"Remember when teachers, nurses, doctors, police, firefighters, ambulance personnel and all our soldiers crashed the stock market, wiped out banks, took billions in bonuses and paid no tax? No, me neither. Please show your support for the public sector strikers"

I am alive today because of the talent, passion and dedication of hundreds of medical professionals who have saved my life on a number of occasions and improved my life on countless others. I’m educated enough to write this because of an incredibly committed learning support assistant and a team of fantastic teachers who never allowed me to give up no matter how hard living with my disability sometimes was.

On Wednesday thousands of public sector workers will go on strike. MPs and journalists will condemn them and call for you to do the same.  If, like the media you are unwilling to give them your support this is why you should at least give them your respect.

Presumably when people go to hospital, send their kids to school, or call out the emergency services to attend to the crisis they or their loved ones are in the midst of, they would like qualified, conscientious, hardworking individuals, with talent and dedication to their profession to turn up. It's quite straight forward if the government keep moving the goal posts for public sector workers - nurses, doctors, physiotherapists, ambulance personnel, the police force, fire fighters and teachers, the quality of service you get from those people will drop rapidly.

Sure there are some council workers, some headteachers, some people at the very top of the education authority for instance who are picking up massive wages and who have for years been able to look forward to very generous pensions at the end of their careers at huge expense to the taxpayer. These reforms however will not hit those people anyway near as hard as it will young people entering those professions now, people who have happily accepted a two year pay freeze and accept that they are unlikely to earn anymore than 25k a year, no matter how many years they stay dedicated to the job, even after taking on extra responsibility and shouldering the kind of stress most averagely paid private sector workers can't begin to comprehend. 

For years teachers have had to put up with the government telling them how and what to teach, constantly restricting the freedom they have to god forbid work out what the kids they teach need for themselves. Nurses are constantly harangued in the media when mistakes are made and bad care provided but when do our national newspapers celebrate the incredible commitment and hard work of those who are saving and improving lives on a daily basis? Last weekend we were told that the government have decided that GPs are no longer responsible enough to honestly assess the condition of their patients in regards to their ability to work. Knowing your patients well is a problem according to this government. I’m sure I’ll have no problem summarising 18 years of medical history and the impact of over 50 operations I’ve had to a government official who knows nothing about me. I can imagine those suffering acute stress or depression will be relishing the opportunity to discuss in depth the painful and traumatic experiences that prevent them from functioning properly with well, Tom, Dick or Harry.     

Undermined, disrespected, patronised and criticised, these people just have to get on with it, we expect them to, we demand that they do, we take for granted that they will.

There are no bonuses per 100 lives these people save, or per 100 children a teacher brings from below the national average to above it. Teachers spend hours after the working day planning, marking and assessing having spent all day providing a safe, secure, educational and enriching environment for 10 times the amount of kids the average parent has to contend with at the weekend. Those in the NHS go home regularly knowing that no matter how hard they work, they may be unable to help a patient improve their quality of life or prevent them losing their lives, having spent the day on their feet knowing one small mistake on their part, regardless of however many lives they have improved or saved could result in a patient's death and utter devastation for their family. 

Yes they choose these professions, but they have partners and children themselves which should always come first and the government are making it harder and harder for such people to justify the long, stressful hours they work to the families who hardly see them. The pension schemes went a long way to doing that, parents knowing they wouldn't burden their kids in the future when they reach old age, knowing they would have money and time to support their offspring and grandchildren in later life making up for the time they had to spend away from them in their childhood.

What incentive would a caring, hardworking young woman have to become an NHS nurse now, 3 years of university required to earn 20k a year, wiping bums, cleaning up blood, urine, vomit, tolerating abuse from grief stricken relatives and watching people die instead of going to work in the private sector, knowing her hard work will be recognised and rewarded with bonuses, increased holiday allowances and where extra responsibility will equal greater career progression and salary increase? 

We are always hearing how the private sector and its workers are so important as they’re what drive the economy and increase the country’s wealth. That is all that is important of course and keeping people alive, safe and educated well enough to work doesn’t really matter that much.

  When hospitals are staffed purely by the immigrant workers already frequently abused for their trouble, who are qualified but struggle with the language required to provide the most effective service for patients. When your kid's learning disability goes unnoticed or ignored by numerous of teachers only willing to do the bare minimum they are paid to do. When you call an ambulance out for your elderly parent struggling to breathe and get a man in a green uniform turn up, shrug his shoulders and tell you he's only qualified to drive the white vans. Then will you tell the completely selfless few who have tolerated this slap in the face from the government to stay in the public sector, to simply pack it in if they're not happy? 

