Dispatches: Britain on The Sick

[45002]

On those hidden cameras been used,i can see ATOFF wanting to do strip seachs next

[carcrazy]

i cant see how it lowers the welfare bill as if people are sick and ill will be forced to apply for job seekers and have to tell lies that there fit for work

 

iv a tribuneral to go to in 2 weeks time i would be aswell canceling it , and applying for jobseekers

 

im waiting on another operation to fuse wrist as im in pain and have little movement

 

so i will look forward to getting a job with one hand i can use ,

[antone]

i cant see how it lowers the welfare bill as if people are sick and ill will be forced to apply for job seekers and have to tell lies that there fit for work

 

iv a tribuneral to go to in 2 weeks time i would be aswell canceling it , and applying for jobseekers

 

im waiting on another operation to fuse wrist as im in pain and have little movement

 

so i will look forward to getting a job with one hand i can use ,

 

(Bolding mine)

 

Please think very carefully before doing this. Plenty of people win at tribunals. What would you gain from withdrawing your appeal?

[antone]

I think from what I understood, that he had his assessment prior to his hospitalisation, and just received the results of that while in hospital - whether they filled in the correct paperwork for him once in hospital is another matter. I think the point they were making is that at the time of the assessment he was so ill with the stress that it caused him to be hospitalised - calling into question his assessment.

 

You're probably right. I just dislike misleading or confusing information. It does seem clear that a person who is sectioned shortly after an assessment finding him fit for work most likely should not have been found fit for work in any fair and just system.

[worried33]

You're probably right. I just dislike misleading or confusing information. It does seem clear that a person who is sectioned shortly after an assessment finding him fit for work most likely should not have been found fit for work in any fair and just system.

 

if thats true I was misleading sorry although your point seems valid to me.

[RaeUK]

... I won't name this person ...

 

I read your post, Erika, with an ever increasing amount of sympathy for this poor person. Not to mention empathy. The more I read, the more I realised we were in pretty much the same boat and I knew exactly what she was going through. It was only later that I realised you might have been talking about me! If so, and I really hope I am the only one in my particular situation, always feel free to identify me. I would hope that, whilst it is increasingly difficult financially, at least people can see that there is some sort of option in 'failure', that if you are ill stand your ground and show that JSA is not an answer.

 

I've just watched the Panorama programme and will catch the other probably tomorrow. It must have been filmed quite a while ago as the benefit rates sounded slightly low. Not unnaturally, I felt for the guy with emphysema and recognised a lot of me in there.

I didn't think it was a bad programme but it just reminded me of a little while ago when we had a similar thing on tv. I remember watching Danny Alexander saying in a programme what a disgrace it all was and how he would fight tooth and nail to right the wrongs forced upon the sick and disabled. Or words to that effect. I wonder how he's getting along with that ...

[worried33]

Didn't know that, Antone. I knew that inpatients were exempt from the assessment though.

 

I have to admit that I Understand Grayling saying that we shouldn't just leave people on sickness benefits for years. But at the same time, they're going the wrong way about it. Sending people for assessments with long-term incurable conditions is pointless.

 

Talking from personal experience, there seems to be next to no help helping disabled people back into work. I think this is what's needed. I know many disabled people who want to work and don't want to claim benefits; but there's no help at all for them out there. The work programme has been no help at all. Especially as in my case, they decided they know my disabilities better than I and my consultants do.

 

I do agree with you.

 

I see absolutely nothing wrong with giving help to those who want it, training, specialised job searches for people with specific conditions and so on, and key is it should be voluntary only so people's stress levels never go up and cause relapse. What they dont seem to understand is that these WFI's are not help, they just merely serve as an annoyance to make people be hostile to the DWP.

 

The issue is the forced work activity, the overly harsh WCA, legislation not been followed, far too frequent reassessments etc. Of course also the refusal to accept that work is not a cure and actually in many cases will make people more sick and possibly kill them. In some cases it may make people think better about themselves doing work, but it isnt going to cure their illness as they keep portraying.

[antone]

Rae, I'm pretty sure Erika was talking about you.

 

And you're right that these TV programmes are of limited effectiveness, it was just refreshing to see two (on the same night, no less) that actually dealt with some of the real problems with the system, and the human cost of those problems, without resorting to "Scroungers!!!!!" type rhetoric. I liked the BBC approach in that they did, in fact, identify a couple of obvious cheats and then point out that there are hardly any such people - half of one percent was the figure they gave, IIRC.

