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Post by Admin on Dec 21, 2021 18:55:38 GMT
Prior to this year's Dispatches documentary 'Truth About Disability Benefits', Channel 4 had made another Dispatches documentary called 'The Great Benefits Row' which focussed on PIP, and CAPITA'S DISABILITY ASSESSMENT PROCESSES. It's a damning piece and such inhumainty and the lives it has cost should never be forgotten. Here's the programme: www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnItQ9-atjw
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Post by Admin on Dec 21, 2021 21:07:24 GMT
Homeless man found dead near his dog in city centre just days before Christmas Tributes have flooded in for Jonathon Ellerington, who was a familiar sight in Hull city centre along with his pet Jack Russell, Teddy, after he was found dead on Saturday morning www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/homeless-man-found-dead-near-25750376A man who slept rough has died just days before Christmas. Jonathon Ellerington was a familiar sight in Hull city centre along with his pet Jack Russell, Teddy. The 41-year-old did not have a home to live in and could be regularly seen sitting outside a Costa in the town, Hull Daily Mail reported. On Saturday morning he was found dead by the coffee shop. For almost three hours an ambulance and four police vehicles were parked on the pavement outside the Costa following the tragic discovery. Jonathon's death is not being treated as suspicious. Since his death, his dog has been taken in and looked after by members of his family.
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Post by Admin on Jan 6, 2022 20:54:41 GMT
Coroner: DWP ‘must act’ after it told severely ill patient to leave hospital to make claim By John Pring on 6th January 2022 Category: Benefits and Poverty www.disabilitynewsservice.com/coroner-dwp-must-act-after-it-told-severely-ill-patient-to-leave-hospital-to-make-claim/A coroner has called on the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) to make urgent policy changes, after it ordered a disabled patient to leave hospital to visit a jobcentre despite being severely ill with a condition that later killed him. The call for urgent action has come in a prevention of future deaths (PFD) report, the latest in a series of such letters to be sent to DWP by coroners over the last 12 years following the department’s repeated failure to ensure the safety of disabled benefit claimants. Health professionals had told an inquest into the death of Terence Talbot that they had never heard of such a “severely ill inpatient” being told by DWP to leave hospital to make a benefit claim in person. Talbot was being treated for drug hypersensitivity syndrome, while also being detained under the Mental Health Act, because of a rare reaction to medication that had been prescribed for his mental distress. The severe allergic reaction had left him “very vulnerable to infection”, but DWP refused to allow him to submit a claim for benefits electronically. Instead, he was told to leave hospital and attend his local jobcentre in person. He later died in Maidstone Hospital, on 9 April 2020, aged 58, from multi-organ failure caused by the lung conditions pneumonia and empyema, which themselves were caused by drug hypersensitivity syndrome (also known as DRESS syndrome). Sonia Hayes, assistant coroner for Mid Kent and Medway, wrote to work and pensions secretary Therese Coffey last month to warn her that other claimants could die if she did not make urgent changes to how DWP deals with such cases. She told Coffey in the PFD letter – also known as a Regulation 28 report – that DWP had “required Terence Talbot to attend in person to make a claim for benefits rather than accept an electronic claim”. The coroner said she had been told by “all the doctors and a senior nurse in this case” that they had “never experienced nor heard of a case” where such a “severely ill inpatient” was required by DWP to “leave hospital to attend its offices in person to make a claim for welfare benefits”. She said Talbot had been experiencing mental distress and “an exceptionally rare and complex disease with a risk of death and suffering severe exfoliative dermatitis that rendered him very vulnerable to infection”. Coffey has to respond to the coroner’s report by 28 January. A DWP spokesperson told Disability News Service: “Our condolences are with Mr Talbot’s family. “We are considering the report and will respond in due course.” The coroner was also highly critical of Kent and