The far right polemicist, ersatz journalist and wife of multimillionaire Reform MP Richard Tice, Isabel Oakeshott, has certainly ruffled a few feathers this morning, with her attack on benefit claimants. Oakeshott was having a pop at chancellor Rachel Reeves for her budget which she claimed rewarded “people who do the least, so basically benefits claimants”. Calling for a “crackdown“, she went on (and on):
“How many young people are supposedly too sick to work and being supported by the state?
“These figures are absolutely off the chart, and they are completely unjustified.
“By not announcing such a crackdown, Rachel Reeves basically turned this into a Budget of removing resources from those who work in order to keep on sustaining those who, frankly, can’t be bothered to get out of bed and get themselves out, whether it’s to an office or to any kind of job, and prefer to just sit on the sofa and order their Deliveroo and when and take everything that the state can offer.
“The state, that is people like you and me and our very many listeners who are grafting just to try to make ends meet.
“Basically these people are, frankly, parasites.”
I should not, I suppose, promote the lies and distortions of the rich and privileged as they promote their class-based hatred of what they see as the lower orders, but this sort of stuff needs calling out.
I have said on many occasions that it is impossible to live the life of Riley when you’re on benefits, unless you are also committing benefit fraud. Oakeshott says “these figures are absolutely off the chart“, but of course makes no effort to explain which figures she is talking about. It is true that more people are on disability benefits than before, but there are reasons for that. Under the Conservatives, NHS waiting lists have increased to over eight million. Many people, I don’t know how many, are unable to work until they have had the treatment they need. A large number of folk have “long Covid” which can be extremely debilitating and prevent people from having the ability to work. But let’s explore the myth of “those who, frankly, can’t be bothered to get out of bed and get themselves out, whether it’s to an office or to any kind of job, and prefer to just sit on the sofa and order their Deliveroo and drive their Motability free vehicle and take everything that the state can offer.”
It is hard to know where to begin to reply, given the depths of ignorance Oakeshott displays. In order to claim benefits, people have to go through a number of hoops. You don’t just tell the DWP you’re seriously disabled in order to be handed out riches, including a “free Motability vehicle“. Not least because the Motability scheme is not free: usually severely disabled people give up a portion of their none too generous disability benefits in order to obtain a vehicle which enables them to get out of the house. (There is an argument that says the Motability Scheme should be looked at by government because in the early 2000s it was already the second largest fleet of vehicles in the world, after the Chinese Army, but that does not mean it is abused or even a drain on the taxpayer.) But let’s look at another aspect of benefits which Oakeshott does not mention, but is a key concern to many: fraud.
I know a bit about benefit fraud, having worked on it for 15 years until 2014. Under the Labour government of 1997 to 2010, significant resources were allocated to investigating major fraud. Investigators were trained by former specialist police officers, including Special Branch, former MI5 and MI6 staff and ex Special Forces who taught us, for example, surveillance techniques. It enabled investigators to go after the high value fraud cases rather than the easy hits. In 2014, David Cameron’s austerity heavy Conservative government in which some Lib Dems had jobs, decided to change all that and voluntary redundancy packages were handed out to investigators across the land, of whom I was one. Subsequently, the emphasis turned to compliance and a return to easy hits. The exact opposite of a crackdown on fraud, yet the likes of Oakeshott either didn’t realise what was going on or didn’t care. If a Labour government had decided to go soft on fraud, which was exactly what the Conservatives were doing, it is hard to believe shit-stirring opportunists on the hard right of politics would have ignored it. The staggering amounts of fraud committed during the Covid epidemic went ignored by all but the investigators on the ground who knew what was going on, reported it repeatedly up the line and were, until very recently, ignored.
Sure, there are people faking disabilities in order to get benefits. We used to have specialised investigators who dealt with that and I worked with them on many occasions. But the idea that people with severe disabilities, advanced cancer and all the rest of it are “parasites” is very offensive to many of us who have a degree of sympathy for those whose lives have been and are being blighted by conditions beyond their control.
Come to my food bank and then tell me that there is a large body of “parasites” milking the system and I will call you a liar. I will show you people who have been let down and abandoned by a government that doesn’t care. And if these media hate merchants genuinely believe that somehow there are millions of bone idle people, just lying in bed all day while waiting for the McDonalds delivery and happily milking the system, they are frankly idiots. Almost everyone I see would love to work and indeed a surprisingly high proportion of food bank users do work. Rather than blame those at the bottom, shouldn’t we ask those at the top, the illiberal elite like Oakeshott how this country got into such a mess, with homelessness, poverty, low pay and life expectancy rates that are actually falling.
Let’s call this out for what it is: class war. Attacking those who have no means of defending themselves, accusing the sick of faking it while the upper classes milk the system themselves, dodging taxes and using the media to double down on their hate and lies.
The most stupid aspect of Oakeshott’s rant is when she refers to those driving “their Motability free vehicle“, when she is clearly talking about “young people“. In order to qualify for a vehicle you must be in receipt of the Higher Rate Motability Component of Disability Living Allowance; the Enhanced Rate Mobility Component of the Personal Independence Payment; War Pensioners’ Mobility Supplement; or the Armed Forces Independence Payment. There will be young people who come under that category – disabled ex services personnel, for example – but most beneficiaries will be older. I fail to understand, snowflake that I am, how anyone could call someone in those categories “parasites“. Oakeshott would probably argue that actually she didn’t actually mean to suggest that disabled war heroes are “parasites“, but if you lump everyone in the same category, then what does she expect?
I conclude this blog with this. “The state, that is people like you and me and our very many listeners who are grafting just to try to make ends meet.” Oakeshott, who was educated at Gordonstoun, where all the royals go, and enjoys highly paid right wing media gigs, whose partner is the filthy rich grifter Richard Tice is “grafting just to try to make end meet“. I don’t think so. I wouldn’t include her in the same category of the nurses, postal workers and shop workers I have helped in our food bank in recent weeks when they have run out of money and food. But that’s how the entitled people feel, just like Jeremy Clarkson who just can’t get enough money, while millions can’t get any at all.
If you’re on benefits, your life is probably not great. And being a benefits claimant does not mean you are the same as every other benefit claimant. Pensioners are benefits claimants. Are they all parasites, too? Retirement Pension is quite literally a contributory benefit. I’d say they’re not, but haters gonna hate and they could be next in Oakeshott’s sights when she decides who next to attack.
And, as you should know by now, anyone who calls for a “crackdown“, whether that’s a politician or a hack, you just know they’re bullshitting, replacing action by empty rhetoric. The biggest parasites are the ones calling for crackdowns.