In other countries those who save lives, care for the sick and educate our children are valued and respected, in ours they are told to stop whinging and get used to the real world! Lets hope those from other countries flock to Britain to come save our public services because in a few years your children and grandchildren will depend on them.

I completely accept and understand that the state of the economy dictates money has to be saved and public spending decreased. I'd wholeheartedly back the introduction on salary caps and pension caps on those in bureaucratic roles being grossly overpaid for the work they do.  Once again the government have shirked from addressing the areas where that small minority are benefiting hugely and unjustly from the system, instead to create a proposal that indiscriminately targets and punishes those far from living a life of luxury (sound familiar?). A lazy, badly thought through decision which causes unfair detriment to the over worked, undervalued key public sector workers, getting their hands dirty on a daily basis, for modest reward and recognition. Something of which our politicians should be utterly ashamed.

Of course they won't be, the majority, having only ever enjoyed private health care and private education, will have no concept of the incredible work these people do and the invaluable benefit it has to those less privileged who rely on them.

As our public services are obliterated by our government, talented professionals driven out of the NHS and state school jobs they were previously steadfastly committed to, we as patients, pupils and general members of the public will suffer from a dearth of people who care. Those who can afford the luxury of private health care and private education will be benefitting directly from the surge of fantastic people still dedicated to improving lives but desperately seeking some respect flocking to work in private hospitals and private schools.

If you don’t believe that that is fair, please support our public sector workers strike action on Wednesday and make the title of this post your Facebook status. They aren’t just fighting for their pensions, they are fighting for their respect and your right to be treated and educated by those who care the most.

Saying What You Mean and Meaning What You Say - (The one about PIP)

I’m a big fan of words. Bloody useful things they are. I particularly like the English Language because it’s full of under-used words that are bloody lovely to say and write and because they are under-used it’s quite easy to select one of these words, whack it into a sentence and make your statement that little bit more interesting, distinctive, or unique.

 I think it’s really important to read as much as you can and always ask somebody when they use a word you’re unfamiliar with, what that word means if you don’t know. Increasing your vocabulary increases your ability to better express yourself, it’s as simple as that. There is no shame in not knowing what a word means when you hear it, only in not bothering your arse enough to make the effort to find out for yourself so you know the next time. It’s impossible to say how many words even exist in the English Language so it’s unreasonable to expect us to know the meaning of every word knocking about the place. It’s a bit like asking an MP to recall a list of all the times they’ve deliberately told a whopping pie of the pork variety or Russell Brand the first name of all his pre-Perry dalliances. You can’t do it, it’d be ridiculous.

Whenever I write, if the opportunity arises, I will endeavour to use a more interesting word in place of a boring word, to hopefully increase the enjoyment the person reading, gets from my ramblings. It’s important to make sure, of course, that I make sure the replacement word means the same as the original word I used, and that the entire sentiment of the sentence it is in, is improved or at least preserved. Massive problems occur when word bandits, presumably in effort to make themselves appear more intelligent go about firing words out willy nilly when they have no sodding clue what they mean. It’s important to say that efficient use of long or unusual words is not necessarily an indication of intelligence. Lots of very silly people, in possession of rather absurd logic use big words, and some very insightful and particularly emotionally intelligent people struggle to express themselves. What it is, indisputably, is fecking problematic when people say things they don’t mean or mean things they don’t say because they haven’t correctly considered the word they have used and the meaning of it.

I like the word discombobulating. It’s lovely to say, wonderfully camp and theatrical in my opinion but I can’t just shove it in any old place I fancy, just because it sounds good. I can’t say I’ve gone out without a coat or brolly whilst it’s discombobulating outside so I am now drenched through to my bones. It sounds nicer, BUT IT’S NOT RIGHT! The bleeding rain has pissed all over me, not fecking confusion, perplexity or bewilderment, the bleeding effing rain.  It is not appropriate to replace raining, with discombobulating. It is not ok, ok? If I were to do this, it would be incredibly discombobulating.

Most of the time, of course, the odd incorrect use of a word has no great consequence, it is annoying, but nobody dies. Usually. However it is important for people providing goods and services to express themselves clearly when they are advertising those goods and services in exchange for money. That is why bodies such as The Advertising Standards Authority exist, to make sure essentially, that people can’t pedal utter bollocks to you and con you out of your money. You can buy Just for Men and if you use it properly it will get rid of your grey hairs. It will not make your immediately more handsome and irresistible to women or discombobulate women into mistaking you with George Clooney. The advert can discombobulate you into assuming that will happen but they can’t SAY it will do that. You might still be just an unfortunate looking bastard and an A grade tool but you will be one without grey hairs. Your hair is all they will be able to claim they can help you address, they can’t claim it will make you better in bed, lengthen the size of your man hose, improve your earning capabilities or make you more charismatic. If they said that it would do that stuff, they would be lying and that, my friends, is really really naughty.