Medway NHS and Social Care Partnership Trust (KMSCPT) – which provides mental health services across Kent and Medway – and Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust (MTW) for their failures. She said there had been a failure to carry out regular reviews of Terence Talbot’s skin condition, and to apply moisturising treatments to his skin – they were recorded as “self-administered” even though he could not apply them effectively himself – while he experienced malnutrition because he did not receive the food, fluid and nutrition he needed. The coroner said this “amounted to a gross failure to provide basic medical care that would have prolonged but probably would not have saved his life”. She told KMSCPT that it had failed to subject all the decisions about Talbot’s care and treatment to formal Mental Capacity Act assessments at a time when he was “refusing medical interventions that were in his best interests”. And she said MTW had failed to consider a specialist dermatology referral for his severe dermatitis, caused by the DRESS syndrome, and had failed to ensure regular input from a dietician to deal with his malnutrition. Instead, she said, MTW had focused in meetings on problems relating to his discharge rather than the treatment he needed. MTW had also failed to carry out mental capacity assessments of Talbot’s decisions on all the occasions it should have done, she said. MTW is preparing a response to the PFD report. But KMSCPT has already responded to the report, apologising for its failures, and telling the coroner that it had “identified a need for more joined up working with [MTW] particularly when it comes to accessing care for physical health for our in-patients at the Priority House site in Maidstone”. The mental health trust said it also knew that it was “extremely important for us to thoroughly assess capacity and to document it when any of our patients are refusing to accept treatment for their physical health conditions”. And it said it recognised “the importance of engaging with families and seeking their support with situations where the patient might appear to be refusing care and treatment for a deteriorating physical health condition”. It described several measures it had taken to address the concerns raised by the coroner. The trust said it was “sincerely sorry for the shortcomings in our care of Mr Talbot and are committed to ensuring that the improvements we have made are sustained”.
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Post by Admin on Jan 12, 2022 9:24:51 GMT
DWP admits secret report was altered but takes more time to decide if it will release original www.benefitsandwork.co.uk/news/4475-dwp-admits-secret-report-was-altered-but-takes-more-time-to-decide-if-it-will-release-originaThe DWP has admitted to Benefits and Work that it ‘may’ have a copy of the original secret report into claimants’ unmet needs, but has allowed itself an extension of time before it will say whether we can have a copy of the original, unaltered report. Regular readers will know that the DWP is fighting to keep secret a report entitled ‘The uses of health and disability benefits’ which deals in part with the unmet needs of benefits claimants. The Commons work and pensions committee has told the DWP that they have until 11 January to publish the report or the committee will obtain a copy themselves and publish it. However, a whistleblower told the Disability News Service that after being shown the first draft of the report, the DWP told the authors to reduce the number of references to “unmet needs” and to delete some of its analysis. Benefits and Work made a freedom of Information request to the DWP for a copy of the original, unaltered version of the report. The DWP have now responded that: “We can confirm that we may hold information falling within the terms of your request; however, we need more time to consider aspects of your request.” The DWP go on to claim that the ‘Formulation of government policy’ exemption may apply to the request, which allows refusal in order to allow ministers a safe space in which to formulate policy. The DWP say that they will let us have a full response by 4 February. In reality, the DWP are probably waiting to see if the work and pensions committee follow through on their threat to publish the altered version of the report. If that does happen, it will be hard to argue that the exemption could still apply and the DWP will need to try to find another excuse for not allowing us to see a copy of the original report. We’ll keep you posted.
