Cancer sufferer’s benefits are cut – and the chattering classes demonise HIM

Tags

allowance, benefit, benefits, cancer, Coalition, Conservative, Democrat, demonise, Department, DWP, employment, ESA, feckless, Lib Dem, Liberal, National Health Service, NHS, Pensions, Pete Woodcock, privatisation, scrounger, Scunthorpe, social security, support, Tories, Tory, unemploy, volunteer, welfare, work, work-related activity group, WRAG

The vindictiveness of our Conservative-led government knows no bounds.

Not only has the government cut a man’s state benefits after he was diagnosed with cancer, but its supporters then attacked him in the local newspaper’s comment column – even though they knew nothing about his situation.

The gentleman concerned is Pete Woodcock of Scunthorpe who, according to a report in the Scunthorpe Telegraph, has been unemployed for around eight years.

Rather than sit around, he has spent his time volunteering in the community – for up to 40 hours per week – while also job hunting.

But when his doctors told him he had cancer, DWP officials cut his benefit money by 40 per cent (from £140 per week to £84). This is because attending hospital on both sides of the Humber meant he was unable to attend job clubs and had to claim a sickness benefit instead.

“When a person has cancer the last thing a person needs to worry about is finances but I now have to look after my family, pay bills and finance my trips to hospitals on less than £100 per week,” Mr Woodcock is quoted as saying. “Is this what health and welfare reforms have led to?

“The DWP even told me that if I went back on to jobseekers and gave up my treatment I could go back on to £140 per week to live on – meaning if I decided to die, I could be richer!”

So much for your caring Conservative-led government. Now look at this despicable response from a reader:

“Not much gratitude shown to taxpayers for the hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of free cancer treatment he will receive. I would say that is a pretty substantial benefit myself.”

Disgusting. The whole point of the National Health Service is that everybody pays something towards it, to ensure that it is free at the point of use. One has to question whether this commenter was a government plant, ordered to make this statement as part of the campaign to soften us all up for privatisation.

Here’s another one with his head in the clouds: “I’d look at this man’s situation the other way and suggest that he’s been overpaid (by at least 40 per cent) over the last eight years, whilst he’s been sat at home reaping in the benefits – whilst the rest of us have been going to work. Eight years is a very long time. Why couldn’t he find a job? Not really looking perhaps.”

It happens that a previous commenter had already answered this claim, but clearly these people don’t pay attention to anybody but themselves. The other commenter noted: “He is long-term unemployed (so largely unemployable), he didn’t sit on his behind all day (from what I hear) and smoke pot. The guy has a social conscience and appears to give a toss about where he lives.”

But this person noted that Mr Woodcock’s voluntary work could also harm his benefits: “I have to say he should be careful; the Jobcentre could class that as ‘not actively seeking and being available for work’, mainly due to the amount of time his job-seeking should occupy compared to a full time job.” We’re living in a crazy, upside-down country!

Final word goes to another commenter who pointed out that nothing has changed since the Coalition government first tightened the rules for claiming sickness benefits: “The aim of Govt was to demonise those on benefit by highlighting the worst cases of abuse and unless you are near to terminal there is the idea by the DWP you can do something.”

This is eerily reminiscent of the incident that sparked all the other stories about the victimisation of the sick. Does anybody remember, years ago, when the Coalition government was chastised for putting a patient with terminal cancer into the work-related activity group of Employment and Support Allowance, telling that person he should spend the final six months of his life at work?

Despite the huge backlash and protestations from the government that it has changed the system, it seems there has been no improvement at all.

Meanwhile, perhaps because of the constant right-wing media attacks on the sick as “feckless” “scroungers”, it seems the public have been manipulated into hardening their attitude.

ADDENDUM: You can read another perspective on this, from Scriptonite, here.

Just as the Tories wanted.

