Sad News: Andy Campbell

Hi everyone

I’m afraid I have the sad news to share that Andy Campbell passed away peacefully this weekend, following a battle with cancer in the last year.

Andy worked at Greenwich WRS for over a decade, and before that had a long career at Kent County Council as a social worker and then welfare rights adviser. I know that he is very well known across the advice sector, highly regarded and was such a lovely person.

Andy had an incredible sense of justice and DWP staff members still have bruises from his sharp elbows in pursuit of the right outcome for his clients. He was strongly involved in highlighting the weaknesses in DWP safeguards, and more recently was successful with the case leading to the Parliamentary Ombudsman recommendations for compensation for IB to ESA claimants. Andy provided his own summary of the case here: https://www.rightsnet.org.uk/forums/viewthread/5928/P435/#85052
It was a lot of fun watching the press attention that day, in Andy’s words it was better than Christmas!

As @Jo_Smith also puts in this thread, he absolutely was one of the hero’s in the welfare rights world.

If anyone would like to know the details of the funeral arrangements, when known, please contact me at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

Thanks
Corin

Oh no, that’s really sad news Corin, Andy had been doing welfare rights for ever and a lovely bloke as well.

Thoughts and condolences to his family, friends and Greenwich WRU.

I am very sorry to hear that Andy has died. Over the years we helped each other out sharing opinions on various welfare benefits cases and what might be the best approach on sometimes complicated matters. His opinions were consistently insightful and positive. If a case did not go his way, Andy could be very determined, and would go the extra mile for his clients. His recent Ombudsman case is a good example of that. On a personal level, I always found Andy to be most caring and supportive. A client of Andy’s would always be in safe hands, which is about the best you can say about a welfare rights adviser. All the best to you Andy. X

Really sad news - Andy was a lovely bloke and a fantastic welfare rights adviser - a huge loss.

Condolences to all his friends and family.