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Post by Admin on Jan 18, 2022 16:42:43 GMT
UK poverty report: 1.8 million children are growing up in deep poverty leftfootforward.org/2022/01/uk-poverty-report-1-8-million-children-are-growing-up-in-deep-poverty/There are 500,000 more children living in significant poverty in 2019/20 compared to 2011/12 A damning new report looking at poverty in the UK has found that 1.8 million children are growing up in ‘deep poverty’, with 500,000 more children living in significant poverty in 2019/20 compared to 2011/12. The new analysis published by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, also found that households on low incomes will be spending on average 18% of their income after housing costs on energy bills after April. For single adult families on low incomes, this rises to 54%. By contrast, the impact on higher-earning families will be much less severe – it says middle-income households will be spending an average of 6% of their income on energy bills. The report, entitled, ‘UK Poverty 2022: The essential guide to understanding poverty in the UK’, also warns that the poorest families will be hit disproportionately hard when the Energy Price Cap rises in April. The report states: “Low-income households have less of a buffer against rising costs or any unexpected expenses, given they are less likely than other households to have savings, with just over a third of people in the poorest fifth of households having liquid savings of less than £250 compared with 1 in 6 of the overall population.” Soaring energy bills, tax increases and inflation are pushing families up and down the country into destitution. The amount energy companies can charge customers on certain tariffs under the government’s Energy Price Cap is predicted to go up in April by around 51%. The JRF is calling for an immediate emergency payment for people on the lowest incomes to help prevent hardship in the months ahead. Katie Schmuecker at JRF said: “The reality for many families is that too many children know the constant struggle of poverty. The fact that more children are in poverty and sinking deeper into poverty should shame us all. “The case for targeted support to help people on the lowest incomes could not be clearer. But this must go hand in hand with urgent action to strengthen our social security system, which was woefully inadequate even before living costs began to rise. “Our basic rate of benefits is at its lowest real rate for 30 years and this is causing avoidable hardship. The Government must do the right thing and strengthen this vital public service. “Rising energy prices will affect everyone, but our analysis shows they have the potential to devastate the budgets of families on the lowest incomes. The Government cannot stand by and allow the rising cost of living to knock people off their feet.”
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Post by Admin on Jan 23, 2022 10:34:04 GMT
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Post by Admin on Jan 23, 2022 10:43:37 GMT
Britain’s welfare system ‘unfit for purpose’ with millions struggling, experts warn www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/britain-s-welfare-system-unfit-for-purpose-with-millions-struggling-experts-warn/ar-AAT3g6eBritain’s welfare system is “unfit for purpose” and in urgent need of reform, experts warned on Sunday amid fears that millions more families will struggle to make ends meet amid the dual pressures of the pandemic and the spiralling cost-of-living crisis. The soaring price of food and rent, along with energy bills – which are expected to more than double in April when the price cap is lifted, bringing the number of households under “fuel stress” to at least 6 million – is forcing families to choose between basic essentials such as food and heat, the experts said, while growing numbers are being forced into debt and relying on food banks. The warning comes as a damning report, due to be published on Monday, calls for rapid reforms to the social security system to protect low-income families from extreme hardship as its lead author cautioned that they “don’t have any resilience left”. Covid Realities, a two-year study by the universities of York and Birmingham and the Child Poverty Action Group documenting the lives of 150 low-income families with children during the pandemic, says Covid has exposed and exacerbated existing problems with the benefits system. “Our social security system is currently ill-suited to protect people from poverty, and to provide individuals with some level of security as they navigate what are often temporary challenges in their lives – for example, the loss of a job, relationship breakdown, parenting and care work or ill health,” said Ruth Patrick, senior lecturer in social policy at York University and leader of the research programme. “This was clear before the pandemic, but Covid-19 further exposed and highlighted just what it means when your social security system is simply unfit for purpose.” Patrick said many were struggling before the pandemic, which added to difficulties that are now being compounded by the cost-of-living crisis. “People have just been battered again and again by things and they don’t have any resilience left.” She said many are being forced into making “impossible” trade-offs – sitting in the dark to conserve electricity or saving the heating for when the children come home – and are living in fear of the coming months, which is also having an effect on mental health. “People are experiencing stress, anxiety and insecurity about how they’ll manage now and in the future,” she said. The report, created with parents and carers living in poverty, calls for changes to the welfare system, which it said often increases financial pressures on families because of structural issues with universal credit, which was cut by £20 a week to pre-pandemic levels in October.
