Guardian news story re: WCA

Interesting story from the Guardian society section. Gentleman attended WCA. Despite pretty serious health problems was awarded zero points. Gentleman died shortly afterwards as a result of health problems. Article doesn’t really show ATOS in a good light. Link to story is: http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/jul/24/atos-case-study-larry-newman

The sad thing (from a welfare rights point of view) is that I am not surprised.

“The report says that Mr Newman’s pulse was fine, that he had no scars on his chest and that he managed to climb on to the examination bed without any problem. Mrs Newman says that her husband did not get on to the examination bed, that his pulse was not taken, and that the assesser did not look at his chest, otherwise he would have seen scars.”

A very familiar paragraph to me and i’m sure to many WELFS - i’m sick of complaining and nothing changing.

No surprises there, no doubt there are hundreds (if not thousands) of similar stories. The sick and disabled deserve better.

Re: Nicky’s post ” A very familiar paragraph to me and i’m sure to many WELFS - i’m sick of complaining and nothing changing.”

I completely agree with all the posts on here regarding the ATOS medical assessments.  I wondered about raising the possibility of people writing to their local surgeries to see what their take on it.  It’s a potentially powerful lobbying voice; - after all it is the GP’s who generally sign their patients off as either unable to work or able to do some work within the limitation boxes on the MED 3 Fit Note.  I am compiling a long article on Mylegal.org.uk and have used some of the material from Rightsnet (always giving credit to show the source of the info).  The principle article I’m working on currently is ‘Welfare Reform - A Car Crash’.  But more topical to this thread is how we are still collecting case studies of people helped by Legal Aid / welfare benefit specialists.  These will be used to good effect.

It would be helpful if anyone has any experience as a legal aid provider of any clients affected by these dire ATOS assessments to give some consideration to posting an article either on here and I’ll copy it in or directly on the Mylegal post; - full mention will be given to the author and Rightsnet ofcourse. 

I agree that there is a sense of hopelessness over what we can do, but believe we should press on and use our collective voice to build up all the evidence we can gather.  The welfare reforms are getting a rough ride in certain quarters and as always it’s powerful real life stories which make people sit up and take notice.  The trouble is MP’s are making decisions of political allegiance, rather than out of any sense of humanity for those in their constituencies.

Link.

http://mylegal.org.uk/index.cgi?action=display&board=frontline&thread=405&page=2

It occured to me that it wouldn ‘t be a bad idea to run a presentation of the impact welfare reform will have upon the community, despite putting a lot into preparing for it and getting the right venue; - the stark reality is very few turned up.  It doesn’t deter me from trying again but it does ilustrate how people feel either resigned or disinterested in it all.

It’s a shame because clients are really getting a battering and I wonder what on earth they will do when avenues of help are withdrawn. 

Nickd
Mylegal.org.uk
Staff member