A word about our Patron...

Time was, being asked to be a patron of a charity was nice gesture to a local big-wig. Or maybe an automatic response if you were a large charity and the sovereign deigned to grace your letterhead. However, some Tory MPs - particularly those who decided to toe the party line and support the £30 weekly reduction in Employment Support Allowance - are now finding their charitable patronage of disabled groups facing serious and sustained opposition. None more so, it seems, that Stephen Crabb MP, the replacement for the suddenly principled IBS at the Department for Work and Pensions. Crabb is Patron of the Pembrokeshire branch of Mencap, even though he supported the ESA cut and has some rather strange views on 'curing' homosexuality. Suddenly being a figurehead is nowhere near as much of a safe sinecure that it used to be.