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ESA/WCA inquiry chair: ‘Victims are NOT being sidelined’

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allowance, Anne Begg, assessment, Atos, benefit, benefits, capability, Coalition, committee, Conservative, decision maker, Democrat, Department, disability, disabled, DWP, employment, ESA, government, health, IB, Incapacity Benefit, Income Support, inquiry, is, Lib Dem, Liberal, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, Parliament, Pensions, people, politics, SDA, Severe Disablement Allowance, sick, social security, support, support group, Tories, Tory, unemployment, Vox Political, WCA, welfare, work, work-related activity group, WRAG

Dame Anne Begg. [Image: BBC]

Dame Anne Begg has responded to concerns that people who submitted evidence to the Commons Work and Pensions Committee’s inquiry into Employment and Support Allowance and Work Capability Assessments were being sidelined – with a denial.

The committee’s chairperson said the call for evidence generated 190 submissions, and every single submission will be circulated to all committee members.

In addition, the committee clerk in charge of the inquiry, who will be writing the brief for committee members, has carefully read all the submissions as they have come in, she stated in an email yesterday. (March 30)

“However, in line with our practice in the past when we have received a large number of submissions describing personal experiences (such as our inquiries into the roll out of ESA and the Pensions Bill) we have taken the decision that not all of the personal submissions will be treated as ‘formal written evidence’ which is published along with our report,” she continued.

“This is because a number were very personal in nature, or didn’t address the terms of reference, while some asked for anonymity which isn’t possible in formal evidence, or included inappropriate language.

“It was made clear in our call for evidence that the committee would make the decision whether a submission would be treated as formal evidence or not. However, it is still treated as evidence – just not ‘formal written’ evidence.

“Once the formal evidence is published, you will be able to see that there are quite a number from individuals so it is simply untrue to say that all individual submissions are being ignored, suppressed or sidelined.”

Are you happy with that?

Personally, I can’t say that I am entirely convinced, as my own evidence (for example) fits the required criteria and should not be omitted from the formal evidence for the reasons Dame Anne mentioned in her email. Yet this is what has happened.

I responded, saying it is hard to give the benefit of the doubt to any Parliamentary investigation into this issue because of the mistreatment that people have suffered over the past few years.

While I would like to think that the Work and Pensions Committee, and those who work for it, will treat us all with fairness, it is only prudent to suggest that we all keep a watchful eye on proceedings, including all documentation that comes from this inquiry. If there is the slightest hint of foul play, then it will be our responsibility to raise the alarm.

Hopefully Dame Anne, the committee and its clerks have realised that their conduct is being scrutinised.

Let us hope they respond positively.

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Why are victims being sidelined by MPs’ inquiry?

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allowance, assessment, Atos, benefit, benefits, capability, Coalition, committee, Conservative, decision maker, Democrat, Department, disability, disabled, DWP, employment, ESA, government, health, IB, Incapacity Benefit, Income Support, inquiry, is, Lib Dem, Liberal, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, Parliament, Pensions, people, politics, SDA, Severe Disablement Allowance, sick, social security, support, support group, Tories, Tory, unemployment, Vox Political, WCA, welfare, work, work-related activity group, WRAG

Sidelined: People like this lady have campaigned across the UK against the unfair assessment system for sickness and disability benefits. Now that they are finally getting an inquiry into this corrupt system, are their views going to be ignored? [Image: Guardian]

Here’s a disturbing email from the Commons Work and Pensions committee:

“Thank you for your submission to Work and Pensions Committee’s inquiry into Employment and Support Allowance and Work Capability Assessments.

“The Committee has received a large number of written submissions from individuals who have claimed ESA and undergone WCA, setting out their personal experiences of the process.

“Your submission, along with other similar personal testimony submissions, will be circulated to the Members of the Committee as background information to the inquiry rather than published as formal evidence.

“I know that the Committee will find submissions such as yours very helpful in their inquiry and I would therefore like to thank you for taking the time to contribute to the inquiry.”

Background information?

I smell betrayal.

I did not write a detailed description of Mrs Mike’s suffering at the hands of the Department for Work and Pensions, just so that it could be hidden away and ignored as “background information”!

