UC update
My telephone appointment last week went fine. All the Work Coach wanted was to ask if I had received, completed and sent off the form for...
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Aug 28, 20183 min
ESA and UC aren’t talking
Phoning ESA again. It has a long spiel followed by ‘please press 1 to continue’. Why not just carry on without having to press 1? After...
Aug 27, 20183 min
Universal Credit and ESA transfer
I started my claim for UC on 16th July. I told ESA on the same day, or possibly a day or two before, that I had moved house, no longer...
Aug 20, 20183 min
Universal Credit standard shenanigans
After getting a letter from ESA last week, this week I logged on to my UC journal and found that I had – at last – got an award...
May 25, 20183 min
Work is not a health outcome
A couple of days ago I saw this tweet on Twitter: “Work as a health outcome is a fundamental principle for us. There must be a shared...
Feb 27, 20174 min
Governments have no right to be ignorant
The government still doesn’t know what its talking about. But this time it’s almost seven years on from when it gained power, and its...
Mar 27, 20142 min
Atos to leave WCA contract early
On Thursday the DWP announced that Atos is withdrawing from its contract to run Work Capability Assessments, the controversial assessment...
Dec 14, 20134 min
Evidence-based review of the WCA
The government has been carrying out a study of suitable descriptors to use for assessments for ESA. The results were supposed to be...
Sep 28, 20133 min
The benefits system, workfare and public opinion
We cannot afford to base policy on public opinion when the public opinion is based on false information. ESA is a good example of this....
Aug 23, 20134 min
The importance of medical evidence for disability assessments
When it’s their word against yours, medical evidence is what proves you’re not the one lying. Medical evidence is what says that you are...
Apr 6, 20133 min
Do people leave sickness benefits ‘rather than’ face an assessment?
I received a request to write about the 878 300 people who drop their ESA claims early. The government’s line – repeated several times –...
Oct 10, 20123 min
Sickness and suicide
“84% of GPs say they have patients who have presented with mental health problems such as stress, anxiety or depression as a result of...
Oct 9, 20124 min
Disability’s Not Working
The government has plans to further sanction long-term sick or disabled people if they deem these people to not be working hard enough. ...
Sep 6, 20129 min
Atos and the Paralympics
A few days ago James Max wrote an article about Atos and the Paralympics. Many disabled people and their supporters have been upset by...
Jul 31, 20125 min
Panorama and Dispatches report on the WCA
Last night Panorama (BBC2) and Dispatches (Channel 4) featured documentaries on the Work Capability Assessment (WCA), part of the process...
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