In 2007, the then Labour Government introduced Work
Capability Assessments (WCAs)[1] – a new way of assessing an individual’s
abilities and disabilities, capacity to work and entitlement to benefits. Quite
rightly, the under-pinning assumption was that everyone should be assisted to
work if they are able, recognising the support that might be required, and
providing the appropriate benefits to help an individual with a disability to
play a full part in society.
Unfortunately, since 2010, the coalition government
decided that the primary purpose of WCAs is to ‘get people off benefits
and into work’.[2] However, the government forced through assessment
processes that weren’t fit for purpose and contracted out the assessment
process to the multi-national company ATOS, whose performance has been a
disaster - a catalogue of long delays and poor decisions, causing misery and
fear to thousands of people across the country.[3]
Crisis meetings between ATOS and DWP revealed that
recruitment failures had left the company with a severe shortage of doctors.[4]
This compounded the widespread incompetence in the delivery of work capability
assessments which lead to 40% of ATOS’s decisions being appealed, and one in
every three appeals being upheld. Thus, one in every seven decisions has been
demonstrated to have been wrong. In addition, last May, the courts have
determined that the processes disadvantages people with mental health problems,
learning disabilities and autism, and, in December, the Court of Appeal threw
out the government’s appeal against that judgement.[5]
By May 2011, 63% of initial claims were taking longer
than 91 days to process. By the second half of 2011 this had risen to 77% and
by the first eight months of 2012 this figure stood at 82%.[6] Last week, the
government was forced to admit that ATOS is failing to meet 63 of its 96
Employment and Support Allowance targets - which require ATOS to process all
ESA applications within 35 working days.[7]
Things are so bad that the government has stopped
publishing performance data. The October 2013 statistical release for Work
Capability Assessments did not include either the statistics for the assessment
of existing Incapacity Benefit claims, nor the outcome of appeals of initial
WCAs. And these statistics still haven’t been released.
This is not surprising given that the July 2013 release
had revealed
“to date 39% of all Fit-for-Work decisions have been
appealed against. 70% of initial Fit-for-Work decisions appealed against were
upheld after challenge; and 30% of initial Fit-for-Work decisions appealed
against were overturned after challenge”.[8]
The Department of Work and Pensions’ Annual Report was
published in December. It confirmed:
“5.5.1 A particular example of the control challenge
around commercial suppliers identified above is the number and quality of Work
Capability Assessments undertaken by Atos Healthcare, in support of both
Employment and Support Allowance and the programme to reassess Incapacity
Benefit claims. The number of assessments has fallen consistently short of
demand... 5.5.3 The work by Atos Healthcare to improve quality further reduced
the volumes of completed assessments. This further increased the numbers of
cases awaiting assessment.”[9]
It’s clear that it is the government and the contractor
it chose which need incapability assessments, not the unfortunate people who
are trapped in this wretched process.
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[1] Welfare Reform Act 2007
[2] Welfare Reform Act 2012