Look at the committee’s original call for evidence. It was “particularly interested” to hear views on, among other things:

• Delivery of the WCA by Atos, including steps taken to improve the claimant experience
• The effectiveness of the WCA in indicating whether claimants are fit for work, especially for those claimants who have mental, progressive or fluctuating illnesses, including comparison with possible alternative models
• The ESA entitlement decision-making process
• The reconsideration and appeals process
• The impact of time-limiting contributory ESA and
• Outcomes for people determined fit for work or assigned to the Work-Related Activity Group (WRAG) or the Support Group.

The experience endured by Mrs Mike, who has both progressive and fluctuating physical conditions and mental health issues, included a humiliating work capability assessment medical examination and being pushed into the WRAG after a wrong decision by Atos/DWP. The Department failed to inform her of its decision on her appeal, and failed to act on that decision before cutting her benefit (it didn’t tell her that was going to happen either). If I had not been around to stand up for her, she might have been thrown onto the streets by now.

Is the Work and Pensions Committee no longer “particularly interested” in stories like that?

If so, what kind of inquiry are we likely to get?

A whitewash?

Dame Anne Begg chairs this committee. I’m going to contact her and see what she has to say for herself and her people.

If you have received the same communication, no doubt you’ll want some answers as well. Please let me know if you have.

It is entirely possible that there is a good reason for what I’ve been given. Until I know what it is, though, I have to suspect the worst.

If I wait for this inquiry to take place and then find we’ve all been betrayed, it will be too late.

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Send your ESA/WCA experiences to the new MP inquiry

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allowance, assessment, Atos, benefit, benefits, capability, Coalition, committee, Conservative, decision maker, Democrat, Department, disability, disabled, DWP, employment, ESA, government, health, IB, Incapacity Benefit, Income Support, inquiry, is, Lib Dem, Liberal, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, Parliament, Pensions, people, politics, SDA, Severe Disablement Allowance, sick, social security, support, support group, Tories, Tory, unemployment, Vox Political, WCA, welfare, work, work-related activity group, WRAG

Fit for purpose? Parliament’s Work and Pensions Committee wants to hear about your experience of the work capability assessment and ESA.

The government wouldn’t do it – so an influential Parliamentary committee has decided to launch its own inquiry into Employment and Support Allowance and the Work Capability Assessment that determines eligibility for it.

I will be submitting evidence to this inquiry and I strongly suggest that, if you have a story to tell, then you should provide evidence as well.

According to the Parliament.uk website, the decision to undertake an inquiry from today (February 6) was made in light of recent developments including the publication of several reviews of the WCA, expressions of concern from DWP regarding Atos’s performance in delivering the WCA, and the introduction of mandatory reconsideration.

Submissions of no more than 3,000 words are invited from interested organisations and individuals.

The Committee is particularly interested to hear views on:

• Delivery of the WCA by Atos, including steps taken to improve the claimant experience
• The effectiveness of the WCA in indicating whether claimants are fit for work, especially for those claimants who have mental, progressive or fluctuating illnesses, including comparison with possible alternative models
• The process and criteria for procuring new providers of the WCA
• The ESA entitlement decision-making process
• The reconsideration and appeals process
• The impact of time-limiting contributory ESA
• Outcomes for people determined fit for work or assigned to the WRAG or the Support Group and
• The interaction between ESA and Universal Credit implementation
• Submissions do not need to address all of these points.

The deadline for submitting evidence is Friday, March 21.

To encourage paperless working and maximise efficiency, select committees are now using a new web portal for online submission of written evidence. The web portal is available on the Parliament.uk website here.

The personal information you supply will be processed in accordance with the provisions of the Data Protection Act 1998 for the purposes of attributing the evidence you submit and contacting you as necessary in connection with its processing.

Each submission should be in Word format with as little use of colour or logos as possible, and have numbered paragraphs.

If you need to send a paper copy, send it to: The Clerk, Work and Pensions Committee, House of Commons, 7 Millbank, London SW1P 3JA.

Material already published elsewhere should not form the basis of a submission, but may be referred to within a proposed memorandum, in which case a web link to the published work should be included.

