The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has come under fire after it announced a scheme whereby jobcentre sdtaff assess claimants mental health. The £100,000 scheme being rolled out in Cornwall will see claimants on Universal Credit assessed by the work coach to as “to avoid seeing their GP”. The DWP have announced a controvertial £100,000 scheme for benefit claimants
Read more
Stuart has written for the site before. He is on Universal Credit and I allow him to share his story in exactly his words. I don’t edit anything. The spelling and flow may sometimes be off but, in this article he is sharing some of his innermost thoughts he wrote at a real low point. Nothing at all has been
Read more
Minister for Disabled People, Sarah Newton MP gave a statement on the 20th of December updating the House of Commons on the progress of Personal Independence Payment (PIP). What seems to have gone largely unreported is that at least 4,600 people who were found to have incorrectly lost their Disability Living Allowance (DLA) in 2017, still haven’t been contacted by
Read more
A study by The University of Lancaster on the effects of austerity in the social security system has labelled the policy as ‘social murder’. While this is of no surprise to many, it does add weight to the growing calls to end cuts to the benefit system. The research titled:“‘Violent proletarianisation: social murder, the reserve army of labour and social
Read more
NOTE to readers Everything Stuart writes is unedited and raw. I don’t believe in touching it bar a few layout changes. He writes what he feels and has experienced. Alex Stuart’s Article l wrote this email to one of the heads of UC and tried to hit him hard with the true facts that i still could prove about his
Read more
A Freedom of Information request has shown that since Personal Independence Payment (PIP) came into being in 2013, over two-thirds of cases that go to Tribunal result in the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) decision being overturned. This will come as no surprise as the number of decisions emerging in favour of the claimant has always been high. What
Read more
National foodbank charity The Trussell Trust have released their latest study on the effect Universal Credit has had foodbank referrals and other poverty factors in the UK. The comprehensive study is damning for the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) as it shows that the new benefit is directly to blame for the rise in foodbank use. More worryingly it
Read more
Data released in a Freedom of Information request (FOI) by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) shows between 2010 and 2014, Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) claimants with a mental health condition were 5 times as likely to be sanctioned than those with other health conditions. The FOI request submitted by Jack Dutton on whatdotheyknow.com asked for; “A graph showing the employment and
Read more
How i survived the worst 4 months of my life
Read more
A report by The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has revealed that over one third of Personal Independence Payment (PIP) claimants don’t appeal the decision made during the mandatory reconsideration (MR) stage because the process would be too stressful. This comes as figures show that the DWP spent £200 million fighting disability appeals. The report released by the DWP shows
Read more
Following my journey through the Personal Independence Payment (PIP) application process and first stage of appeal, I can show how the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) are intentionally misleading applicants. The way they are operating is leading to disabled people losing out purely on how things are worded. It’s no secret that applying for Personal Independence Payment (PIP) is
Read more
Just a day after telling me that they had overturned their original decision on my fitness to work and stating that I’m due back payment. The Department for Work and Pensions – DWP have now suddenly found debts to recover from it. The catch they couldn’t tell me what they are yet. So I last wrote about the DWP’s sudden
Read more
In a strange but welcome turn of events, the Department for Work and Pensions – DWP have cancelled my tribunal and recognised my health affects my ability to work. This morning, 29th August, I received an email for Universal Credit stating that I had a message in my online account to read. I was slightly worried as I barely ever
Read more
I wrote before that the DWP had told me that my mental health was not an issue when they gave me my Personal Independence Payment – PIP Assessment decision. Despite saying they’d contact my psychiatrist it appears they didn’t. I called the PIP helpline this week to see if my Mandatory Reconsideration had been done yet. As I previously advised,
Read more