Understanding the rightwing backlash over the government scheme helping people with serious disabilities get cars

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Motability really ought to be a boring subject: a government scheme helping people with serious disabilities get a car by using a portion of their benefits to pay for the lease. But over the past week, anyone who had never heard of Motability would have got a more lurid impression.

First reported in the Daily Mail, and then in a string of follow-up stories, Motability was portrayed not as a useful mechanism for helping people with disabilities but an outrageous example of con artists milking the taxpayer.