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2nd PIP Appeal assessor for PIP contradicts Assessors findings on LCWRA

Crosslight Welfare Rights Manager
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Welfare Rights Crosslight London

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Joined: 28 January 2022

Hi All

I am assisting a client with her sons PIP appeal (second time they have had to go to tribunal) PIP was disallowed as assessor stated the claimant coped well with the assessment and doesn’t need prompting etc.. However in the appeal bundle I find the LCWRA assessment report, where an assessor directly contradicts the findings of the PIP assessors report.  Clearly stating the claimant struggled greatly with the assessment and history and evidence shows the client needs prompting, support and supervision with all activities.

Am I right in thinking there was some caselaw or rule about one departments decision being upheld by another or something like that?  Or should I just point out the hypocrisy of these two separate assessments?

Tim Saint
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Benefits Service Coordinator, Swindon Carers Centre

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Hi there there is this one asking tribunals to consider ESA assessment:
[2018] UKUT 216 (AAC)CPIP/1055/2018,

also SF V SSWP (PIP) [2016] UKUT 543 (AAC) and HA v SSWP (PIP) [2018] UKUT 56 (AAC) saying it is people’s ability to engage socially that is being tested, not the ability to engage with a health care professional.

On an anecdotal note, it happens so often that “they were able to engage with the health professional” is brought up, but no analysis of whether the person was stressed for days before or exhausted afterwards, or even that they needed someone with them for support.

Va1der
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Welfare Rights Officer with SWAMP Glasgow

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Different HCPs take different views based on their experience and on how the claimant presents on the day. In principle there’s nothing wrong with that.

The ESA decision/assessment will just form part of the evidence before the panel that they should take into account when making their decision.
That information doesn’t transfer directly to PIP, as the descriptors are different, but it sounds like it will support your client’s own/other evidence.
As in the case Tim cites, the tribunal shouldn’t ignore it (or generally any evidence, for that matter), though they can give grounds for why they assign it less weight than other evidence. 

Do you have access to the previous PIP tribunal’s decision? If their health hasn’t changed considerably, that might be more directly relevant.

Elliot Kent
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Shelter

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It’s all just evidence pointing in different directions. The Tribunal has to weigh it all up. There is no magic bullet.

There is something of a tactical choice to be made about how to approach the reports. One approach is simply to suggest that the two reports, completed at similar times for similar purposes by similarly trained people, basically cancel one another out insofar as it isn’t really possible to place any weight on either report when the core findings are contradictory. Another would be to suggest reasons why the WCA report might in fact be the better and more reliable one, for example because it has been prepared by a mental health nurse..

Certainly I think you are entitled to say, as Va1der suggests, that the new PIP report is somewhat incongruent with both the WCA report and the previous FtT decision.

Tom B (WRAMAS)
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WRAMAS - Bristol City Council

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Agree with all the above.

Was the PIP assessment significantly shorter than the WCA one? Was the WCA in person and PIP over phone? Just a couple of thoughts as to arguments that could help a Tribunal weigh the evidence gathered in the WCA more favourably…