UK: Disability benefits (UC, ESA and PIP) - news and updates 2023 (including government plans to scrap the work capability assessment)

So, as usual, what the DWP announces to the media, and what they actually do, are completely different things.

Diametrically opposed things in this case.

Almost as if they were telling porkies to the public.

For some reason.

 

And what they're able to do, in the face of staffing chaos, is yet another unknown.

 

And yet, rather than tell us they won't have the capacity to review everyone, they keep us all on tenterhooks assuming that the brown envelope could land on the doormat any day. It's psychological torture.

 

Do you have a link to the FOI result please @BazzaBoyle ?

or perhaps that would be too personally identifying? - not sure how these things work never having made an FOI request.

At any rate I hope you'll be able to let Benefits and Work know? so they can put people out of their misery. I've been reading the comments on the news article about this , so so many terrified and confused people. There is a 'contact us' link where you could email it to them if you wanted to stay private.

 

Here is the link to it:

https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/uc_wca_reassessments_policy#incoming-2497028

I did message Benefits and Work on Twitter but didn't get a response.

 

Brilliant thanks, a big well done for doing it.

Ah well as long as B&W are aware of it they can tell their people/commenters themselves. Its been interesting to read some of the comments on their news story about this. There seem to be a couple of people in same position as me with a reassessment due soon & no way to know whether its going to happen or not.

Ugh well we trudge on.

People sometimes ask me what i would do if i was suddenly healed - i'd be straight down the job centre to get a job, almost any job, so i could tell the DWP to keep their assessments. Anyone who thinks being on benefits is a 'secondary gain' has a screw loose.

 

https://www.gov.uk/government/stati...ry-reconsiderations-and-appeals-december-2023

This is a different report to the Universal Credit Work Capability Assessment posted earlier (Post #519)

National statistics
ESA: outcomes of Work Capability Assessments including mandatory reconsiderations and appeals: December 2023
Published 14 December 2023

 

Thank you, that's interesting. It appears they've done two or three thousand at the most during the last year; it's feasible that some or all of those weren't routine reassessments, but were prompted by changes of circumstances.

The 2015 drop in reassessments coincides with a large peak in new ones, and the opposite seems to happen in the latter half of 2019. Post-pandemic, new assessments climb again as reassessments fall, but far fewer than in previous years after the benefit was redesigned. So perhaps the rate at which reassessments were done always tended to reflect the pressure on capacity from new claims.

Anyway, the last couple of years really doesn't look like the picture of a department strongly committed to reassessing current claimants. It looks as if they've been working steadily towards the phase out of IR-ESA.

 

the thing is though that graph only goes to June 2023 & they warned they were stepping up reassessments in sept
More WCA reviews to be carried out, DWP warns (benefitsandwork.co.uk)

I agree it certainly looks like the number of reassessments depends on number of new claims, there seems to be a consistent capacity and it gets directed to new claims first. Which, for once, is the way it should be.

What i object to is the way they almost seem to revel in keeping existing claimants hanging, not giving any info about how the decisions are made about who to reassess, so you just have no idea whether this horrific event, this thing which is going to take ALL your strength and make you physically unwell, stop you being able to look after yourself as you and your carer have to spend the time/energy you'd normally spend on cooking/personal care etc sorting out the forms etc. And the thing which is going to make you very mentally unwell too, increasing ideation etc. They dont want you to know whether its coming or not.
They act as if a reassessment is a casual, minor thing, an hour fillin in a basic form, but we all know it's a MASSIVE, seriously life impacting thing.

But they just keep us hanging
We ask 'is the sword of damocles going to fall, or not?'

And their answer, as the ones holding ALL the power, the ones in control of our very survival... Is... 'Well we might do and we might not, that's for us to know and you to find out'.
It really is extraordinarily callous. I experience it as abuse.

But i suppose if you believe that 99% of claimants are the lazy, malingering, scum of the earth, fraudsters that we are represented as, then that attitude of almost enjoying keeping us hanging, must feel justified.