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Post by Admin on Jan 27, 2022 23:37:42 GMT
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Post by Admin on Feb 1, 2022 17:51:01 GMT
The Work Capability Assessment is the adoption of disability denial by BJGP Life 13 October 2021 bjgplife.com/the-work-capability-assessment-is-the-adoption-of-disability-denial/Mo Stewart is the research lead for the Preventable Harm Project which ran for ten years and is published by the Centre for Welfare Reform, Sheffield. She is also the author of Cash Not Care: the planned demolition of the UK welfare state, London, New Generation Publishing, 2016. Whilst the world is distracted by the global pandemic, and the United Kingdom (UK) is adjusting to the reality of Brexit, there is an ongoing public health crisis created by social policy reforms and austerity measures which is being totally disregarded by successive administrations. Those in greatest need who are unfit or unable to work now live in fear of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), who first adopted the fatally flawed Work Capability Assessment (WCA) in 2008 to successfully limit access to long-term out-of-work disability benefit, with often fatal consequences.1 The WCA is not a medical assessment, an incorrect assumption often claimed by politicians, journalists and academics. Influenced by corporate America, the WCA is the adoption of a biopsychosocial (BPS) model of assessment, which is the invention of the health insurance industry to limit access to claims, and is identified as being a “non-medical functional assessment”, which disregards all clinical opinion and failed all academic scrutiny.1,2 The initial introduction of the WCA by the Labour administration in 2008 was the adoption of disability denial, and was guaranteed to cause preventable harm, as those in greatest need are treated with suspicion by the DWP, as a consequence of the adoption of neoliberal politics. Neoliberal politics is the politics of power, profit and greed with an emphasis on a small state.3 This right-leaning ideology has swept the world and influenced social policies in all 38 member countries of the OECD (OECD 2003).4 Neoliberal politics was first adopted in the UK by Margaret Thatcher in 1979, and was guaranteed to cause preventable harm to those in greatest need, as Thatcher insisted that the welfare state was an unacceptable financial burden to the public purse.5 Following Thatcher’s long reign as Prime Minister, in 1994 the John Major Conservative administration appointed the second largest income replacement health insurance company in America as welfare claims managers, and so began corporate America’s influence with future UK social policies, as UnumProvident Insurance co-designed UK disability benefit assessments, with catastrophic human consequences.1 Subsequently, social policies were adopted by successive administrations to create Thatcher’s stated political ambition, which is the future demolition of the UK welfare state;2 with long-term sickness and disability benefit to be funded by private income replacement health insurance, similar to the American system of funding health and welfare support to replace “state paternalism”.6 Similar to its use by the health insurance industry, the adoption of a BPS model of assessment for the fatally flawed WCA was used to restrict access to disability benefit. The WCA is dangerous. It disregards diagnosis, prognosis, past medical history and prescribed medicines; which guaranteed that many of those in greatest need would perish, often by suicide. Hence, the introduction of the WCA was ideologically motivated with the political expectation that, if disability benefits were made as difficult as possible to access, the purchase of private health insurance would increase – which has yet to be established. Websites: www.mostewartresearch.co.ukwww.researchgate.net/profile/Mo-Stewart/publicationswww.centreforwelfarereform.org/about-us/centre-fellows/mo-stewart.html References 1. Stewart M (2019): Psychological tyranny masquerading as welfare reform. Journal of Critical Psychology, Counselling and Psychotherapy Vol 19, Issue 1, pp 26-35 2. Stewart M (2016): Cash Not Care: the planned demolition of the UK welfare state. London, New Generation Publishing, 2016 ISBN: 978-1-78507-783-8 pbk, 188 pages 3.Monbiot G (2016): Neoliberalism – the ideology at the root of all our problems. The Guardian online, posted 15 April, 2016 (accessed 3rd October, 2021). 4.OECD (2003): Transforming Disability Into Ability: policies to promote work and income security for disabled people. Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development 2003 ISBN: 92-64-19887-3 pbk, 207 pages. 5. Gamble A (1988): Privatization, Thatcherism and the British State. Journal of Law and Society Volume 16, Number 1, Spring 1988, pp. 1-20 6. The National Archives (1982): Renewing the Values of Society. Files from 1982. (accessed 4th October, 2021)
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Post by Admin on Feb 2, 2022 17:05:15 GMT
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Post by Admin on Feb 21, 2022 20:20:41 GMT
Benefits changes could have serious consequences on mental health, warns UK psychologists’ body Exclusive: British Psychological Society describes planned changes as ‘deeply concerning’ Ashley Cowburn Political Correspondent www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/benefits-changes-deeply-concerning-psychologists-b2016328.htmlThe planned tightening of the benefits system is “deeply concerning” and could have “serious negative consequences” on claimants’ mental health, according to a leading body representing psychologists in the UK. The warning from the British Psychological Society (BPS) comes after work and pensions secretary Therese Coffey last month hailed a new government target to get 500,000 jobseekers back into work by June.