Once submitted, evidence is the property of the committee. It is the committee’s decision whether or not to accept a submission as formal written evidence.

Select committees are unable to investigate individual cases.

The committee normally, though not always, chooses to make public the written evidence it receives, by publishing it on the internet (where it will be searchable), or by making it available through the Parliamentary Archives. If there is any information you believe to be sensitive you should highlight it and explain what harm you believe would result from its disclosure. The Committee will take this into account in deciding whether to publish or further disclose the evidence.

Further guidance on submitting evidence to Select Committees is available on the Parliament website.

Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) was introduced in October 2008 for claimants making a new claim for financial support on the grounds of illness or incapacity. It replaced Incapacity Benefits, Income Support by virtue of a disability and Severe Disablement Allowance.

ESA is paid to people who have limited capability for work (who are placed in the Work Related Activity Group (WRAG)), and people who have limited capability for work related activity (who are placed in the Support Group).

Most claimants applying for ESA are invited to a face-to-face assessment to help determine whether they fall within either of these two groups or whether they are fit for work. This Work Capability Assessment (WCA) is carried out by Atos Healthcare under its medical services contract with DWP. Atos produces a report and this is used by the DWP Decision Maker, alongside any other additional evidence, to determine whether the claimant should be placed in the WRAG or the Support Group, or is fit for work.

In April 2011, the Government began reassessing existing Incapacity Benefits (IB) claimants to determine their eligibility for ESA using the WCA. The Committee published a report on Incapacity Benefit Reassessment in July 2011.

A debate was held in Parliament on January 13, in which MPs called for an inquiry into the effect of changes to the benefit system on the incidence of poverty in this country; the question was whether poverty was increasing as a result of the so-called reforms.

Parliament voted massively in favour of the inquiry (125 votes for; two against), as reported here.

But the Conservative/Liberal Democrat Coalition government ignored the vote and did nothing.

It seems this committee-led inquiry is the next-best thing.

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Coalition spins a li(n)e about disabled people and work; media ignore it

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allowance, benefit, benefits, cheat, Coalition, Conservative, declare, Democrat, Department, disability, disabled, DWP, Easyjet, employment, ESA, fiddle, government, ignore, Jobseeker's Allowance, Lib Dem, Liberal, Media, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, news, Pensions, people, politics, programme, self-employed, sick, Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, social security, statistics, support, tax credit, tax credits, Tories, Tory, training, unemployment, Vox Political, welfare, work, work-related activity group

Is it possible that the news media are finally learning to examine Coalition press releases critically, rejecting those that don’t stand up to scrutiny?

There’s a crumb of hope in the fact that the latest disinformation about disabled people has received a very poor pick-up in the press. This is probably because it is easily-disproved nonsense.

The release claims “More than 500 disabled people a week supported into work or training”, which is a grandiose claim when one remembers the trouble suffered by the DWP in doing just that, only a few months ago.

According to the text, the DWP reckons more than 78,000 “opportunities for disabled people” have been created since 2011, where they have either found a job or “taken a significant step towards the workplace”.

But the logic falls down when you get to the quotation from Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, founder of Easyjet. He said: “Already over 100,000 disabled entrepreneurs employ an equivalent number of people in their business start-ups.”

Firstly, in the light of other quoted statistics that say 21,000 (of the 78,000 initially mentioned) have been on work experience placement, while more than 10,000 more started in sector-based work academies, one must wonder where 53,000 of the people mentioned by Sir Stelios came from.

Secondly, did you notice that he let the cat out of the bag (so to speak)? “Business start-ups”, is it?

Didn’t we all discover, via a BBC 5 Live investigation back in February last year, that job seekers on the work programme were being encouraged to declare that they were self-employed – when they aren’t – in order to get more money in tax credits than they would on Jobseekers’ Allowance?

This is just the same scam, applied to people on disability benefits like the work-related activity group of Employment and Support Allowance. Once their year on ESA runs out, they have a choice of going on Jobseekers’ Allowance (which is problematic as they cannot say they are fit for work), going without benefits altogether, or taking the self-employed cheat.

