Look at disabled and remember Holocaust

THIS week the Prime Minister expressed his “deep sense of shame” at the rise of anti-semitism across the world and he is right, the seeds of the Holocaust no longer lie dormant, they flourish in a political climate of increasing blame and derision.

The Nazi programme against the Jews began with a political and media onslaught of dehumanisation – not only against Jews, but Poles, Communists, the Romany community and disabled people: all labelled as “untermensch” – less than human.

And for all Mr Johnson’s determination to fight anti-semitism he should recognise that the seeds of such social devaluation have germinated much closer to home.

After the progress in the 1990s, disabled people have seen their rights slowly eroded.

We no longer have a Disability Rights Commissioner and we’ve endured a steady stream of vilification from government and the media.

Even the BBC joined the chorus during the Cameron era, labelling disabled people as “Saints or Scroungers”.

UN reports have pointed to the “conscious cruelty” of the DWP disability assessment process and Ian Duncan Smith openly used the Auschwitz motto “Work Makes You Free” to justify his brutal Personal

Independence Payment and Universal Credit systems.

I hear conversations in my local swimming-pool claiming that “over half of disability claims are fraudulent” (even the DWP only claims 1%) and current MPs have called for the minimum wage to be dropped for disabled people.

It appears that we are fair game for public condemnation.

This is not necessarily the language of hate, it is the language of contempt; dismissing a section of society as unworthy – as our untermensch, and that is even more dangerous.

As the Jewish community knows too well, if we allow this to continue, if we stop caring what happens to others, we might open the doors to increasing cruelty and that, Prime Minister, would be a real shame.