Work Capability Assessment Survey - Disability Rights UK

The ‘Work Capability Assessment’ (WCA) is the testing system used to decide what support and out of work benefits disabled people can access. It is also used to move disabled people off incapacity benefits and onto either ‘Employment and Support Allowance’ (ESA, if found only partly fit for work or unable to work at all) or ‘Jobseeker’s Allowance’ (JSA, if found fully fit for work).

There are about 11,000 WCA tests every week and Disability Rights UK is very concerned that the system:

• is unfit for purpose (40% of the people tested appeal the initial DWP decision and 40% win their appeal costing £27 million in the last financial year)

• is not delivering the central aim of reform (ensuring disabled people are supported into work where possible); and

• causes significant distress and anxiety for disabled people.

Recently, Channel 4 ‘Dispatches’ and BBC ‘Panorama’ investigations have also suggested significant problems with the WCA system. These programmes can currently be viewed online at: http://www.disabilityrightsuk.org/wcaontv.htm

Professor Malcolm Harrington is undertaking his third and final independent Review of the WCA and we would like your help to shape our response.

We have drafted a short survey and your answers and input could help improve the WCA.

The questions from the Harrington Review form part of our survey. We also provide some extra questions to ensure we provide a response based on disabled people’s experiences.

Our WCA survey is available online @ www.disabilityrightsuk.org/harringtonsurvey.htm

We hope you will complete our survey and thank you for your involvement in advance – but please don’t forget to provide us with your email address if you’d like to receive a copy of our final submission to the Review.

Best wishes,

Ken Butler

Membership Organisations

Benefits and Tax Credits Adviser

Disability Rights UK

Direct Line:0207 5660113

Email:ken.butler@disabilityrightsuk.org

Disability Rights UK
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