Swedish Radio-profile forced to stop working – Aftonbladet

Today, she is one of the most popular profiles on Swedish Radio P1.

But Catherine Hahr , 54, has had to fight against all odds. Meanwhile, the School of Journalism, she suffered a sudden the regnbågshinneinflammation.

31 years old, she became blind. First reaction was that she did not want to live anymore.

– To take my life. The reaction was that life was over, that blindness was not an option and I was there. It’s been really tough. I had to start working for free for taking me in from below.

“Like sitting in jail”

But she succeeded. Thanks to the accompanying help from the municipality, she has been able to work and live as normally as possible. Her “Catherine Hahr face” has become a favorite of many listeners.

But after 20 years came the news that the municipality pulls out her escorts, she told SVT.

– It was in late July and again last week. You get a registered letter “Unfortunately, you will not get help.”

This means that she can not leave home, let alone carry out their work.

How did you then?

– “it is finished”. A life without being part of the community what it is for life, it’s like being in jail.

Now she has appealed the matter to court.

Katarina Hahr wonder how the decision goes together with the politicians talk about the importance of everyone to work.

– We talk all the time about how important it is for everyone to work. But people with disabilities is not talking about, we are no longer. But I found. What should I do now?

She wonders why she must pay tax if she can not take part of the safety net that will give everyone the same opportunities to have a family.

– Then they get Well give me a tax break so that I can hire someone yourself, or how should I do? The law says that we have the right to participate in society on equal terms. We have signed the UN human rights of people with disabilities shall be entitled to attend and have civil rights. Then I say: bullshit. If not, I can get an escort when I’m not worth as much. Is my job worth anything? I am worth as much as others? Should I participate in democracy or not? Previously counted blindness as a disability that limits your life, now think that it is not there anymore.

They tell you to fend for yourself?

– Tell me to go out for lunch, it’s clear that I can not do it yourself. Or I’ll buy clothes for my son. Live, all the things that everybody does all the time.

She believes that the change came two years ago.

– I have had the great care managers in all the years and so they switched and then it became a halt.

You do not know what changed?

– My problem has rather become worse and my need of help has increased.

“This is an overall assessment ‘

Katarina Hahr has given SVT authority, but His Wallöf , operations planner on the Kungsholmen district administration in Stockholm, would not comment on the case.

When Nöjesbladet reaches him, it is the same answer.

If a person, in general, need escorts to work, it must get it?

– There’s a giant difficult question you ask me now, because it gets so categorically. It is clear that people with disabilities are able to work and earn an income … it gets tricky. It is clear that people should be able to work in möjligste extent but this is a helhelsbedömning.

And where have you made this assessment can be observed.

– It is clear that the starting point is that the person to be out of work even with a disability.

This is not about some cutbacks or changes in the regulations?

– nejnej, absolutely no such thing. No, it does not.

Can you imagine that if you pull into a person’s contact person, do you mean that the person can do their work anyway?

– I will not comment more than this.

“There is some now”

Katarina Hahr not aware that she had no explanation for why the escort disappeared for 20 years.

– Previously, I belonged to the provision, LLS, which is that you should have the right to a good levnadsstanadard. Now they say that I do not belong to what they call “personal community”. What they suddenly want to do is put across to the Social Services Act. Which should have a “reasonable” standard of living and then you are not entitled to more than food and shelter. Not jobs, to move, then put yourself in the same position as 94-year-olds. They are trying to hand over responsibility to my husband who is pursuing workers and would go under.

They change words section of the law?

– Yes, but they do not talk about it. I do believe that this is a way to save money. There are lots of blind people who are now losing his companion under LSS, the ongoing anything now. The municipality’s response has been horrible.

How?

– You are treated like a cupboard. It’s like talking to a wall. “We have new guidelines,” they say

As they say therefore that there are new guidelines that His Wallöf says it is not.

– Yes.

“SKL never liked the legislation”

Leif Jeppsson , legal advisor at the Visually Impaired Association, agrees that image.

– There is a problem that lasted for many years. From the beginning, we got through quite easily, since the practice has been tightened at all times. It’s almost as if you can touch a finger is considered one does not have the right to help. Then it does not matter that you had help in the 20 years before.

The problem lies in the LSS first paragraph, where the third person circuit includes persons who have “considerable difficulties in daily life and hence an extensive need for support service “. The question is what is “significant difficulties”.

Although the LSS are not reformulated ceaseless test cases where the Court interpreted the law more stringent.

– Local Authorities and Regions (SKL) has never liked this legislation. They work very legally to help municipalities to get away from this. It uses the argument that the person can attend to their personal hygiene, for example. The bill is also about difficulties in moving and it has of course the visually impaired, especially in places where you have not been before, says Leif Jeppsson.

When a person is not covered by LSS applies municipalities rather than the Social Services Act which means that they can charge for the service.

Katarina Hahr see only one way forward: to win his appeal and get their lives back. For she is not rich enough to pay for escorts yourself.

– I do not sleep. I’m thinking of how I have the energy to work even more, with nothing on the weekends.

How are you today?

– Poorly. The weekend was tough. But nobody cares if I go in, I have to fight and show what it has become. This is new in Sweden today.

Footnote: Aftonbladet have searched Labour Minister Ylva Johansson (s) and her cabinet minister and Chairman Raimo Pärssinen (s) of the Labour Committee for more general comments, but without result.