An award-winning actress has said she has been left "housebound and isolated" after a Government "error" saw her disability support cut by 80%. Renu Arora, who became disabled in 2017 after being hit by a London bus, relies on the Access to Work (AtW) grant to continue her career as a creative.
Career and reliance on AtW
Ms Arora was more than a decade into her career when the accident left her wheelchair-bound. Since then, she has used the AtW grant, which covers costs beyond reasonable workplace adjustments, including support workers and specialist equipment. The scheme allowed her to star in the Royal Shakespeare Company's production of The Magician's Elephant and develop a musical based on her experience, The Burgundy Book, with Arts Council funding.
Shortly after securing investment from the Peggy Ramsey Award for the biographic project, Ms Arora learned that her AtW support had been cut from 45 to 23 hours a week, with the hourly rate slashed from £30 to £17.50. Her job aide was also removed entirely, equating to tens of thousands of pounds in cuts.
Impact and criticism
Ms Arora attributes the change to an "error" by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), which has left her "unable to work, housebound, isolated and further disabled". She said: "Everything AtW has enabled me to sustain and build since becoming disabled is now being ripped out from under me. It feels like the DWP is punishing me for being disabled."
She accused Labour of dodging blame by attributing issues to its "inheritance" from the previous Conservative Government, calling it a "boilerplate cop-out". She added: "The Government may have inherited AtW, but it is responsible for how the scheme is being administered now, and for addressing decisions that are leaving people unable to work and actively causing harm."
Warnings and support
Ms Arora warned that failure to reform the system would "deprive the world" of the "unique insight" of disabled voices. She said: "I am watching my colleagues worry about their next rehearsal schedule, their next press night. And yet here I am, staring down the barrel of 'will I ever work again?' It's a profoundly lonely place to be."
Erica Whyman OBE, former acting artistic director at the RSC, described the cuts as "monstrous and outrageous" and said they would prevent Ms Arora from working in any capacity. She added: "The fact that she is a skilled, expert and experienced creative who was poised to fulfil the enormous promise of her piece, The Burgundy Book, compounds that outrage."
Around 74,000 people currently receive support through AtW. The DWP has pledged to tackle issues, recently hiring 500 new staff to help process applications. A DWP spokesperson said: "We have received the reconsideration request [from Ms Arora] and are looking into this case. Access to Work is a lifeline for disabled people and those with health conditions, helping them to start and stay in work, but demand for the scheme has grown significantly and the number of people supported has nearly doubled in five years. We know from employee and employer feedback that we inherited issues in the scheme, which is why we're working with disabled people and their organisations to improve it."
