Tonight’s Channel 4 Dispatches exposé of Atos confirms people’s experience
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Tonight’s Dispatches Britain on the sick, bears out our experiences as disabled women, of the sadism and brutality of the Work Capability Assessment and Atos:
- One mother, a nurse, in agonising pain with an injured spine after an assault at work, was signed off work, but then found fit for work by Atos because she is managing to care for her children.
- A wheelchair user who gets excruciating pain in her hands, was told by an Atos doctor that since she managed to get to the exam, mobility was no problem. She was worried sick for months before winning her appeal at the independent tribunal.
- A young woman severely traumatised by rape in Rwanda won an exemption from the exam after we sent in medical evidence. Her MP wrote to the Chief Executive of Jobcentres at the DWP, who finally withdrew the exam.
- A rape survivor with worsening health problems, including mental health, was distraught when told she must be reassessed and attend an Atos exam. This came only four months after the DWP put her in the severe “Support Group”. With her MP’s and our help, she was exempted from the exam and paid a small amount of compensation for distress. But despite this, the DWP now insists her claim must be reassessed in three months’ time!
Sick and disabled people, mothers and children, families and carers face a terrifying future denied the benefits we need to survive, and are entitled to.
It’s difficult enough to get an exemption when you have support, but what of all the people who don’t? The government is also closing down Remploy, one of the few places with accessible jobs. And they are ending Income Support, the main benefit which recognises mothers’ and other carers’ vital life-giving work. More than a third of single mothers on benefits have a disability or long-standing illness, many care for a disabled child. Already one in five mothers regularly misses meals so their children can eat, and many more people are having to go to food banks.
The DWP presents the Atos exam as compulsory, but you can win exemption by sending in medical evidence to prove your ill-health and disability, and getting your MP to write. So far, 83 MPs across England, Scotland, Wales and the North of Ireland have signed John McDonnell’s Early Day Motion 295 against Atos and the Work Capability Assessment. People are terrified of the Atos exam because about 88% are failed and immediately cut off benefit. Over 40% of those who appeal, win their benefits. Survivors of war zones, rape and other torture, domestic violence, suffering Post-Traumatic Stress and physical injuries, face racism and other prejudice. But with backing from professionals and others, we can win.
Last year, WinVisible organised a joint open letter to the British Medical Journal Group and Royal College of Nursing, calling on them to end their business relationship recruiting for Atos – over 100 organisations, doctors and nurses signed. We were thrilled when the BMA voted in June, that that the Work Capability Assessment should end. This was followed in Parliament by Early Day Motion 295. UK-wide protests against Atos continue, and disabled people and bereaved relatives are leading the protests against Atos sponsorship of the Olympics and Paralympics.
No profit from our pain! Down with Atos and the Work Capability Assessment!
Single Mothers’ Self-Defence WinVisible (women with visible and invisible disabilities
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