15,000 People Have Now Supported the WOW Petition

Since it was launched just five weeks ago, the WOW Petition has now exceeded...

 15,000 signatures!

Thank you so much for supporting this vitally important petition. Please sign and share widely with everyone you know.

http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/43154

We need to reach 100,000 signatures urgently to call for a cumulative impact assessment of all the cuts and changes affecting sick and disabled people, their families and carers.

Pat's Petition Taking WOW Signatures To Meeting With Liam Byrne

From CarerWatch:-

Before Christmas we mentioned that Liam Byrne had suggested meeting with him to talk about an Opposition Day debate to request a cumulative impact assessment. Arranging diaries hasn’t been the easiest of tasks, especially with the christmas holidays in the way. But we now have a date.

Five of us will be heading for Westminster on 6th February to meet with Liam Byrne 

We can feel the start of a change of mood as people awaken to the individual impacts of the changes. More groups are protesting, more people are using social media sites to air their fears and concerns. There has been an unanticipated emphasis on Welfare Reform as tbe Benefits Uprating Bill makes its way through Parliament.

The Bedroom Tax is beginning to worry tenants as their landlords get in touch with them.

People are more familiar with terms like ‘Personal Independence Payment’ and ‘Universal Credit’ if not with ‘Employment Support Allowance’ and its two groups. Their sponsorship of the Paralympics means that everyone has now heard of Atos. Local authorities are making public decisions and we are hearing about the difficult decisions to cut vital services.

We are seeing language change to include ‘strivers’ as well as ‘scroungers’ but we’re still not convinced that the media gets the full picture for disabled people, their carers and families. This is why we need a Cumulative Impact Assessment, and it is what we will take to our talk with Liam: issues that are important to you, the 62,703 people who signed Pat’s Petition and all the people who have since said they would have signed it if they’d understood.
 

Please keep contacting your MPs, details here. Send them details of how the changes are impacting on you now.

Sign the new WoW petition by Francesca Martinez. You can read more about the WoW group here

We must all keep on keeping on.

Pat

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Pat has also said she will be taking WOW petition's signatures with them to the meeting along with those of Pat's Petition. Showing how the strength of feeling is increasing.

WOW commends MP's for exposing WCA, Condemns government for rejecting democratic scrutiny

In the House of Commons on Thursday the Back Bench Business Committee called for the Department of Work and Pensions to “park” Work Capability Assessments and the company that administers them, ATOS, “on one side and to move off in a different direction”. Full transcript here. Michael Meacher MP (Oldham West) who secured this debate, summed it up as following:

Mr Michael Meacher (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab):

I cannot remember attending such a compelling and powerful debate, combining passion, analysis and a very powerful demand for radical reform. It is absolutely clear that the consensus of the whole House is that the current Atos system has failed irretrievably and needs to be replaced by a wholly new and fair system.

During the course of the debate many comments were made by MP’s which highlighted the many issues constituents had faced when negotiating this process, including the following.

Natascha Engel (North East Derbyshire) (Lab):

The fault lies not with Atos, but with its employer, which, in this case, is the Department for Work and Pensions. When we look at the other employers for which Atos works, such as Royal Mail and the NHS, we see numerous cases of people who have been signed off work—not just their current work, but for any work ever again, with a recommendation that they be retired from all kinds of work—going back to Atos, but this time when it is employed by the DWP, and being assessed as entirely fit for work. They get no points and are deemed fit for work. As my right hon. Friend said, the number of people who are not just not fit for work but who die after being assessed as fit for work, is a reflection not of Atos but of the DWP. That is where the questions need to be asked.

Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green):

…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?

Dr Eilidh Whiteford (Banff and Buchan) (SNP):

Finally, I want to say a quick word about the situation facing people with serious mental health problems and long-term fluctuating conditions. There is a world of difference between being potentially fit for work, given the right support, and being an attractive prospect to a potential employer. The elephant in the Chamber today is the fact that many employers will think very long and hard before taking on a member of staff with a serious long-term or fluctuating health condition.

Heather Wheeler (South Derbyshire) (Con):

One of my early letters to a previous Minister asked about the point when we say that the system is not working; frankly, I have not had an adequate reply. When someone drops down dead within three months of being assessed as being perfectly capable of going back to work, what is the review process for Atos?

Guto Bebb (Aberconwy) (Con):

I do not think it is necessarily wrong, harsh or unreasonable to say that people who could work should be supported into work, but we need to do that in a way which recognises the dignity of individuals going through the system. Despite my support for the welfare changes that this Government are making, the examples that I have seen in my own constituency surgery leave a lot to be desired. We should not throw out the baby with the bathwater, but we need to make sure that the recommendations that have been made time after time are implemented as soon as possible. We owe that to the constituents we represent.

