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According to conservative MP Philip Davies, disabled people should not expect to be offered the same pay rate as non-disabled individuals.

Davies, who has previously referred to people with learning, developmental, and physical disabilities as “scroungers,” said that they should accept less than the minimum wage in order to secure a job and stop having to be dependent upon benefits.

Davies claimed “people with disabilities” or who had “mental health problems” were disadvantaged in the workplace because they had to compete with able-bodied candidates for jobs.  He stated that it was inevitable that the employer would take on the person who hasn’t got any health problems given that they were both going to be having to be paid the same rate.

“Given that some of those people with a learning disability clearly, by definition, can’t be as productive in their work as somebody who hasn’t got a disability of that nature, then it was inevitable that given that the employer was going to have pay them both the same they were going to take on the person who was going to be more productive, less of a risk, and that was doing the disabled a huge disservice.” he told the House of Commons.

Naturally enough there’s been a massive response from disabled people throughout the UK. Most point out that the ten million disabled people in the UK already face countless ingrained prejudices in the working world. By describing us as a source of cheap labour, Davies is making it even more difficult for us to overcome these prejudices.

Even the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) have felt the need to responded (having been conspicuous by its absence in most other disability related issues recently!). A spokesperson for the EHRC commented: “This is nonsense. It shows a total lack of understanding of the abilities and aspirations of Mr Davies’ disabled constituents. Disabled people have the right to work and to be treated equally in the workplace … We will be writing to Mr Davies in due course to remind him of his responsibilities.”

Davies, MP for Shipley and ‘parliamentary spokesman’ for the Campaign Against Political Correctness lobby group is no stranger to the EHRC. Over the past several years he has bombarded the government’s equalities watchdog with a series of extraordinary letters about race and sex discrimination, in a one-man campaign against ‘political correctness’.

What is interesting though, is that Davies never seems to be rebuked by the party leaders. Almost as if he’s the litmus paper they occasionally use to test out the public’s attitudes around possibly sensitive issues?!