An equalities minister has caused bemusement among members of the disability movement after claiming it was illegal for them to reserve jobs solely for disabled people. Maria Eagle – a former disabled people’s minister – made the comments this week during a one-off evidence session on the work of the Government Equalities Office. During questioning [...]

A disabled peer has hailed improvements to the public sector equality duty – the “holy grail” of the equality bill – as a “huge breakthrough” in the fight to maintain disabled people’s protection from discrimination. Baroness [Jane] Campbell introduced the amendments to strengthen the equality duty in the bill so it did not provide a [...]

The Liberal Democrats have become the first of the three main political parties to accept all of the disability-related recommendations of a committee set up to increase the diversity of MPs. The Speaker’s Conference on Parliamentary Representation made 71 recommendations aimed at increasing the number of disabled, female and minority ethnic MPs. Recommendations include calling [...]

The Equality and Human Rights Commission’s (EHRC) new lead on disability issues has pledged to help change the way it is viewed by disabled people, and to do more to explain and promote the work it is doing. Mike Smith, the new chair of the EHRC’s disability committee, said he believed the EHRC had done [...]

An independent report on income inequalities – commissioned by the government – has concluded that nearly a third of disabled people are living in poverty. Official statistics previously estimated about a quarter of disabled people were in poverty, but An Anatomy of Economic Inequality in the UK says the figure is probably more than 30 [...]