John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab):

Someone said that what we are debating is a party political issue. Let me be clear: I opposed the system when it was introduced by the last Government and I oppose it now—for the same reason. I see it as a brutal attack on the weakest and most vulnerable individuals in our society and an exercise by private companies to profiteer at those individuals’ expense.

Stephen Gilbert (St Austell and Newquay) (LD):

None of us can underestimate or undervalue the human effect that some of these assessments are having. I would like to read into the record an e-mail I received from a constituent. It is probably similar to e-mails that all hon. Members have received. It reads:
“They never asked about the amount of pain I have to contend with or how tired I get from coping with it. After the interview I was told I was to be disallowed ESA benefit. I could probably go down the route of appeal but I really don’t feel like fighting for a benefit that I have already been made to feel that I do not deserve, neither do I have the energy”
to appeal. If we in this House cannot give voice to these people, who are some of the most vulnerable in our society, I really do not know what we are for.

In Summing the debate up Michael Meacher concluded:

Mr Michael Meacher (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab):

This issue is a test of the Government’s accountability to the House. In my opinion, the incontrovertible message conveyed by today’s debate is that until the Government and the DWP listen to, and act on, the unanimous view that has been expressed today—I have never seen such unanimity across the Benches—and introduce a wholly different system, the House will not let the matter go.

The WOWpetition(wowpetition.com) supports these statements and calls for:

'An immediate end to the Work Capability Assessment, as voted for by the British Medical Association'

Our position can be summarised by the following:

The government doesn’t have to beat us up to get us to work. We all want full lives, but it is critical to our health to respect our limitations.

The government not only fails to respect limitations confirmed by the NHS it forces us onto a job market where millions already cannot find work.

The DWP & ATOS together with for-profit ‘training’ companies force us into work without any medical exam to determine what we can realistically do without worsening our condition or what reasonable accommodations we need in order to be able to do it, endangering our health without realistic prospect of improving our job chances.

The current ATOS administered Work Capability Assessment system was developed in consultation with private health corporations at the same time some were being fined for fraud in disallowing medical treatment in the US. The government is demonising sick and disabled people, imposing unreasonable expectations on them, starving them by denial of benefits and driving them to suicide by removing all hope, self-respect and self-esteem.

We do not believe the current system is fair and cannot believe it is beyond the imagination and ability of the UK Government to replace it with a system that is both fair and fit for purpose.

Emotional MPs Discuss Anxiety and Hardship Caused by Work Capability Assessments

Atos told incontinent woman to ‘wear nappy’

Thousands of sick or disabled people have died after undergoing assessments to find out whether they were fit to work, the House of Commons was told today.


Atos, the firm contracted to conduct work capability assessment (WCA) tests for the Government, was condemned by MPs for “ruthlessly” pressurising sick and disabled people into returning to their jobs.

The debate was told of cases of people who had committed suicide after being stripped of their benefits under the process and of an incontinence sufferer who was told she could return to work wearing a nappy.

Former Labour minister Michael Meacher opened the debate saying that 1,300 people had died after being placed in the “work-related activity group”, for those currently too ill to be employed but expected to start preparing for an eventual return to work...

...Kevan Jones, a former Labour minister, said suicides of claimants who were found fit to work by Atos had been reported. “There are...a number of well-publicised cases where people have taken their own lives because of this system,” he said. “It is not too strong to say that this Coalition Government has blood on their hands for the deaths of those individuals.”

Read the full article in The Independent

 

The WOW Petition Passes 14,000 Signatures!

Progress update - WOW petition reaches 14,000 signatures.

The total number of people who have now supported is 14,214!

Since the petition was submitted to the e-petition website by Francesca Martinez, sick and disabled people have been hit by further cuts. Coalition MPs voted to cap ESA so that it no longer rises with inflation. This means that some of the most vulnerable people will not be able to keep pace with rises in food and fuel costs.

The bad news continues. Today we have learned that the government is trying to 'sneak' a change to the way people's conditions are assessed, based on nothing more than a hypothetical series of assumptions which will mean even more genuinely sick and disabled people will be found fit to work and lose the benefits they rely upon to survive.

Read more - (http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/node/17811)  

* Withdrawal of benefit if an assessor believes that medication would reduce the risks posed by a claimant's condition, seemingly without regard for whether it would be appropriate in a work context.

