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22 year old son with aspergers and unemployment

munchkin

hi everyone hoping somebody can give me some advice ,my son of 22 is diagnosed with aspergers and has in the past been employed at the place of my work which sadly came to an end for him last october due to harassment in the workplace ,he went on to claim jobseekers allowance which now as been santioned he has a real phone phobia and finds speaking to people he dosent know quite stressful ,filling in applications really difficult so now his jobseekers allowance as been stopped due to them feeling he isnt doing enough ,my son says he as made them aware of his difficulties but to be honest i dont think they have a clue about aspergers and how it affects people in their daily lives so now he has no income at all the family is trying to support him financially untill he gets sorted out with a job ,i just feel so stressed and anxious all the time worrying about him and what his future holds i think i fooled myself thinking his problems would get easier has he reached adult life but to be honest its more difficult i just dont know what or where to turn for help for him ,any help or advice please Smile

  • Hi - have you appealed against your son losing his benefits?  I'm no expert in this area, but with most things there is still an appeal process.  Also you could ask C.A.B. for advice.  They know their stuff about benefits - whether they're autism-aware, I don't know.  I wd try to get letters from any professional who's involved with your son to back up your case.  There may be info on this site via the home page.  You have my sympathies.  The govt hasn't a clue + is intent on cutting the welfare budget, come hell or high water, regardless of the suffering.

  • just found a charity called the shaw trust in our area who may be able to help and it says you should  be referred to them by the job centre what a disgrace that is so why wasnt he !going to ring them on monday for a chat see if i can arrange anything !

  • i agree this goverment is a disgrace and is certainly hitting the wrong people unfortunately for my son and lots of others with aspergers  are in no mans land when it comes to finding employment ,my sons first and last employer who i have worked for for many years has no understanding of aspergers and my son was getting harassment off another member of staff all he got off the boss was if you cant proof it i cant do anything in the end my son walked out and still feels like his complaints were ignored ,so now has lost confidence to work in that enviroment again ,not enough help is out there or support i just find myself in tears worrying about him and what his future holds !

  • Just by way of illustration, back in March I got a community newsletter through my letterbox from a big engineering employer near me, telling everyone how great they were.

    True they were supporting an altzheimer charity and doing outreach work to schools.

    But I thought, here's an excellent example of what Disability Confident could do to help the disabled. Why isn't their newsletter saying anything about taking on more disabled people in the light of the Government's hard line on benefits for the disabled, and their promise to improve the workplace situation.

    So I emailed their head office on the contact email given in the newsletter for community feedback, explaining what the Government was doing and asking if they had any plans to implement it.

    Did I get a reply? Did I even get an acknowledgement? You've guessed it....no! Because its all hot air. No-one is going to act on Cameron's feeble attempts to explain away his persecution of the disabled.

  • I do feel with these situations that what is needed is a letter to David Camoron (maybe copied to a newspaper or two) pointing out your son's difficulty and asking where all these new measures like Disability Confident have got to.

    I think the more it is flagged up that the Coalition Government's policies on disability employment are one big joke, the better.