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Post by Admin on Feb 24, 2022 22:42:35 GMT
Finally, a Television Show About the Damage Wrought by Austerity BY DALIA AL-DUJAILI The BBC’s new medical drama This Is Going to Hurt is set amid the chaos of an austerity-starved National Health Service. It comes at just the right time, as the pandemic forces the UK to take stock of the damage austerity has done to the NHS. jacobinmag.com/2022/02/uk-neoliberalism-nhs-bbc-covid-tories/Over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, the UK public watched as the National Health Service (NHS) under Tory leadership was pushed to its breaking point. The BBC’s adaptation of ex-NHS doctor Adam Kay’s 2017 memoir, This Is Going to Hurt, comes at precisely the right time, as the nation now grapples with the emaciation of the health system that was once prized as the best of Britain. The tragicomedy is garnering praise for its many outstanding qualities, including a stellar performance from Ben Whishaw and writing that’ll leave you in stitches (pardon the pun). It’s also refreshingly honest about the pitfalls of an austerity-starved NHS. The show’s protagonist Adam is a brilliant doctor who’s underpaid and overworked. He’s also rude and short-tempered in a charming, distinctly British sort of way. Breaking the fourth wall in Fleabag fashion, Adam’s casual asides and glances at the audience — handled with remarkable fluidity by Whishaw — heighten the theatricality of the show as it transports the viewer into the world of hellishly ill-organized maternity wards. (Warning: spoilers ahead.) In one episode, Adam is teetering on the brink of broke. In need of some money, he takes a shift in a private maternity hospital. With its gargantuan chandelier and marble pillars, the private hospital seems like it would make light work of labor. But as we come to see, the facility suffers from inadequate resources, and so a birthing mother in crisis is rushed to accident and emergency services (A&E) at Adam’s NHS hospital. Although the NHS ward basks in the success of saving mother and baby, Adam laments that the staff won’t receive the cold hard cash for its work, which will of course be paid to the private hospital all the same. Another episode details a press visit from a politician to the ward, like those Boris Johnson routinely performed during the pandemic. The hospital realizes it’s not quite suitable for public display, with an alarm that hasn’t worked for four years and shoddy, overcrowded rooms. To improve appearances, short-notice renovations take place around the ward. With wires hanging from the ceiling and dust from drilling covering all the surfaces, Adam’s senior consultant Lockhart (played by Alex Jennings, who brings his flawless acting from The Crown to this role too), remarks, “Jesus Christ, it’s like downtown Basra in here.” “They must think the entire NHS smells like fresh paint,” bites one of the nurses with regard to the face-lift inspired by politician’s visit. “Still, new computer.” “I wouldn’t get too attached, love. Once the right honorable bastard has done his little tour, that’ll all be gone faster than you can say ‘A&E closure,’” responds nurse Tracey, played by Michele Austin. The real Adam Kay left the NHS after being “struck off” (having his medical license revoked) following a faulty cesarean which resulted in the death of the baby. In the show, Adam delivers the baby, and it survives. He avoids having his license revoked by explaining how he’d been working an understaffed night shift, how he was the only doctor who was available to come in that night despite the fact it was supposed to be his night off, and consequently how desperately tired he was. This story resonates with the experiences of a junior NHS doctor I spoke to. George Huntington told Jacobin that during his on-calls he covers ten medical wards, attending to emergencies or admitting patients to hospital from A&E. “Today is supposed to be a day off,” he said. “I have been called by my consultant asking why I am not in and who he can contact that is on the ward.” Huntington said that “even before the pandemic, it was obvious things have become very stretched.” For example, in 2018, the NHS recorded its worst-ever A&E waiting hours. While he doesn’t think things will “collapse overnight,” he believes outcomes for patients may get worse and “there may be more malpractice lawsuits; nurses and doctors being struck off which creates a spiral of people leaving the workforce.” He adds, “I feel that the situation is likely to get worse before it gets better.” Unlike most hospital-setting TV dramas, everyone in This Is Going to Hurt looks like a normal person instead of a supermodel-cum-surgeon (I’m looking at you, Grey’s Anatomy). The show doesn’t shy away from reality in other aspects, either, from medical crises to social ones. There’s some typical social-issue fare, such as when Adam