20/09/2011

Inclusion London’s response to the second review of WCA, being conducted by Professor Malcolm Harrington, pointed out how the assessment process produced inaccurate and unjust outcomes. We believe that the evidence shows that the changes to Incapacity Benefit and introduction of Employment Seekers Allowance and Work Capability Assessment (WCA) are being driven by a goal of radically cutting the numbers of disabled people in receipt of benefits, with too little regard for the real needs of many disabled people.

We argue that:

• There are inherent problems in the HPC assessment provided by Atos which should be addressed as a matter of urgency.
• Atos should bear the cost of tribunals resulting from inaccurate assessments.
• Atos HCP assessors lack the expertise required to properly and fairly assess people, such as those with mental health conditions, cognitive impairments, fluctuating conditions and other impairments.
• Reports by health care professionals as well as the claimant’s own testimony should be central to the decision-making process.
• Disability poverty is likely to increase because disabled people will not be receiving an income from benefits or employment due to punitive ESA system.
• There should not be a time limit on ESA as one year is an unrealistic timeframe for disabled people to find work.

You can download the full response from the column on the right.