Protests in Hull Credit: ITV Calendar
By The Hull Daily Mail
ATOS was first awarded the contract to carry work capability assessments (WCA) by the Labour Government in 2005.
It was subsequently extended until 2015 by the coalition.
Official figures show 40 per cent of appeals against a decision not to award employment and support allowance, largely based on the WCA, are upheld.
The figure rises to 70 per cent if the claimant is accompanied by someone such as a Citizens’ Advice Bureau officer.
Tribunals that hear appeals cost the taxpayer £50million a year.
Two recent TV documentaries appeared to expose a target-driven system in which inadequately trained health professionals carried out a tick box exercise to decide whether people were entitled to benefits. Both Atos and the DWP rebutted the criticisms.
Richard Hawkes, chief executive of the disabled charity Scope, said: “The Government has a responsibility to ensure taxpayers get a fair deal from its contracts but also to ensure its departments and contractors treat disabled people fairly and with a duty of care.
“It is the Government that has designed this deeply flawed assessment and until it makes fundamental changes to the design of this test, it will continue to have a devastating effect on disabled people’s lives.”
One response
And we will continue to battle until this government are removed from office and this company can no longer humiliate, belittle and terrorize the disabled and vulnerable on behalf of said government and its ministers.