very low and uneven uptake within and between different parts of the UK. This is accounted for in part by resistance from some Labour-controlled local authorities, which regard direct payments as a threat to public sector jobs. In addition, access to direct payments has been uneven across impairment groups. However, from a very low base there has been a rapid expansion in the use of direct payments over the past three years. The extent to which direct payments are able to facilitate the ultimate goal of independent living for disabled people requires careful monitoring.

5. The Significance of Rituals in Parliament

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emma Crewe ◽  
Paul Evans
Keyword(s):  
House Of Commons ◽  
Parliamentary Debates ◽  
Political World ◽  
Members Of Parliament ◽  
House Of Lords ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Power Hierarchy ◽  
The Way

This chapter examines the significance of rituals in the UK Parliament, focusing on the centrality of rules in such rituals, how parliamentary debates are ritualized, and how ceremonies order relationships between different groups in our political world. It first explains the purpose of parliamentary rituals and how they are regulated, showing that the value attached to the way Parliament ritualizes its interaction is strongly contested between Members of Parliament (MPs) and by outside commentators. In particular, it considers Standing Orders, rules made by either the House of Commons or the House of Lords to set out the way certain aspects of House procedures operate. The chapter also discusses how rituals result in conflict and conciliation and as markers of power, hierarchy, and identity in Parliament.

A General Model of Author “Style” with Application to the UK House of Commons, 1935–2018

2020 ◽  
Vol 28 (3) ◽  
pp. 412-434
Author(s):  
Leslie Huang ◽  
Patrick O. Perry ◽  
Arthur Spirling
Keyword(s):  
Statistical Model ◽  
General Model ◽  
Panel Regression ◽  
House Of Commons ◽  
Members Of Parliament ◽  
Covariate Effects ◽  
The Uk

We consider evidence for the assertion that backbench members of parliament (MPs) in the UK have become less distinctive from one another in terms of their speech. Noting that this claim has considerable normative and substantive implications, we review theory and findings in the area, which are ultimately ambiguous on this question. We then provide a new statistical model of distinctiveness that extends traditional efforts to statistically characterize the “style” of authors and apply it to a corpus of Hansard speeches from 1935 to 2018. In the aggregate, we find no evidence for the claim of more homogeneity. But this hides intriguing covariate effects: at the MP-level, panel regression results demonstrate that on average, more senior backbenchers tend to be less “different” in speech terms. We also show, however, that this pattern is changing: in recent times, it is more experienced MPs who speak most distinctively.

scholarly journals MPs' Attitudes to Welfare: A New Consensus?

2006 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
HUGH BOCHEL ◽  
ANDREW DEFTY
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
New Right ◽  
The Political ◽  
House Of Commons ◽  
Political Language ◽  
Welfare Provision ◽  
Mixed Economy ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Welfare State

The post-war ‘consensus’ on welfare was based largely in the perceived agreement of leading politicians of Conservative and Labour parties on the role of the mixed economy and the welfare state. However, from the late 1970s economic and demographic pressures and ideological challenges, particularly from the New Right, led to cuts in spending on welfare, increased private involvement and an emphasis on more individualistic and selectivist approaches to provision. Recently some scholars have begun to discuss the emergence of a ‘new liberal consensus’ around welfare provision. Drawing upon interviews with 10 per cent of the House of Commons, this article examines the extent to which a new political consensus upon welfare can be identified. In addition to analysing responses to questions on welfare issues, it considers the extent to which MPs themselves believe there to be some degree of consensus in approaches to welfare. It also considers whether any consensus exists merely in the political language used in relation to welfare issues, or whether there is a more substantive convergence.

scholarly journals Partisan Dealignment and Personal Vote-Seeking in Parliamentary Behaviour

2020 ◽  
pp. 003232172095350
Author(s):  
Thomas G Fleming
Keyword(s):  
House Of Commons ◽  
Members Of Parliament ◽  
Electoral Strategies ◽  
Legislative Proposals ◽  
Empirical Tests ◽  
Low Levels ◽  
Election Results ◽  
The Uk ◽  
New Evidence ◽  
The Relationship

What shapes legislators’ incentives for personal vote-seeking in parliament? Recent work suggests that partisanship among voters deters personal vote-seeking, by limiting its effectiveness. This has potentially significant implications for policy-making, election results and patterns of accountability. However, empirical tests of this argument remain few in number and have several limitations. This article thus offers a new test of the relationship between partisanship and personal vote-seeking. Using legislators’ bill proposals as an indicator of their personal vote-seeking activity, I analyse legislative behaviour in the UK House of Commons between 1964 and 2017. I find that members of parliament make more legislative proposals when voters are less partisan. Moreover, partisanship appears to moderate the influence of other drivers of personal vote-seeking: electorally vulnerable legislators make more legislative proposals, but only at low levels of partisanship. These findings provide new evidence that voters’ relationships with political parties affect legislators’ electoral strategies and parliamentary behaviour.