struggles to come out as gay to his colleagues, while his coworker Shruti struggles to choose between the right job for her and pleasing her South Asian immigrant parents. But there’s also a hilarious scene depicting a workshop on politically correct language, such as replacing “patient” with “client” and “disabled” with “differently-abled.” Tracey, a black nurse with a disabled child, asks how beneficial changes like this really are when workers don’t have “a working printer on our ward. We’ve had a leak in the ceiling for over four years, and this is what they’re spending their money on?” Shruti Acharya is the show’s most tragic and sobering character. The subject of Adam’s repeated bullying, Shruti’s endurance as a doctor is put to the test multiple times throughout the show. Sharp teasing from Adam and other senior doctors quickly wears away at the young training doctor. The show breaks our heart before its culmination with Shruti’s devastating suicide. The script thus hones in on the NHS’s “last taboo” — the disproportionately high rate of suicide of NHS doctors. According to a report from the Office for National Statistics from 2018, a health care professional takes their own life every three and a half days in the UK. The pandemic has only worsened NHS workers’ mental health, with a record-high number of staff resignations — 27,000 over three months, leaving around 6 million patients on a waiting list. “A lot of nurses I worked with on ITU [intensive therapy unit] through the first and second wave are leaving intensive care . . . or nursing altogether. As much as I hate it, I really don’t blame them,” Huntington tells me. Almost half of intensive care staff surveyed by Kings College London during the first wave of the pandemic were reported to be suffering from PTSD, severe anxiety, depression, or drinking dependencies, and one in eight workers claimed they’d experienced suicidal thoughts or had thoughts of harming themselves. Low pay isn’t helping matters. In 2021, a 3 percent pay raise was awarded to NHS staff but not junior doctors, despite the fact that take-home pay for junior doctors has fallen by 23 percent since 2009. Moreover, says the British Medical Association (BMA), “a three per cent pay uplift . . . does nothing to address years of pay erosion.” Junior doctors Sarah Hallett and Mike Kemp said in a BMA press release: With days spent on Covid wards with no end in sight, being redeployed into unfamiliar departments, wearing ill-fitting or non-existent PPE that left us fearing for our own safety and the safety of our patients, to be excluded from any additional reward is an extraordinary insult. Afshan Sharif has worked in the NHS for two years as a mental health nurse, and used to work in intensive care as a health care support worker. “The biggest problem is understaffing,” she told Jacobin, “There’s too much workload, which adds to the stress and people taking time off because they’re unwell physically and mentally. But we don’t have the budget, so . . . ” she trailed off. Sharif was hired during the peak of the pandemic to work in COVID wards, and although it was “emotionally draining,” she explains that her team were “so amazing that it didn’t feel so bad sometimes.” Sharif, being a recent addition to the NHS, didn’t experience conditions before the pandemic, but she does believe that staff have become burned-out, and she’s witnessed many people “leaving or switching to private because of it.” Although Sharif herself has not faced bullying akin to Shruti’s, she knows people who have been subject to racism. “I think a lot of black health care workers suffer the most. I’ve seen it, and try to speak out when I can. It’s definitely an issue.” The issue is exposed and interrogated, with a good dose of dark humor, in This Is Going to Hurt. In one episode, Tracey is subjected to racism from a patient who’d rather not have her tests handled by Tracey, a black nurse, or her baby delivered by Shruti, a South Asian doctor. This type of treatment isn’t uncommon for the 22 percent of NHS staff who are Black, Asian, and “minority ethnic.” Huntington says that one of the main issues currently facing the NHS is that “there isn’t the funding for more training places,” which he believes will “lead to a worse staffing crisis in about five to ten years’ time.” If he could change one thing, it would be “more money going into the right places.” Huntington adds: The service needs to be run at a loss. Obviously, the public needs value for their money, but you need to build redundancy in so that we have surge capacity for the next pandemic or winter crisis. If money is the bottom line, then people’s health becomes secondary. The truth is that public health is already taking a back seat to belt-tightening in the NHS. And although the truth can hurt sometimes, we have to face up to it if we want any chance of healing a wounded national health care system.