Our government don’t have to answer to the ASA but they do have to answer to us, the general public, tax payers (yes disabled tax payers do exist and are not in fact extinct like dildos, dodos!) the people they serve, the people they debate and legislate on behalf of. We are entitled to know what the hell it is we are paying for, voting for, supporting and using. If Dave and friends decided to use public money to say fund a weekly paint balling session with their best buddies, but told us it was actually necessary for ensuring the country’s safety from invasion or attack, that would be wrong. You would never get the defence secretary using tax payers or voters money to fund holidays or imaginary job roles for his best pal. That would never happen. (Oh wait a second, the rules for us and the rules for them are so discombobulating, I lose track)

So why then, lots of disabled people are asking, are they allowed to replace Disability Living Allowance with something they call Personal Independence Payments?

 Disability Living Allowance, in acknowledging the massive extra costs a disabled person is likely to incur whilst managing their disability, has assessed people’s extra needs in regards to their care or mobility limitations, provided them with financial support and given them the freedom to use that money how they see fit. Trusting the people with such conditions (and those who help them deal with them) to make, incredibly, the right decisions necessary for managing and obtaining the care that they feel they need. It gave them options and choices and freedom and respect. Things, most able-bodied people are guilty sometimes of taking for granted but conversely that most disabled people value above all else and often risk their health to defend.

Personal Independence payments will assess people’s eligibility for them based on their ability to;

Plan and buy food and drink, prepare and cook food, take nutrition, manage medication and monitor health conditions, manage prescribed therapies other than medication, wash, bath and groom, manage their toilet needs and incontinence, dress and undress,  communicate with others plan and follow a journey and get around.

Apparently.

The format of the assessment doesn’t take into account a disabled person’s environment, it doesn't take into account how difficult or impossible it often is for a disabled person to access public transport. It doesn’t take into account how important socialising with others is to the mental health of all human beings, let alone disabled ones. It doesn't consider that a disabled person may need to eat food of a high nutritional value, in order to stay healthy; it doesn’t consider that sometimes non-prescribed, non-essential treatments may benefit an individual more than those deemed more conventional methods of pain management. It doesn’t consider additional responsibilities many disabled people have on top of merely staying alive and functional, such as children, jobs, bills, mortgages. It doesn’t recognise that disabled people often need mental health support even when their disability is physical. It doesn’t consider that disabled people need to have clean clothes, clean bedding, a clean environment and appearance, confidence and social skills in order to even consider themselves in a position to look for employment and that they may have great difficulty in ensuring they possess and maintain such things.

It doesn’t give them options and choices and freedom and respect. It provides the basic minimum requirements for survival, not independence. However they want to call it a Personal Independence Payment. They want to have the general public, taxpayers the people they serve, and the people they debate and legislate on behalf of believe they are improving people’s ability to take better care of themselves and obtain employment. They want to have us believe that the people who don’t meet their strict rigid formulaic criteria for it, don’t need it. That they don’t need help or support, that they should be able to live independently and maintain employment without any support.

If the economy can’t afford to help disabled people live more independent lives then please don’t tell everyone that that is what you are aiming to do. If, as a country, we can’t afford to equip disabled people with the means by which to break down their own, individual barriers to equality, don’t pretend that is what you are going to do.

I imagine that many MPs, in order to perform their jobs, maintain a manageable work/social life balance, take care of themselves and their loved ones and ensure their own sanity, require the assistance of others.

Personal assistants, nannies, housekeepers, cleaners, chauffeurs, masseurs, personal advisors, spokespeople, accountants, therapists. Are there many MPs who cope all the time, without any of this sort of assistance? Do any of them have debilitating physical or mental impairment?

Don’t insult, patronise and disrespect people by pretending that disabled people don’t need some, all of that assistance and other really important services that are being cut left right and centre, in order to manage their lives.

Otherwise shall we just do away with the meaning of words and send people kettles when they pay us for cars? Shall we not call Just For Men, Just For Men and instead  call it Looks Enhancing, Sexy Man Hair Juice?

 No, let’s say what we mean and mean what we say.

Dear Great Britain,

Nobody will ever make me feel guilty for doing stuff, for having a social life, for enjoying my life. I fight with my body, with my health, with uncertainly, with an inaccessible world, with ignorance, my own insecurities and my own better judgement on a daily basis to lead the life I do. I don’t want admiration, congratulations or sympathy for my situation, but I’m unwilling to accept condemnation or criticism for enjoying the life I’m lucky to have, for doing everything in my power to overcome whatever challenges might come my way to grasp tight hold of each and every opportunity that fate affords me.

