DISABILITY rights campaigners have accused Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn of wasting the opportunity to speak out about the UN’s condemnation of the “human catastrophe” created by Tory policies.

They say that although they are grateful the UN report was raised by Corbyn at Prime Minister’s Questions yesterday he let Theresa May “clean off the hook”.

John McArdle, co-founder of the Black Triangle group, said: “Corbyn was presented with a wide open goal for disabled people and the Labour Party today.

READ MORE: Theresa May criticised for 'diabolical' Scottish economy claim during PMQs

"Not only did he fail to boot the ball into the back of the net, he picked up a tennis racquet instead.”

McArdle said Corbyn should have made clear why the UN’s Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) described what was happening to disabled people in the UK as a “human catastrophe”.

“He should have pursued her with all the deaths and called for the scrapping of the work capability assessment and Personal Independence Payment reassessment regime — which has been catastrophic — and explained in facts and figures why,” McArdle said.

“He should have raised the matter of the catastrophic cuts to social care which mean many disabled people can’t even get up, wash and dress in the morning. He should have raised the loss of Motability vehicles which mean disabled people can’t even get to the shops to buy food and are virtual prisoners in our own homes. The list goes on, and on and on.

“May could have been left reeling like a punch-drunk boxer.”

Corbyn had no answer to May’s response that the Government spends £50 billion a year on people with disabilities — a figure disputed by campaigners as a misuse of statistics.

Linda Burnip from Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC) said it was pleased Corbyn had finally raised the issue of the UN finding the Tories guilty of the “grave and systematic violation of disabled people’s human rights”.

She added: “We are so bored, having to listen, yet again, to Theresa May churn out the same old comments, such as that the UK spends £50bn supporting disabled people.”

The campaigners now want Corbyn to convene an urgent press conference “to shine the spotlight fully” on all the CRPD’s findings and explain why committee chair Theresia Degener describes the situation of people with disabilities as a “human catastrophe”.

McArdle said: “The mistreatment and multiple violations of the fundamental human rights of disabled people is the biggest tragedy and scandal to hit Britain since the beginning of the disabled people’s movement and the Second World War.

“This abysmal performance simply won’t wash. Labour should have highlighted all this, set out before the nation how they would do things differently, and made the Tories hang their heads in shame.

“Instead May was allowed to get away with whitewashing seven years of hard graft by campaigners documenting all these violations to get to the point where an independent international body describes it as a catastrophe.

“Instead we have been drowned out yet again by the familiar yah-booing of the Tory benches who have no moral conscience or shame. If Corbyn hopes to win the votes of 11 million people on these isles who have a disability, he needs go to war with May’s Government in defence of our human rights — not just give her a wee ticking off over a damning UN report.”