Some of them might be working but it seems likely that the vast majority aren’t.

Meanwhile, the government gets to fiddle the unemployment statistics to make it seem that the Work Programme is succeeding and more people have jobs.

It is right that the news media should not promote this blatant false accounting. Instead (as Elizabeth Caldow states in the comment column below) they should be exposing it for the outright fabrication that it is.

There should be a law against it.

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Success for one disability campaign – but another needs your help

Tags

Atos, benefit, benefits, Coalition, Conservative, Department for Work and Pensions, disability, disabled, doctor, DWP, Employment and Support Allowance, ESA, government, GP, health, House of Commons, human rights, Labour, Liam Byrne, Mandatory Work Activity, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, opposition day debate, Parliament, pat onions, pat's petition, people, politics, Samuel Miller, sick, united nations, Vox Political, WCA, welfare, work capability assessment, Work Programme, work-related activity group, Workfare, WRA, WRAG

Don’t let the despair go on – join the debate and put an end to the suffering.

You may remember an irate column on this blog a few weeks ago, berating the British public for failing to provide the required 100,000 signatures for Pat’s Petition.

The petition, calling on the government to “stop and review the cuts to benefits and services which are falling disproportionately on disabled people, their carers and families”, totalled more than 62,600 signatures when it closed, fair short of the required amount of support.

I am delighted, therefore, to report that there will be an Opposition Day debate in the House of Commons, bsed around the petition.

The Labour Party agreed to the debate after campaigners sent an open letter to Liam Byrne, the shadow Work and Pensions Secretary.

The petition’s creator, Pat Onions, wrote: “The debate will probably take place some time in January and we will only have a week’s notice, so the important thing now is to get ready for the debate and make sure all the issues we have been campaigning on get attention.

“The theme of the motion for the debate will be the Pat’s Petition demand that the government stop and review the cuts to benefits and services which are falling disproportionately on disabled people, their carers and families, and a demand for a cumulative impact assessment. It’s a very wide brief so if you want to focus on a particular issue that’s fine.

“We will need lots of help from you all to make sure that, after all your effort, this debate gets real results. We will also need help to ask MPs from all parties to speak in this debate.”

Contact your MP via this link.

This is all very encouraging.

But securing a debate does not mean any battles are won, and another aspect of the fight against those disproportionate cuts to benefits and services is the appeal to the United Nations by Samuel Miller – another matter which has been well-reported on this site.

Mr Miller is calling for people who are sick or disabled, and in the work-related activity group for Employment and Support Allowance, to send him scans of letters from their GP that state, explicitly, that they are not fit for work.

“This information is needed for the filing of United Nations complaints against the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland,” he wrote.   “It is my opinion that the British government’s mandatory Work Programme for sick and/or disabled persons is in violation of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which it signed on September 16, 1968 and ratified on May 20, 1976. (See http://www2.ohchr.org/english/law/pdf/cescr.pdf and http://www2.ohchr.org/english/law/cescr-ratify.htm)   “Further, it is my opinion the British government is violating the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and Optional Protocol.” (See http://www.un.org/disabilities/documents/convention/convoptprot-e.pdf and http://www.un.org/disabilities/countries.asp?navid=12&pid=166)

I strongly urge anyone who is able to help Mr Miller to send him copies of these documents. The more information he is able to collect, the easier it will be to persuade the United Nations that the British Government is knowingly and deliberately causing serious harm to sick and disabled people across the UK.

The email address, as ever, is disabilityinliterature@gmail.com

Benefits: how much information are the authorities holding back?

Tags

benefit, Coalition, cuts, disability, disabled, Employment and Support Allowance, ESA, Iain Duncan Smith, Incapacity Benefit, Job Centre Plus, Jobseeker's Allowance, recession, shrink, state, Work Placement, Work Programme, work-related activity group, Workfare

It might look like another boring benefit claim form to you, but to some people with disabilities and long-term health conditions, the sight of an ESA50 is enough to trigger anxiety, panic, or even heart attacks.

