Work Capability Assessments Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Work and Pensions
Tommy Sheppard
Main Page: Tommy Sheppard (Scottish National Party - Edinburgh East)Department Debates - View all Tommy Sheppard's debates with the Department for Work and Pensions
(6 years, 4 months ago)
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David Linden
I am grateful to the hon. Lady and will come back to how the assessments are conducted, because that forms a major part of my speech.
At this juncture, I want to commend to the House the excellent report by Rethink Mental Illness entitled “It’s broken her”. It was published just last week and makes truly harrowing reading. The report lays bare the full extent of the challenges for people with mental illness when facing assessments for both ESA and PIP. Drawing on findings from a series of interviews and focus group-style discussions, the report finds that the assessment can be “traumatising and anxiety-inducing” for the following reasons: there are numerous issues with the paper forms that claimants must submit, including their complexity and length, and the inflexible nature of the questions they ask; claimants must collect their own medical evidence, which is extremely burdensome, often expensive and time-consuming; the staff who perform face-to-face assessments frequently have a poor understanding of mental illness; and, finally, delays in mandatory reconsideration and appeals to the tribunal mean that claimants may have to wait many months for the correct result.
The report concludes that the current PIP and ESA assessment procedure
“inherently discriminates against people with mental illnesses”.
It sets out a number of policy recommendations to
“dramatically improve the benefits system for people with mental illnesses, as well as saving the Government the vast costs that are currently incurred due to persistent incorrect decisions made early in the process.”
Tommy Sheppard (Edinburgh East) (SNP)
My hon. Friend is making a powerful case. May I bring to his attention the case of my constituent, Adam Brown, a 51-year-old man who suffers from epilepsy and cerebral palsy and has a learning disability? By the time Adam came to see me, he had been trying to get a work capability assessment for nine months with the assistance of benefit agencies, and had not got it. We had to intervene and got it within 10 months. It is surely shocking that it takes the intervention of a Member of Parliament for people with disabilities to get fair treatment.
David Linden
My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. I am glad that his office was able to help on that occasion, as mine was in the case of my constituent David Stewart. It is all well and good that as Members of Parliament we can intervene in individual cases, but so many people are affected throughout the entire process that our being able to help on a one-off basis is not good enough.