A little less than a month after my sixth birthday I was injured in a road traffic accident, which caused the death of my dear mum and left me paralysed from the chest down. During my childhood I had to undergo numerous operations and spend long periods of time in hospital. I never learnt to swim without armbands or even to tie my shoe laces properly; I was learning how to catheterise, train my bowels and how to move my body from place to place using my fists. I never felt unlucky and I was rarely angry about the situation but I’d be lying if I didn’t admit there were times when I was so, so sad about things. There was too much to do to be sad for too long though and tears got me nowhere, sheer bloody mindedness, incessant determination made things happen. The choice was an easy one. Just deal with it and do it.

 I remember vividly the struggles I had learning to dress myself, a process I had to work on for years, starting with just my socks, a few months after the accident, a task alone that took me over half an hour the first few times. I accomplished each new necessary skill, that was in turn followed each time by a new challenge; unfurling my clawed fists to do up a button, finding the balance to place a t-shirt over my head without toppling over, rolling repeatedly from side to side to get my trousers up, learning how to put on and do up my back brace without assistance. I didn’t care how long it took me to accomplish these things, despite the embarrassment I often felt at my slow progress or the frustration of so many full hearted unsuccessful attempts, I was always going to get there, giving up wasn’t an option. Other people my age were able to dress themselves and so would I. I needed to be just like everybody else. It took until I was about 13 until I could do it all on my own, by 15, I was able to do it all myself in just under half an hour. I wasn’t proud that I could do it, I was just relieved. It was something I should have been able to do.

 I can’t do it anymore, I struggle to balance without holding onto the bed, I can’t put on my body brace on my own and I can’t pull my trousers up much higher than my knees without lying in a painful position. When I have the time, the inclination and no audience it takes me up to half an hour to pull my trousers past my twisted pelvis and over my bottom, which forms a bustle way out of line with my shoulders, themselves way out of line with each other. It breaks my heart every day that something I worked so hard to achieve is completely impossible for me now. Some days that pain is so hard to face that I only put on underwear and a vest, other days it takes me hours to put my head in the frame of mind to face the fact that I will need to ask for help. Most of the time, I ask for help immediately to get the process over with as soon as possible for acknowledging what I’m no longer able to do is sometimes so gut wrenchingly painful for me that I can’t even face leaving the room.

Then there are times when I wake up after a good sleep, ready and raring to go, so eager to enjoy the day that the difficult process of getting dressed doesn’t cross my mind, I just get on and do it. With an exciting day ahead of me, the opportunity to spend time laughing with my beautiful nephews, gossiping with my fiercely loyal mates or simply having a pint in the pub with my saint of a partner whose patience and dedication to loving me is unwavering, the difficult start to the day matters sod all. They give me strength, joy and instil in me a determination that says fuck you to anything that tries to stand in my way. I owe them my time, my will power and my commitment because they are the people who invest in me when I get too tired, too stiff, to stressed or too sad to invest in myself. There are times when I look in the mirror and hate everything I see, times when I feel nothing but contempt for a body that is always letting me down and hopelessly inadequate of fulfilling the dreams my hearts sets itself on. They always love me, all of me. None of the stuff that has the power to knock the stuffing out of me, matters one jot to them. Their love, their kindness, their acceptance of me, as I am, is often the only thing that can force me to cut myself some slack. I accept that if they love that much that I ought to at least like myself a little bit.

I don’t have to prove anything else to anyone. To people I don’t know who make judgements about me, to the media that misrepresents people like me, to a government that wants to analyse, classify and pigeon hole me. I will prove they’re wrong about me because I want to, because I can, not because I have to, not because they’ll make me feel guilty if I don’t.  I’ll carry on fighting, to laugh, to love, to live, to work when I’m healthy enough, help others when I’m able to and contribute to society the best way I can.

 I will not feel guilty or worthless when I can’t. I won’t feel angry or bitter and I won’t punish myself and the people I love, who will be the ones picking up the pieces and putting me back together again, by working my body into the ground and risking my life. When Ian Duncan Smith is spending every waking moment next to my beside when I’m in intensive care with Pneumonia then starting a new job, when David Cameron is bombing down the motorway, after taking his kids to school and before his working day to check I’m being taken care of properly, when journalists are up late at night convincing me I’m worth something and when the Tax Payers’ Alliance are fighting for my right to be heard and appreciated. Then, they can have my guilt.

My pride is my own, not for anyone else to take. I will make the best out of my life, not because I owe it to them, because I owe it to myself.