The British economy might be out of recession but the Coalition cuts regime marches ever onward – especially if you are claiming – or lucky enough to be receiving – the much-maligned Employment and Support Allowance.

(It was never about dealing with our economic difficulties, you see. It was always about shrinking the state and cutting the number of people dependent on it for their living – by one method or another).

The latest wheeze among Job Centre Plus staff appears to be the practice of missing out important information about your benefit such as, for example, the fact that being put in the work-related activity group of ESA claimants means you only receive the benefit for 365 days and during that period you should try to make yourself ready for work. After then, you will be put on Jobseekers’ Allowance and subjected to all the sanctions and requirements that entails – including, presumably, Workfare.

Can you imagine what would happen to someone with agoraphobia, who suffers from panic attacks, if they were put on a work placement scheme?

I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking the authorities wouldn’t be ignorant enough to put anyone in a work placement that might be harmful to their health or to their attempts to recover from their condition. Well, if you’re on ESA, all I can say is good luck with that. I’ll be back in a year or so to ask how it worked out for you.

We all know of many cases in which people with disabilities or health problems have been put into situations that have worsened their conditions. The most famous examples were terminal – the people involved are now dead. I understand the average number of deaths per week is now 78. Iain Duncan Smith must be beside himself with joy.

But there are many others who, although they are being pushed to the limit by a system that has been twisted to make it as unhelpful as possible, are still persevering. I know of people who have been put on the work-related activity group of ESA, but weren’t told about the time limit and were left high and dry when the money ran out.

Are you on ESA? Are you in the work-related activity group? Do you know when your benefit will end?

At least that person was lucky enough to receive notification of what was happening to them. Another person, on heavy medication for painful conditions, did not realise they had been moved from Incapacity Benefit to ESA and was astonished to find they had taken and work capability assessment and failed it. The result? They were kicked off the benefit. Fortunately, they appealed and won. But the experience was extremely traumatic.

Make no mistake – this is a system that is designed to intimidate you; to weaken you; to push you into the sidelines in the hope that you’ll go away and be no more bother to those who run it.

“The Work Capability Assessment is being continually reviewed and refined, through a series of annual independent reviews, with improvements resulting in a fairer and more accurate system,” according to the Department for Work and Pensions.

That’s excluding where you live, apparently.

The great debate – the incapable assessment regime

Tags

"no financial targets", "you're killing us", Atos, BBC, Black Triangle, Chancellor, Chris Grayling, Coalition, Con-Dem, ConDem, Conservative, corporate manslaughter, Dame Anne Begg, debate, descriptor, disabled, Disabled People Against Cuts, Dispatches, DPAC, Employment and Support Allowance, ESA, fit for work, George Osborne, Iain Duncan Smith, John McDonnell, Labour, Panorama, Paralympic, Personal Independence Payment, PIP, police, sick, Sonia Poulton, Stephen Timms, suicide, support group, tick-box, Tom Greatrex, Twitter, WCA, Westminster Hall, work capability assessment, work-related activity group

Some supporters of disabled people are using this image as a car sticker, to raise awareness of dissatisfaction with the Atos assessments.

The most telling moment in today’s (September 4) Westminster Hall debate on Atos and Work Capability Assessments came when Chris Grayling was delivering his speech. A woman shouted, “You’re killing us!” and was immediately told to shut up or the public gallery would be cleared.

It was an act of insensitivity that put into a nutshell the Coalition government’s attitude to public discontent over its Work Capability Assessment regime for claimants of the new Employment and Support Allowance (and soon, the new Personal Independence Payment); it doesn’t care what we say, it will carry on doing what it wants, and it will lie to us about what that is.

I was listening to the debate and watching responses on Twitter. John McDonnell MP tweeted: “Protesters sum up exactly what this debate is all about. The Atos system is causing immense suffering & killing people.”

Mr Grayling did not address these concerns in his speech.

He said the DWP would not be changing the controversial ‘descriptors’, that are used in WCAs by the tick-box assessors, who need them to understand whether any person’s abilities mean they deserve a much-coveted place among the 13 per cent of claimants in the ‘Support Group’ – or whether they should be turfed out into the ‘Work-Related Activities Group’ or market “Fit For Work”.

