Tory Zac Goldsmith forced out as disability charity patron after voting for ESA cuts

Tory Zac Goldsmith has been forced to resign in shame as patron of a disability charity after he voted for cruel disability cuts.

The Conservative MP and London Mayoral candidate last week voted in favour of Iain Duncan Smith's plan to slash payments for half a million sick and disabled people by £30 a week.

Richmond AID, a charity run by and for disabled people in West London, today told the Mirror Mr Goldsmith has been forced to step down.

In a statement, the charity said: "Richmond AID recently wrote to Zac Goldsmith with regard to his recent decision to vote for cuts to ESA and can confirm [he] has now stepped down as a patron."

Lucy Byrne, the charity's Chief Executive, said: "We are shocked and disappointed to find that both our local MPs here in the borough of Richmond voted for this cut, one of whom is patron of our organisation.

"Having voted for this brutal cut we believe that Zac Goldsmiths' position as patron is no longer tenable.

"Zac's decision is a complete conflict with our social model and ethos.

"In order to have equality disabled people need to have increased funding."

Colin Brummage, a manager at Richmond Aid who is himself disabled, said: "We were all shocked and disappointed Zac made this decision.

"We utterly reject the notion that cutting welfare payments will make disabled people more enthusiastic about finding employment.

Zac Goldsmith poses for a photo with Chancellor George Osborne

"Disabled people are already doing all they can to find work and are prevented from doing so because of discriminatory practices in the labour market.

"This is a decision to take money from a group of people who are already in relative poverty.

"We have real concerns about the impact this cut will have on the lives of disabled people."

Colin, who uses a wheelchair himself, added: "We are a disabled people's organisation and we understand that in society there are a series of cultural, social and environmental barriers in the way of disabled people being fully included citizens.

"Zac's decision doesn't acknowledge any of these barriers.

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Multimillionaire Mr Goldsmith is standing to be Tory Mayor of London

"Unless the Government does something about the discriminatory practices in the labour market any measures to get disabled people in to work will have limited impact."

The cut reduces sick and disabled people's Employment and Support Allowance payments from £102.15 to £73.10 a week from April 2017 - equal to jobseeker's allowance - if they are deemed fit for "work-related activity".

Half a million people are in the work-related activity group. The cuts will affect new claimants and those who interrupt their claims for more than 12 weeks.

The Mirror contacted Mr Goldsmith's office for comment, but they had not responded at the time of publication.

A string of high profile Tory MPs have been slammed this week for voting for the cut, despite some of them being patrons of disabled charities.

North West Hampshire MP Kit Malthouse, a former Deputy Mayor of London in Boris Johnson's team, was forced out as patron of the Multiple Sclerosis Society.

Tory MP Kit Malthouse was also forced out as a patron of an MS Society branch

Its members said voting for ESA cuts "prevented him from being an effective patron."

As Mr Goldsmith was forced out of his role, some 20 Tory MPs wrote to the Chancellor calling on him to back down on cutting some £4.4billion from benefits for the most poor and vulnerable.

And yesterday, a key Conservative disability campaigner dramatically quit the party, blaming his departure on the decision to cut disability benefits.

Wheelchair-user diabetic Graeme Ellis - who has voted Conservative for 40 years - handed in his membership in disgust after today's Budget.

And he took the entire website of the Conservative Disability Group with him - replacing it with a statement saying: "This website is temporarily closed owing to Disability Cuts