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allowance, appeal, assessment, Atos, benefit, benefits, Coalition, Conservative, Democrat, Department, Diary of a Benefit Scrounger, disability, disabled, DWP, employment, ESA, fail, fit for work, fluctuating, government, Harrington, health, Iain Duncan Smith, IB, Incapacity Benefit, Lib Dem, Liberal, Liberal Democrat, mental, Migration, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, motivate, Pensions, people, political, politics, Professor, sick, social security, Sue Marsh, support, Tories, Tory, unemployment, unfair, Vox Political, welfare, work, work capability assessment
In 2008, Labour introduced a new out of work sickness benefit, Employment and Support Allowance, to replace the old Incapacity Benefit.
The new system of application and assessments was much tougher, and politicians originally hoped that up to a million people could be moved from the benefit.
However, by 2010, it was clear there were significant flaws in the process. People with mental health and fluctuating conditions were not being fairly treated and successful appeals against “fit for work” decisions soared to 40%.
Professor Harrington was asked to review the new benefit and make recommendations for improving it. As the election took place in 2010, crucially, only new claimants were being assessed. ESA was yet to be rolled out to the more complicated, and often longer term, Incapacity Benefit claimants, though trials were underway in Burnley and Aberdeen.
Most people claim out of work sickness benefits for short periods – perhaps to get through a sports injury, accident or one off surgery – and stop their claims within 2 years. However, this will always leave a few people with serious, life limiting conditions who will need to claim the benefit for longer periods. Over the years, those claims build up, increasing the proportion who need long term support.
When the coalition came to power in May 2010, they immediately announced that they would go ahead and start to reassess those already claiming Incapacity Benefit.
I could never understand this decision. Why would you take a failing benefit and roll it out to almost 2 million of the most vulnerable claimants? Not only that, but at first, just 25,000 people per month were being assessed, but the government constantly increased and increased the numbers until today, nearly 130,000 assessments are carried out every month.
Why?
For the answer, please visit Sue Marsh’s Diary of a Benefit Scrounger where the full story is revealed – that Professor Harrington never approved the migration of IB claimants onto ESA, that the decision was politically-motivated and that millions of people are being rushed through a failed and unfair assessment system.
The government will not want anyone to know about this and the mainstream media are unreliable when it comes to exposing such behaviour. As Sue states in the article, “We must be our own media”. Please therefore publicise the link to her blog on all the social media available to you.
Let’s put pressure on these white-collar thugs to answer for their actions.
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Mike Sivier's blog 
Send it to Sonia Poulton on The People’s Voice.
She’s excellent and a real journalist!
As opposed to whom?
Actually I’ve been on Sonia’s show a couple of times so she might have picked it up already.
She has, Sue may be on this evening’s show.
Reblogged this on seachranaidhe1.
* Apparently over 80 % – 85 % were winning their appeals in Burnley in the trial area …the run down area was selected because it had * apparently too many people on IB …..there was also problems with getting people to co-operate as they quite rightly didn’t trust #ATOS and / or the WCA itself …they had to be coerced into it …being told they could appeal .
The #DWP said 20 % migrated to JSA was their target …also there was the mandatory #ATOS horror stories which can be confirmed by professional advocacy , with too much of a familiar ring to them to be within the realms of coincidence .
* Allegedly …Somebody was asked if he had recovered from AIDS , a mother was asked if her son had been ” cured ” of Downs Syndrome …a man stricken with arthritis using walking sticks …was told ” it was all in the mind ” by the #ATOS ” Health Care ” Professional ” ” …..that is text book quasi scientific / medical #Unum Bio – psychosocial method illegal insurance industry methods / definitions .
I’m afraid the only healing of the sick tends to be in the Bible or on US TV Gospel Hour type shows but not on Planet Corrupt Entity #ATOS .!
The problem with the Blarite Labour party was they thought they’d outflanked the Tories and kept the Tory tabloids like The Daily Mail , Express and The Sun / Star off their backs …..in reality ….they’d left the back door insecure for the Tory burglars to creep in and take things to unprecedented extremes .
#Unum ( previously the outlawed Unum Provident ) had far too much lobbying …or bribery …if you want to be cynical …influence .
#ATOS also had a dreadful reputation as a ” Occupational Health Provider ” with Royal Mail and the #DWP too .
Reblogged this on Diary of an SAH Stroke Survivor.
No wonder Duncan-Smith needs machine-gun toting bodyguards these days. If I were him I’d be scared for my life too.
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Reblogged this on Beastrabban’s Weblog.
so, the #Bliarites invented a #WelfareTrap that would deny, most probably the very people that believed the BS who then handed them the power, the most basic means to life itself
and the elitists have stuck a turbo charger on it just to hurry the process along a bit to supply their lusts..and to pay off a few small gambling debts of course.
It seems Labour was as horrified as the public when the truth about ESA dawned, and was not going to roll it out the rest of the way.
Trouble is, someone let the Tories get in, and they pushed it for all they were worth.
If that’s the case, where did the norms come from? Were the assessments just as bad under Labour? I believe they were and for the same reason. Let’s not forget Unum acted, SFAIK, as advisors to Labour as well as the Tories on ‘welfare reform’. I see no reason to expect things to improve under Labour.
Unfortunately the information about Labour being horrified by the way ESA turned out came from another commenter and I can’t find the comment to quote it properly here. I’ll try to find the evidence and bring it back here, if you don’t find it yourself beforehand.
I would strongly advise you not to go off half-cocked, thinking Labour must have been as responsible for this situation as the Tories – to me, that just indicates that the Coalition propaganda machine is working very well indeed.
agreed m8