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CARERS COLUMN WITH DAN WHITE In this issue’s Carers Column, Dan White discusses the lack of support when it comes to vulnerable children. IN a time of a pandemic, where the “vulnerable” of all ages are still at high risk of a virus, communities should be able to rely on their elected representatives for support and guidance. Those deemed responsible for the lives of said communities should be vocal and visual, especially when the country is at war with an invisible enemy that is especially targeting and decimating that representative’s charges. However since the covid strain arrived, the disabled communities’ sole representative has not been seen. Justin Tomlinson has been missing, failing in his responsibilities to lead and inform us all, disabled adults, children, and parents like me and you. I just would like our representative to step up, appear and exchange words of support, guidance, and information to not only the 14 million strong disabled community, but to the anxious parents of the countries 750,000 disabled children like myself. It is now late 2021, the country is effectively open, vaccines abound, but still, the silence is deafening from Westminster. As long as the horror stories of infection continue we are left crawling around the internet for answers, do we vaccinate our children? Yes? No? Are schools safe? We are trying to make sense of the mixed media messages, when all we want is clarity from the man whose job it is to represent us all. All parents are worried about their
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children, it’s an evolutionary trait, but when your child has complex needs and is first told through a government letter that they are vulnerable, then they are not, then they are, and finally are not, you see the confusion and fear build in all of us. We had that stream of letters through our door, as did many of the parents we know and it is now we would expect to look to a person in the heart of the system that has all the SAGE information at hand to halt the confusion.
“I WOULD JUST LIKE OUR REPRESENTATIVE TO STEP UP, APPEAR AND EXCHANGE WORDS OF SUPPORT.” This is not the first time I have called for Justin Tomlinson to show himself. In fact, I have cried myself hoarse on this subject throughout all the media airtime I have worked since the first time Covid-19 raced across the land. We were first told children were not vulnerable, they were carriers if anything, little transmitters. Then the stories of children with and without disabilities silently came in, children who were seriously ill in hospital. I called for him to show solidarity and to just give us the facts
from a disability community perspective, to do his job in the disability public eye. What is the reality, the truth of childhood infection? A series of conflicting letters and tabloid prevarication was the only information available, albeit emotionally unhelpful and contradictory. We have seemingly heard from everyone else, from Helen Whatley to the minister for culture, Oliver Dowden, but not the man responsible for a community desperately looking for answers and help in a crisis. The PM has, to his credit, promised a new dawn for disabled people in his ‘leveling up’ plan, but he is not our ‘apparent’ spokesperson. Parents would like to believe that we are being led and fed with knowledge and support that will enable us to make the best decisions for our children, to either continue to shield or not. This is not happening. The whole community has been left in the dark. We need Mr. Tomlinson and his department to show some strength and visibility. Justin, we cannot emotionally afford 2022 to be a minority excluding repeat performance, our children are our lives.
Au t h o r: Da n Wh i te We b s i te: danwhite-1972.webnode.com Tw i t te r: @ Da nwh i te1972
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