Atos Work Capability Assessments

Debate between Pamela Nash and Caroline Lucas

Thursday 17th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Pamela Nash (Airdrie and Shotts) (Lab)]

Nothing has shocked me more as the Member of Parliament for Airdrie and Shotts than the sheer scale of anxiety and hardship caused by the flawed work capability assessments, which is apparent in the number of people visiting my office every week. I am sure that that experience is replicated across the House and that we will hear many such stories today. I have had a frail lady sitting in my office who had only recently finished chemotherapy but had been told she was fit for work. I have had a lady who suffered 90% burns to her body—she spends every day in severe pain—and was told that she was now ready to join the Work programme. I could list hundreds of others—sadly, these are very familiar stories. These people are having their lives ruined by a system that was designed to support them.

Last year the whole country came together to celebrate the Paralympic games. I have to say that the vast majority of the country joined those booing in the Olympic park when the Chancellor took the spotlight, but he was not the only unpopular person at the games. Atos’s sponsorship was also widely condemned, leading to protests throughout the country, including by our very own Team GB. Unfortunately, the Scottish Government have not listened to the Scottish people on this. In fact, our Deputy First Minister has welcomed Atos’s sponsorship of the Commonwealth games next year. She has tried to wriggle out of it by saying that Atos is only carrying out the will of the UK Government. However, the Scottish people disagree not only with the structure of these work capability assessments but with the incompetence with which they are being carried out.

As I have such limited time today, I will restrict the rest of my comments to the recording of work capability assessments, which I have raised before on the Floor of the House. I know that there has been a pilot of recording work capability assessments as a result of Harrington review. The result was that the majority of those being assessed do not wish to have their assessments recorded. However, recording should continue to be offered to everyone being assessed, and the reason for doing this—the huge number of assessments whose results are overruled when they go to appeal—should also be explained to every claimant.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

The hon. Lady is making a powerful case. Does she agree that the Atos assessment process is not only humiliating and demeaning for those involved—and often plain wrong—but counter-productive, in the sense that it adds to the stress they are under, making sick people even sicker?

[Pamela Nash]

I thank the hon. Lady for that contribution. I am sure she has had the experience, as I have, of seeing people who have claimed employment and support allowance as a result of a physical disability or illness ending up with mental health problems owing to the stress of going through the system.