[RaeUK]

I agree entirely about the programme on BBC, antone. Reading my post again it sounded a little cynical. I'm glad you picked up on that 0.5% figure as it lodged in my mind also and I suspect I'll be quoting it often!

 

I think you may also be right on your first point. Very kind of her ...

[fightingback99]

Think the programme which showed the GP who filmed his ATOS assessor training gave quite an insight into this.

 

He was being trained by someone whose medical qualification wasn't recognised in the UK. So she could only work for ATOS. His instructor emphasised

 

- the assessment is designed to get people off benefits.

- the need for bilateral loss of function in upper arms/hands meant this descriptor was near impossible to pass.

- sight/hearing impaired people's grasp of braille/lip reading didn't need to be very good, as long as they could understand simple phrases like - Fire

- ability to push a button with 1 finger meant nil points for that descriptor , in Utopia a job existed for someone who could do that.

- it was DWP who set the criteria, ATOS just carried out the test to their guidelines. Pass the buck time.

- Fortunately there was no comeback, or blame apportioned to any of the assessors if they got the assessment wrong and it was overturned at Tribunal. After all they were only asking basic DWP approved questions in a 20 minute assessment.

- If an assessor passed more than a % of claimants his work would be closely audited as there was no room for manoevre on the part of the assessor.

 

And did anyone else think Chris Grayling looked decidedly shifty when he said he categorically denied there had been any targets set by either DWP or ATOS.

 

Quite shocking and just confirms what so many who have been let down by this process say about this system.

[osdset]

I didn't think it was a bad programme but it just reminded me of a little while ago when we had a similar thing on tv. I remember watching Danny Alexander saying in a programme what a disgrace it all was and how he would fight tooth and nail to right the wrongs forced upon the sick and disabled. Or words to that effect. I wonder how he's getting along with that

Mr Alexander sold his fake principles out when he gained a place in the cabinet with all the perks that go with it, he now supports the governments stance on welfare. He dumped on his constituents and the rest of those on ESA for a bag of silver just like they all do.

 

I listened to Grayling's comments on Dispatches last night with some interest, 'tough love' as though the government is a concerned mother keeping her wayward children locked in the bedroom, 'languishing' is another favorite of his, claimants are all festering couch potatoes living the life of Riley on the huge fortnightly handouts they receive.

What he failed to grasp, and consistently fails to grasp is that WRAG does absolutely nothing to further a claimants prospects for employment, unless mandatory work experience counts, there is no training, there are no funds, and there is no future at least as far as the Work Programme is concerned.

 

The undercover filming by Dr Bick of his training with ATOS was a bit of an eye opener, what do we make of the Eastern European mentor who confessed that her 'specialism' was not recognised here, and was 'married' to ATOS? Is she typical of the staff ATOS are employing, doctors that cannot get a position actually administering care to people so choose to work for a company whose agenda is benefit denial?

In her own words the system is 'toxic', some of the other HCP's expressed concern that they could do nothing to assist deserving cases that did not score enough points, well I have a suggestion for these faux caring and concerned individuals, get a job elsewhere if their qualifications are up to scratch and they care so much, I suggest that the only reason they are working for ATOS is because they are pond life at the bottom of the food chain.

[speedfreek]

- it was DWP who set the criteria, ATOS just carried out the test to their guidelines. Pass the buck time

 

You need to really stare down the hole and start realising that it takes two to tango. It's a contract that both parties negotiate and have to fully agree on. So.... who is the monkey and who is the organ grinder? Well the organ grinder is neither as it is UNUM backed by the insurance companies. The monkeys get; jobs and jollies galore for MPs and ATOS is on a promise of a very lucrative new market to break into.

 

Get your tinfoil hats on and read this thread http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=4095693

 

The problem with all these new initiatives (the prime example is Work Program) is the black box approach i.e. we don't care what goes in, what happens in the box, only what comes out. As there's no regulation of what goes on in the box, contracts are awarded on cost and you can bet your bottom dollar, that it will be the lowest form of help if any. What goes on is (as we see with the WCA and WP) then shrouded in the complete carp that is contractual confidentiality and the removal of the right for private individuals/organisations to scrutinise it with for example FOI requests.

 

Last night was a start but we can't take break. We need to keep up the pressure and keep this issue in the spot light. If we don't then some firemen will be on the news saving a cat up a tree and the fickle public will not care when the anti disabled propaganda machine kicks back in.