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Post by Admin on Feb 28, 2022 11:43:07 GMT
Mounting evidence of assessment crisis, as DWP halts WCA reassessments www.disabilitynewsservice.com/mounting-evidence-of-assessment-crisis-as-dwp-halts-wca-reassessments/Mounting evidence suggests a crisis within the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) systems that assess disabled people for their eligibility for benefits. Delays and backlogs across the assessment system have even led to DWP refusing to carry out any repeat work capability assessments (WCAs) for claimants already receiving universal credit (UC) who need a higher level of support. Disability News Service (DNS) reported earlier this month how DWP’s own figures showed a picture of significant delays and backlogs across the personal independence payment (PIP) assessment system. Now DNS has heard of serious backlogs within the WCA system, despite DWP’s refusal to publish official WCA figures for claimants claiming UC. Zeeta Osborn, from Hastings, has been waiting for a year for a new WCA, but has been told by DWP that it is not currently offering repeat assessments to those already receiving UC, and is only booking assessments for new claimants. This means that Osborn, whose health has deteriorated since her last assessment – which placed her in the limited capability for work (LCW) group, for those disabled people expected to move gradually towards the job market – is unable to work but is struggling to survive on the benefits she receives and sharp increases in the cost of living. Her original assessment, more than two years ago, looked only at her mental distress in the wake of her mother’s death, but did not examine the impact of her scoliosis, which has since worsened and means she is now unable to work due to “excruciating constant pain” in her back, legs and arms. She was told last week on her UC online journal – a message DNS has seen – that DWP “are still working on new claims and the reassessments will not be taking place for foreseeable”. Finn Keaney, welfare rights team lead for Mind in the City, Hackney and Waltham Forest, told DNS that one of their clients had been in the same situation as Osborn, and had been waiting for a year for a reassessment that would allow them to move from the LCW group to limited capability for work-related activity (LCWRA). This would entitle the client to a higher rate of support and less stringent conditions. He said his colleague had been informed by DWP staff that they were not currently reassessing people with LCW. He said: “We have noticed the beginnings of a trend wherein people who already have LCW are not being granted reassessments to determine whether they also have LCWRA. “The impact of this is that some long-term sick and disabled adults, in particular those whose health may have deteriorated over the course of the pandemic, are being denied access to additional financial support and reduced conditionality. “With COVID restrictions and COVID-specific support coming to an end it should not be impossible for the government to grant access to reassessments to those individuals who need them.” A discussion on the Rightsnet online forum last month raised the same issue, with one welfare rights expert describing how her client, in a similar situation to Osborn, had been told by DWP that “the dept is not currently undertaking WCA reviews due to the ongoing pandemic”. DWP continues to refuse to provide statistics that would show how many universal credit claimants have been put through the WCA process, how long they have had to wait for a WCA, and what level of benefit they received following their assessment. The minister for disabled people, Chloe Smith, told Labour’s Steve McCabe this week that DWP did not have figures showing how many claimants have been waiting longer than three months for a WCA. Another universal credit claimant, Barbara*, from Sussex, told DNS this week that she had been waiting for more than six weeks for a £7,000 backpayment that was now owed to her by DWP after she had been forced to wait nearly two years for a WCA. She said she was “really angry about the whole system”. She said: “I have been under so much financial and emotional stress, not eaten well, and got into debt over the two years. “I tried to claim PIP three years ago too but failed that, mostly due to not enough evidence. “I haven’t got the physical or emotional strength to go through that