Benefits department accused of deliberately misleading select committee and GPs

Shock? Horror? No, not really. A government department is misleading people, including an official committee and doctors. No surprise there, as far as I am concerned, the UK government’s Department for Work and Pensions has a hit and miss attitude to honesty. It may not ‘lie’ but is certainly happy to ‘mislead’. Again and again, …

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Disability benefit decisions continue to use unlawful criteria

It is almost unbelievable, but it seems to be true. The people running the government department responsible for disability welfare benefits appear to have confirmed that they are either stupid, irresponsible, incapable, or all three. As if all the mess with disability benefit claims, notably Personal Independence Payment (PIP), has not been enough – it …

Disabilities: Official papers reveal failings of assessment contractors

Devastating papers, reluctantly released by the government under the Freedom of Information Act (FOI), reveal frightful failures of a key disability benefit. In particular, the papers show the shortcomings of outsourcing contractors hired to carry out assessments of applications. That means that critics of personal independence payment (PIP), and the way it has been introduced, …

Benefit assessment contractors hiding in plain sight

Assessments of people’s applications for disability benefits in the UK, are carried out by contractors for the government. That is, of course, well known. It is equally common knowledge that those contractors are Atos, Capita, and Maximus. Between them, they have made hundreds of millions of pounds from their contracts with the government’s Department for …

DWP fights to hide WCA ‘under-performance’ and PIP assessments

I suppose, by now, that the ineptitude of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) should not surprise me. And while that is true, what does amaze me is its ability to keep proving it – over and over again. Right now, besides all its usual carryings on, the department is fighting two similar but …

Benefit assessor lied, say doctor and nurse

Assessors working on behalf of the UK government, to evaluate claims for Personal Independence Payment (PIP) continue to be the cause of endless complaints for their unacceptable behaviour. PIP is the welfare benefit paid to people with multiple sclerosis and other disabilities, and the behaviour of some assessors is well below the professional standards we have …

Three disability assessors found wanting in attitude and conduct

Three nurses, all involved in assessing the seriousness of people’s disabilities, have been found to have breached professional ethics – all of which have been made public in quite a short period of time. Just what is going on? People with disabilities deserve better. First, a disability benefits assessor with extreme right-wing sympathies was suspended …