How Does Decentralisation Affect the Welfare State? Territorial Politics and the Welfare State in the UK and US

2009 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 181-201 ◽  
Author(s):  
SCOTT L. GREER
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Social Services ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Intergovernmental Relations ◽  
The United States ◽  
Welfare States ◽  
Central State ◽  
Veto Points ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Welfare State

AbstractThe relationship between political decentralisation and the welfare state is much studied, and large-scale studies have repeatedly found that decentralised states have less generous welfare states. How do we fit that with other studies that emphasise the potential of decentralisation to raise welfare standards? This article argues that decentralisation, as a variable, is too broad and it is more efficient to focus on the structure of veto players in the central state, intergovernmental relations and intergovernmental finance. Those are the actual mechanisms that connect decentralisation to the welfare states, and they can all vary independently of decentralisation. It uses recent changes in the United States and United Kingdom as examples. The fragmentation and average weakness of the US welfare state is mostly due to a federal government riddled with internal veto points that permits considerable interstate variation and low overall average provision, while tight central control on finances in the UK means that most variation is in the organisation, rather than levels, of social services.

scholarly journals Disability ‘Rights’ or ‘Wrongs’? The Claims of the International Paralympic Committee, the London 2012 Paralympics and Disability Rights in the UK

2013 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 164-167 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stuart Braye ◽  
Tom Gibbons ◽  
Kevin Dixon
Keyword(s):  
Online Survey ◽  
Disability Rights ◽  
Disabled People ◽  
Limited Impact ◽  
London 2012 ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Short Essay ◽  
Elite Sports ◽  
Paralympic Games

A central aspect of the vision of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) is that the Paralympic Movement is a vehicle for achieving ‘a more equitable society’ (IPC 2012a). Building upon the findings of an online survey conducted with disabled activists prior to the London 2012 Paralympic Games ( Braye, Dixon and Gibbons 2012 ), in this short essay we argue that whilst this vision is commendable, the Paralympics has limited impact on the everyday lives of disabled people in the UK. Whilst there was evidence of support for the IPC's view that the 2012 Games would be a positive vehicle for improving equality, there were also protests by disabled activists suggesting some disabled people saw the Games in more critical terms. Despite claims that the Paralympic Games has raised awareness of disabled athletes and wider equality issues for disabled people, such a view is not shared by many disability activists some of whom have controversially used the Games as a vehicle to highlight inequalities. It is concluded that the IPC are distinctively positioned to address disability issues as they relate to a unique and elite sports enclave and perhaps ought to restrain from seeing themselves as anything more until they have opened a dialogue with disability activists.

Fulfilling basic human needs: the welfare state after Beveridge

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick Diamond
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Welfare States ◽  
Social Security Systems ◽  
Security Systems ◽  
Human Needs ◽  
Advanced Economies ◽  
The 2008 Financial Crisis ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Post Industrial ◽  
The Welfare State

Traditional welfare states with their origins in the Beveridge report of 1942 have struggled to respond adequately to new structural pressures and challenges that have arisen in the advanced economies over the last seventy years, especially in Britain. These include changes in demography and the structure of family life, alongside the emergence of a post-industrial economy marked by the loss of skilled manufacturing employment and regions of the UK adversely impacted by the process of deindustrialisation. As the pressures on the welfare state have increased, so existing social security systems have struggled to address a diversity of unmet human needs. The purpose of this chapter is to consider the implications of these changes for contemporary social policy in the developed capitalist countries, paying particular attention to the policy landscape in the UK in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis and austerity. The chapter addresses why the crisis and great recession have not led to a more radical recalibration of policy, and examines the emerging models of ‘relational welfare’ that seek to respond to a series of criticisms of the role of states and markets in welfare provision.

scholarly journals Unemployment and Income Protection: How do Better-Earning Households Expect to Manage Financially?

2013 ◽  
Vol 42 (3) ◽  
pp. 587-603 ◽  
Author(s):  
JOCHEN CLASEN ◽  
ALISON KOSLOWSKI
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Strategic Planning ◽  
Welfare State ◽  
European Countries ◽  
Limited Extent ◽  
Average Income ◽  
Income Security ◽  
Working Age ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Welfare State

AbstractApart from health care and education, it could be argued that working-age households with above-average income in the UK have never relied as much on the welfare state as their counterparts in many other European countries. How then do better-earning households expect to cope financially with the risk of unemployment, and to what extent do they plan ahead for a possible loss of earnings? Based on sixty-one interviews with couples, the article discusses various sources of income protection that these households envisage drawing upon in the event of unemployment. State benefits figure only marginally, private insurances to a limited extent and savings slightly more. However, there is little evidence of strategic planning. By contrast, many perceive their current job and personal employability as providing some security and regard the prospect of occupational redundancy pay as a major source of income protection. This finding contrasts sharply with a paucity of systematic information about the actual scope, quality and development of employer-based income security.

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