Abstract
In this article, we examine the situation of disabled people in England and Wales with regard to one specific aspect of social exclusion—experience of justiciable problems, and the potential effects such problems can have on their lives. Having defined ‘disability’, we examine how this fits within the wider dialogue on social exclusion issues. By analysing the results of the Legal Services Research Centre's (LSRC) periodic survey of justiciable problems, we find that disabled respondents were not only more likely to experience a problem, they also experienced more problems. Increased likelihood of a problem was observed in the majority of problem categories and particularly those relating to issues of social exclusion, such as housing and welfare benefits. This propensity to experience multiple problems can lead to a negative impact on the lives of long‐term ill and disabled people.
Notes
* Corresponding author: Legal Service Research Centre, Legal Services Commission, 85 Gray's Inn Road, London WC1X 8TX, UK. Email: [email protected]
Equivalized income is an approximation of the McClement's equivalence scale, adjusted gross income by accounting for dependants.
A type of regression that allows prediction of a discrete (in this case binary) outcome from a set of predictor variables that may be continuous or discrete.
A distribution free or non‐parametric alternative to the t‐test. It tests whether two independent populations have the same location, by ranking all observations as if they come from a single sample, then deriving a test statistic from the sum of the ranks in the smaller group.