[Dilizjo]

After watching the BBCs Panorama program last year that stereotyped claimants of ESA and DLA as fraudsters, I was pleasantly surprised with last night's program, which in my opinion gave good evidence that the WCA is definitely not fit for purpose. Even Professor Harrington expressed his concerns at the horrendous consequences. As for Chris "I will answer your question by smiling at you whilst I lie through my teeth" Grayling, what can I say? the man himself is not fit for purpose! If going out to work will cure me please find me an employer who will employ me, bearing in mind I suffer Rheumatoid Arthritis, COPD and chronic Pustical Psorasis, which means constant pain, breathlessness, mobility issues and chronic fatigue.

 

I also watched the Dispatches program which did indeed confirm what all us victims of the system already knew. I was extremely disturbed that 50% of the assessments that the GP carried out were returned to him to lower the score, if that doesn't make ATOS guilty of fraud, I don't know what does:(

 

Whilst both programs were IMHO very good and a large leap in the right direction, there were important issues left out.

 

1. They did not cover the number of appointments cancelled by them at very short notice due to lack of assessors and other ATOS issues.
   
2. They did not mention the inaccessibility of a lot of the centres.
   
3. They did not mention the long waits in the waiting rooms that most claimants suffer even after being told to arrive 10 mins early.
   
4. They did not mention the right by a claimant to have their assessment recorded and the lack of information provided by both DWP and ATOS on this issue alone.
   

These are just a few in a long line of issues that need addressing.

 

I will be very interested in reading the comments posted on both programs sites.

[Gbarbm]

Why is it that this country has the highest percentage rate of population that 'claim' sickness & disablility in Europe?

 

We are not at all a healthy breed!

 

I can't answer for the rest of the country, but in the South Wales valleys where I was brought up and was actually nursing on the medical ward at the local hospital in my teens/early twenties, the wards were full of coal miners with debilitating chest/heart problems directly caused by working underground.

Just to give you some idea (and I'm not saying this to cause offence or upset - merely to illustrate a point) I had to obtain a sputum specimen from one miner and it was so viscous I had to cut it with a pair of scissors to get it in the sputum pot to send to the lab.

These men had worked all their lives, paying tax and NI, in some of the worst conditions imaginable; so when most of the mines were closed and cheap coal was imported from abroad, these men were left with no where to go and would have been too ill to go there anyway due to the chest diseases they were suffering from such as Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) Emphysema, Pneumoconiosis etc.

Edited July 31, 2012 by Gbarbm
spelling error

[osdset]

These men had worked all their lives, paying tax and NI, in some of the worst conditions imaginable; so when most of the mines were closed and cheap coal was imported from abroad, these men were left with no where to go and would have been too ill to go there anyway due to the chest diseases they were suffering from such as Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) Emphysema, Pneumoconiosis etc.

I have COPD which was caused partly by smoking and partly by breathing in tons of dust over the years on Building sites, in fact I'm surprised I haven't got asbestosis due to the amount of grey asbestos sheeting we used to cut by hand, the industry wised up to asbestos and brought in asbestolux and superlux as replacements, these have vermiculite as a fire retardant additive which is frankly just as dangerous.

I only have myself to blame for any damage smoking caused, the rest I place squarely on past employers and ignorance of the health risks at the time, despite being a wheezing wreck at times, whose day to day mobility and comfort is only guaranteed by the use of medication for the rest of my life, ATOS have decided that I am fit to return to work as a carpenter, the irony is no firm in the country would put up with how slow I have now become and frankly I would not blame them.

[debt4get]

ah yes, but you could push the mythical button job!!!

[debt4get]

on the BBC this morning

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-19048294

'benefit cheats' colour attitude towards the disabled...like we already didnt know that!!!

[Gbarbm]

I have COPD which was caused partly by smoking and partly by breathing in tons of dust over the years on Building sites, in fact I'm surprised I haven't got asbestosis due to the amount of grey asbestos sheeting we used to cut by hand, the industry wised up to asbestos and brought in asbestolux and superlux as replacements, these have vermiculite as a fire retardant additive which is frankly just as dangerous.

I only have myself to blame for any damage smoking caused, the rest I place squarely on past employers and ignorance of the health risks at the time, despite being a wheezing wreck at times, whose day to day mobility and comfort is only guaranteed by the use of medication for the rest of my life, ATOS have decided that I am fit to return to work as a carpenter, the irony is no firm in the country would put up with how slow I have now become and frankly I would not blame them.