* Withdrawal of benefit if an assessor believes that a reasonable adjustment could be made in a workplace to reduce the risks posed by a claimant's condition, without explicit assessment of whether that adjustment is likely to be available.

* The imaginary wheelchair test, where assessors considers the effect on a claimant’s mobility were they to use a wheelchair and bases their decisions on these assumptions, is to be extended to other aids and adaptions such as guide dogs, walking sticks and even prosthetic limbs, without discussing the prospect of such aids with the claimant.

* Dealing with the claimant's physical and mental health conditions separately, rather than looking at the combined effects that physical and mental health has on a person’s ability to work. This would include ignoring the mental and cognitive side effects of treatments for physical conditions, and the physical side effects of treatments for mental health conditions.

Urgent!  

Please sign and share the WOW petition!

http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/43154 

 

#esaSOS: YOUR HELP NEEDED URGENTLY!

WOW Campaign wholeheartedly supports this call to arms!

By Sue Marsh @suey2y

On January 28th 2013 the UK government is due to make a set of changes to the Work Capability Assessment (WCA). The WCA is the flawed ‘fitness to work’ test which assesses whether sick and disabled people can get Employment and Support Allowance (ESA): a benefit designed to help and support very unwell or profoundly disabled people into work.

Although these changes have been advertised as small ‘amendments’, they will in fact have a huge impact on the way people’s illnesses and disabilities are assessed. Many vulnerable people’s needs will suddenly be able to be overlooked or ignored, meaning they could end up losing the support they desperately need to manage their conditions.

Hundreds of thousands of sick and disabled people across Britain need your help to fight these changes!

PROBLEM 1: FALSE ASSUMPTIONS

In the fitness to work test, your needs are assessed by a ‘healthcare professional’ employed by the French private company ATOS. This assessor doesn’t just need to look at your current difficulties. For example, they can also imagine how using an aid (e.g. a wheelchair) might improve your ability to work and make a judgement based on that – without even asking your opinion!

However, soon this “imaginary test” will be able to be used for many more aids (including guide dogs and false limbs!). This means that soon thousands more people could be judged as fit to work, without being asked about why the assessor’s “imaginary aid” might not be appropriate for them.

It gets worse. Even if returning to work may clearly put you at risk, these changes will mean you can still lose your disability benefit – as long as the assessor believes that trying a new therapy or treatment might reduce that risk. In other words: yet another guessing game, with your health at stake!

>>> Imagine Bert, who suffers from severe schizophrenia, but is found fit to work because a behavioural therapy may help improve his condition. Yet, in making that decision, the assessor would not have to look at several vital questions: how hard it would be for Bert to get that therapy? How long would an NHS appointment take to organize? Are there private options in his area – and could he afford them if so? What if the therapy doesn’t work, or takes a long time to adjust to? <<<

If the government’s rule changes go through, people like Bert who are desperate to work will find it nearly impossible to get an accurate assessment, affecting the quality of their support and even preventing their efforts to get back into work.

PROBLEM 2: SEPARATING PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH

The government is also trying to change the way people’s conditions are assessed by dividing health problems into two separate boxes: ‘physical’ and ‘mental’. When looking at what tasks people can do, only the ‘physical half’ of the test will apply to those with physical disabilities. The same goes for the effects of treatment: for e.g., if you’re taking mental health medication, only mental health side-effects will be looked at.

This completely fails to understand the way that many disabilities and illnesses can lead to both physical and mental effects. This is also the case for many common treatments: such as those for schizophrenia, Parkinson’s disease and multiple sclerosis.

>>> Think of Emily, who suffers severe, chronic pain because of nerve damage to her leg. Emily is among the 49% of chronic pain sufferers who also suffer depression as a result of continuous pain. An assessor may see Emily as able to do some work as long as she takes strong painkillers for the rest of her life, meaning she could pass the ‘fitness’ test. Yet the painkillers may not deal with the depression caused by her condition. Painkillers have also often been shown to affect people’s wakefulness and decision-making. So taking the medication may affect Emily’s ability to do a job in a completely new way – yet these new problems would not need to be looked at by the assessor when making their decision! <<<

Pretending the effects of illnesses and disabilities can be separated in this way goes against all medical practice. Going even further, and using this method to ignore sick and disabled people’s needs, is at best hopeless policy, and at worst deliberate cruelty. We cannot let the government treat some of the most vulnerable people in British society in this way.

HOW YOU CAN HELP

The main way you can help is by spreading the message about these changes to ESA. The government have tried to sneak them under the radar – the last thing they will want is people talking about them!

