ABSTRACT
Transformations in understanding of disability over recent decades show the possibility of change in both progressive and regressive directions. The disabling impact of the asylum system cannot be addressed by identifying exceptions considered worthy of compassion. In both sectors and their intersection, people are framed as if a burden on the wider population. Many lives have already been lost as a consequence of the removal of safe routes for people to enter the United Kingdom and the increasing restrictions on arrival. Meanwhile, welfare reforms have already cost lives. Policies that are deliberately designed to deprive people of essential needs, to cause lives to be lost and to stoke hatred among the wider population are beyond the situation when the social model was originally designed. Such policies are also beyond the needs of capitalism, they are, however, essential to the rise of fascism. The scale of change that is needed may appear too ambitious, however, as Clifford (2020, p. 300) writes: ‘We have no choice. The stakes have become too high’.
