Clifford wins Bread & Roses Award for Radical Publishing

Ellen Clifford has won the Bread & Roses Award for Radical Publishing with her book The War on Disabled People: Capitalism, Welfare and the Making of a Human Catastrophe (Zed Books).

The £500 award is supported by the Alliance of Radical Booksellers and recognises excellence in political non-fiction. This year's award was delayed by the pandemic. 

Judges Jane Elliot, Karen Shook, Tom Utterainer and Jane Watts praised Clifford for her "hugely revelatory account of the one-quarter of UK society whose struggle for justice is literally a matter of life and death, and of the determined, defiant disabled activists whose resistance holds important lessons for everyone on the left". 

Clifford, a disabled activist who has worked within the disability sector for more than 20 years, said it was "an absolute honour to win". The War on Disabled People is her first book.

She added: "The Bread & Roses Award is the only award I have ever aspired to win because it validates exactly what I aspire to do, which is to use writing to explore ideas that can make the world a better place. I am grateful that the award and that radical booksellers exist. I am also indebted to Zed Books for giving me the opportunity to write and for taking a chance on a first-time author."

Last year's winner was Johny Pitts for his "unique political documentary" Afropean: Notes from Black Europe (Allen Lane).