But a potential new set of descriptors, more appropriate to the conditions suffered by the sick and disabled, is still being considered. Where’s the truth?

He said the assessment regime had “no financial targets”. This was a flat-out lie. We know there are targets because Atos trainers made that perfectly clear in the recent Dispatches and Panorama documentaries on the subject.

“Atos do not take decisions.” Another lie. The DWP decision-makers rubber-stamp Atos recommendations in the vast majority of cases.

He repeatedly told us the process was “not an exact science” before contradicting himself by stating that the government wants to “get it right”.

Before he got up to speak, the criticisms had been mounting up like a tidal wave against him. All to no avail, as he sailed on, oblivious.

“How many people have died between being rejected and their appeal, and how many committed suicide?” This was a question I was hoping to hear, as this blog has been criticised for using the “32 deaths per week” statistic. No response to that one, though! And what about corporate manslaughter? The issue wasn’t even raised, but the government – and Mr Grayling, together with his (now former) boss Iain Duncan Smith – might be guilty of killing thousands.

“Will claimants still get ESA while they ask for a reconsideration?” The current answer is no. Judging from the lack of response in the debate, that will remain the case.

Assessors’ lack of mental health knowledge came up time and time again.

One MP after another got up to speak, making it clear that they had all received multiple accounts of mistreatment at the hands of a company that clearly couldn’t give… well… Atos: “There cannot be an MP that hasn’t heard terrible constituent stories over WCAs.”

Labour MP Stephen Timms made some strong points. He pointed out the fluctuating nature of many claimants’ conditions, and warned that the work capability assessment does not take account of changes. “The WCA must not be a snapshot,” he said, and went on to add that the test needs “radical improvement”.

He admitted that Employment Support Allowance was a Labour initiative – but made it clear that the Coalition rolled it out before trials to ensure it was fit for purpose had been completed.

And Dame Anne Begg MP won praise for listing poor decisions by assessors and the failings at Atos, repeating, like a mantra: “When people feel this persecuted, there is something wrong with the system.”

She called for the contract to be re-written, saying it “can’t be fixed with a few tweaks here and there”.

Tom Greatrex, who opened the debate, said too many people were being found fit for work when they weren’t fit at all. He said the £60 million cost of appeals against assessment findings meant the taxpayer was effectively paying for a system that doesn’t work, then paying again to put it right. He said details of the Atos contract should be made public (a forlorn hope; confidentiality is a large part of many government contracts with private firms, although the Atos contract is particularly vague).

And he pointed out that, although Mr Grayling had said the transfer schedule for moving people off Incapacity Benefit and onto ESA was on-target, it was in fact very far behind, with waiting times up by 85 per cent.

Honourable mention was given to the disability campaigns Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC) and Black Triangle. Dishonourable mention was made of police brutality at last Friday’s protest outside the headquarters of Atos and the DWP in London.

Calls were made to reduce unnecessary assessments (of people whose condition was unlikely to change), anger was expressed that Atos is a sponsor of the Paralympics. The debate heard that applicants find the process of going through the Work Capability Assessment terrifying (I can personally attest to this, having witnessed my girlfriend’s. Terrifying and humiliating) – and that it was felt to take away their dignity as human beings.

Sadly, nobody called for a comprehensive study of the mortality rate.

Not one single Coalition backbencher indicated a desire to speak.

Amid all this, one online wit tweeted: “I do hope Osborne comes in at the end to take the now-traditional booing” – a reference to an incident the day before, which has already become infamous, when the Chancellor appeared at the Paralympics to hand out medals and was booed by the 60,000-strong stadium crowd.

Sonia Poulton, the Daily Mail columnist who became a campaigner against Atos, summed up the event: “W-C-A….SEIZE THE DAY! Yes, Labour started it, we ALL know that now…but Con-Dems butchered like never before. Time to get rid!”

If only we could.

For another perspective on the debate, please see the BBC website’s report at – oh. There isn’t one.