 

And thats it exactly, they can say anyone is fit for work but if the employer won't take you on because youre always taking time off for appointments or falling ill or like you say being slow because of mobility problems then what are you supposed to do!

It really makes my blood boil and I have no doubt in years to come, people will read about all this and wonder how the government and Atos et al ever got away with it!

[Nystagmite]

- sight/hearing impaired people's grasp of braille/lip reading didn't need to be very good, as long as they could understand simple phrases like - Fire

 

The problem with Braille is that you have to finger read. Unlike large print, where you might be able to read it from a few feet away. It means you have to be right next to the sign to know what it says. How can you when you have no idea where this sign is?

 

And thats it exactly, they can say anyone is fit for work but if the employer won't take you on because youre always taking time off for appointments

 

I think this is the problem many disabled people have. They want to work; but can't find an employer who will allow them to take a lot of time off when they need it. It's going to cost them money for SSP (I think they can claim this back?) and then to find someone willing to cover the disabled persons' shift.

[debt4get]

the govt have per usual gone about this the way they have gone about everything...arse backwards..it is all very well telling the sick, and disabled to get a job, but actually finding the employers prepared to take you on is a completely different kettle of fish.

until there is a sea change in this country, where the disabled are actually looked on as a resource, instead of a drain, then nothing will change.

getting a job is hard enough for abled bodied, never mind the disabled, they fail to understand that the disabled need more resources in order to enter the job market and stay there, no employer is going to spend their own money in order to employ someone, who by the very nature of their disability makes it more likelier to have to time off, because they are ill, or have hospital appointments, need special equipment, etc etc...

it is all very well chris grayling, smiling away and telling the country, that everyone should have a job and work...we would all like to bloody work chris!! but a level playing field is never going to happen under these muppets

[debt4get]

i though the 'trainer from atos' first statement was the most telling....'i work for atos because my qualifications are NOT recognised in UK'

and these are the very people who we the sick and disabled are 'relying' on to give a 'fair' assessment, and even if they did, as the doctor showed, they are told to 'alter' the number of points given, whilst atos blame the dwp, and the dwp deny it 'tail, dog, wag'

[doktorjohn]

The programs have made me realise how hopeless I feel for myself and all the others who are affected.

 

I'm to be migrated within 6 months and I have no chance of getting ESA or earning enough money in a job.

 

They haven't just moved the goalposts, they have buried the goalposts.

 

The Danny Alexander thing highlights the hopelessness I feel about politicians.

 

PS. Dr Bick was my doctor for years but I switched because he wouldn't prescribe anything strong; but he knew I was a recovering addict so I'll let him off.

It's funny cos I had him down as a right-wing toff when he's more of a left-wing toff. (No offence meant by the word toff in this instance).

[frank_begbie]

You have to think about the long term plan here. Keep moving the goalposts until EVERYONE is off benefits!

[Nystagmite]

That's what they want. By doing that, they're hoping we'll all die. Many of us will die when we're old like everyone else. This will also cost the NHS money and I'm sure many will turn to crime.

[osdset]

The Danny Alexander thing highlights the hopelessness I feel about politicians.

I have met a couple over the years, both Labour MP's namely Stephen Timms, and Tony Banks, I won't speak about Timms too much as he is still alive and I would probably get done for libel, but suffice to say that he has had a sudden ' road to Damascus' moment, divine intervention if you like, he now feels he can join Glenda Jackson in a combined assault on Grayling, which is laughable really as Grayling regards him as a lanky buffoon without any credibility whatever, and to be fair he is probably right, where big guns are concerned Timms has a pea shooter.

 

As for Tony Banks, what a self serving individual he turned out to be, forever banging on about the working class struggle, yet the first one with his snout in the trough, I remember when Labour won the election and Blair had to make Banks a cabinet minister as reward for his loyal service to the Labour party, he could not have Banksy banging on about his pet hates and uber left wing rhetoric so he made him minister for sport, which was a master stroke, it promoted him and kneecapped him at the same time, no one gave a toss about some idiot rambling on about sport in the commons.

A good example of Tony Bank's 'finger on the pulse' of his local community was a sixth form presentation at my son's old school, bear in mind that the majority of the kids there were dyed in the wool Hammers fans, Banks gets up on stage as the honoured guest and before launching into his speech starts banging on about his favorite team Chelsea! Needless to say he was booed off the stage.

Edited July 31, 2012 by osdset