Here are some great ways you can raise awareness:

1) Email your MP (you can search by name or constituency at http://www.parliament.uk/mps-lords-and-offices/mps/);

2) Share this blog post on twitter (using the hashtag #esaSOS), Facebook and other social media; CLICK ON THE BUTTONS BELOW THIS POST TO SHARE ON TWITTER AND FACEBOOK

3) Email your friends and family a link to this post – or simply talk to them about it!

Again, the main way we can get the government to reconsider is by getting people to talk about the injustice of these changes. So please spread the word as far and wide as you can!

Thank you so much for reading this far. Now let’s make sure these unwanted, damaging benefit changes never see the light of day!

If you want to do more, please sign WOW petition and call on the government to think again. 
Sign here http://wowpetition.com and ask all of your friends to sign too

Wayne Blackburn: Why I Support The WOWpetition

By Wayne Blackburn @crazybladeuk

On the 18th December, 2012, a group of ill and disabled people hugely concerned about the impact of a succession of cuts to funding, benefits and the rhetoric from the Coalition government launched the “WOWpetition”.  The WOWpetition - named because of a belief that there is a “War On Welfare”, calls for:

• 1. A Cumulative Impact Assessment of all cuts and changes affecting sick and disabled people, their families and carers, and a free vote on the repeal of the Welfare Reform Act.
  2. An immediate end to the Work Capability Assessment, as voted for by the British Medical Association.
  3. Consultation between the Depts of Health & Education to improve support into work for sick & disabled people, and an end to forced work under threat of sanctions for people on disability benefits.
  4. An Independent, Committee-Based Inquiry into Welfare Reform, covering but not limited to: (1) Care home admission rises, daycare centres, access to education for people with learning difficulties, universal mental health treatments, Remploy closures; (2) DWP media links, the ATOS contract, IT implementation of Universal Credit; (3) Human rights abuses against disabled people, excess claimant deaths & the disregard of medical evidence in decision making by ATOS, DWP & the Tribunal Service.

  
  

  Ill and disabled people, thanks to this Coalition government, are facing a fearful and difficult 2013 and beyond as the full range of cuts start to hit hard.

  
  

  In April, the “Bedroom Tax” will come in to effect for those receiving Housing Benefit.  This will mean that those living in a property where it is deemed that you have a “spare bedroom” you will lose 14% of your Housing Benefit, and 25% for two or more bedrooms.  Despite overwhelming evidence and protests to the contrary, this Government decided to push this even on to disabled people, even though a spare bedroom is usually a place for wheelchairs or mobility aids or things needed to help a disabled person live.

  
  

  The same month, many councils will be making changes to their Council Tax Benefit (CTB) rules after the Government made local government responsible for their own CTB arrangements in the Local Government Finance Act 2012.  Whilst many councils are yet to announce how it will be affected, there are expectations of cuts of between 10-20% in many areas (my local council is proposing 20% but have not announced it finally as yet).

  
  

  Then there’s the changes to Employment Support Allowance, the introduction of Universal Credit which is mired in rumours of problems - including rumours of monumental IT problems which have already led to a delay - and implementation costs and the replacing of Disability Living Allowance with the Personal Independence Payment which could mean thousands of disabled people losing a vital benefit at a time when their lives are already difficult.

  
  

  Then factor in the rising costs of living - food, energy prices, petrol, clothes.  All absolutely essential in these times and all rising above the rate inflation.  Then factor in one final thing - the Government limiting benefits, including disabled benefits despite their assurances to the contrary, to 1% (equating to approx. 71p a week) and anyone can see how squeezed a disabled persons’ budget is.

  
  

  It’s important to remember that disabled people - and yes, that includes myself - are not “scroungers”.  In many cases we are intelligent people, people who wish with every fibre of their being that they could work, but who struggle, day in, day out, with immense pain and debilitating mental and physical problems that working is simply something that cannot be done.  

  
  

  For some this is temporary, a time of their life where some illness or injury has caused a disability which will heal.  But for others that simply cannot and will not be the case. In either case, they should be supported, not persecuted.

  
  

  It is a stain on our country that in 2013 the latter, and not the former, is how many ill and disabled people feel, and it is a disgrace that disabled people - and those in low incomes as a whole - are being made to pay for mistakes made by politicians and bankers.

  
  

  I support the WOWpetition because of these reasons.  I support the WOWpetition because I believe that a fair society protects its’ most vulnerable, it doesn’t push them in to poverty.  And lastly, and most importantly, one final reason that is difficult for anybody to write…

  
  

  I support the WOWpetition because I am truly scared for the future without it.  Please, visit www.wowpetition.com and sign the petition at www.epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/43154 and help us ensure fairness. Thank you.