 Front cover | |
| Author | Frances Ryan |
|---|---|
| Subject | Disability and austerity in the UK |
| Publisher | Verso Books |
Publication date | June 2019 |
| Pages | 240 |
| ISBN | 9781788739566 |
Crippled: Austerity and the Demonization of Disabled People is a 2019 book by Frances Ryan about disability in the United Kingdom under the 2010s austerity programme. It explores the effects of welfare cuts, local council cuts, social care cuts, increased taxes for disabled people and means testing for remaining welfare provisions. Between research about the prevalence of each issue, Ryan interviews disabled people affected by the issue. She finds people who have died from having financial support withdrawn, people who cannot afford food, heating or prescriptions, and people unable to wash or get dressed due to removal of social care. Ryan researches into disabled people who live in inaccessible housing, who cannot afford visits to the hospital, who cannot leave violent partners for financial reasons and who rely on young children to look after them.
Ryan is a journalist for The Guardian and a wheelchair user herself. In Crippled—her first book, published by Verso—she aimed to let disabled people report their own situations, cover past successes of disability rights activism, and show that hardship faced by disabled people in the UK is the result of political decisions. The book received a nomination for a Bread and Roses Award. It was received positively by critics, who praised its message, the importance of its subject matter, and Ryan's research.
The fictional short film Hen Night, released by BBC iPlayer on 2 September 2021, was inspired by the book and created by Ryan and Vici Wreford-Sinnott. It features a young disabled trainee teacher during the COVID-19 pandemic as the government withdraws her support.