again. “There are many people being treated like this and it is so wrong. At 51, I could be dead before they pay out.” Meanwhile, there is also growing evidence of problems within the PIP assessment system. Rebecca* acts as an appointee for her disabled daughter Jane*. Jane finally had a PIP review assessment in January after eight months of DWP delays, mistakes and misinformation. But when she received a copy of her daughter’s assessment report, Rebecca realised it was seriously inaccurate and was likely to lead to her daughter losing her PIP support. Like many disabled people, her daughter experiences “overwhelming psychological distress” during the period of not knowing whether she will lose her support. Meanwhile, the Benefits and Work website reported this week that PIP renewals were “in a state of chaos”, with claimants “left terrified that their PIP is suddenly going to stop because a new decision has not been made by the time their award is due to end”. The website said evidence from its readers had made it clear that the PIP renewal system was “currently badly broken”. The main cause, it said, appeared to be a rise in the number of new PIP claims and a decision by DWP “to prioritise these over existing claims, but without any effort to explain what is happening and give claimants a written extension to their award”. But the website did say that it had not yet heard of any cases in which a PIP award had been stopped due to a failure to make a new decision. DWP had not commented by noon today (Thursday). *Not their real names
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Post by Admin on Mar 6, 2022 0:45:57 GMT
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Post by Admin on Mar 13, 2022 13:20:17 GMT
PIP backlog has more than trebled in five years By John Pring on 10th March 2022 Category: Benefits and Poverty www.disabilitynewsservice.com/pip-backlog-has-more-than-trebled-in-five-years/New figures have shown how the backlog of disabled people waiting for a personal independence payment (PIP) assessment has more than trebled in the last five years. The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) figures, secured by Disability News Service (DNS) through a freedom of information (FOI) request, shows there are now more than 310,000 people waiting for an assessment. The size of the queue was 88,500 in October 2016 but this had risen to nearly 312,000 by December 2021. The unpublished figures, which DWP stressed had not been “quality assured” to official statistics publication standards, confirmed that the backlog had begun rising steeply far before the pandemic began in early 2020. The number of cases held with PIP assessment providers Capita and Atos was about 89,000 in October 2017 but by October 2018 it had risen to nearly 134,000, before rising again to about 143,000 in October 2019. After about six months of the pandemic, it had risen to 189,000, and by November 2021 it had reached 295,000. Just a month later, the backlog had risen again, to 311,870. Only last month, DNS reported how growing evidence suggested disabled people were facing significant and increasing delays and backlogs in the PIP system. Chloe Smith, the minister for disabled people, told Labour’s Ian Lavery in September that the pandemic had caused “distortion” and that “work is ongoing to manage the recovery”. Vicky Foxcroft, Labour’s shadow minister for disabled people, said: “This government has long promised to fix the problematic assessment system; this FOI is yet more damning evidence of their failure to act. “Disabled people deserve so much more than long waits for assessments, which we know lead to unnecessary stress and financial hardship. “It’s about time ministers fixed the assessment system. “A Labour government would put disabled people at the heart of the system and ensure they’re treated with respect and provided with security.” A DWP spokesperson declined to say why Chloe Smith thinks the backlog has risen so steeply, whether she is concerned by the increase, and what steps she is taking to reduce it. But the spokesperson said in a statement: “We closely monitor the progress of cases awaiting assessment and take all steps possible to ensure claimants are assessed in the most efficient way to ensure they get the support they are entitled to as quickly as possible. “This includes the use of face-to-face, paper-based, telephone and video appointments.”
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