Tag Archives: ukcuts
Million sickness benefit applicants 'fit for work'
25 January 2014 Last updated at 00:16
Nearly a million people who applied for sickness benefit have been found fit for work, according to figures from the Department for Work and Pensions.
The DWP claims 980,400 people – 32%, of new applicants for Employment and Support Allowance – were judged capable of work between 2008 and March 2013.
More than a million others withdrew their claims after interviews, it adds.
But disability campaigners said the work tests were “ridiculously harsh and extremely unfair”.
A spokesman for Disability Rights UK said many of those passed fit will not, in fact, be capable of entering the workplace in any meaningful sense due to physical or mental health problems.
“They are finding people fit for work when they aren’t and they are not even giving them the support they need to get a job. It is a disgrace,” he told BBC News.
Older cancer patients ‘should not be written off’
24 January 2014 Last updated at 10:34
Older cancer patients should not be “written off” as too old for treatment, a charity has warned.
Macmillan Cancer Support said decisions on care should be made based on a patient’s fitness, not their age.
It cited data which suggests 130,000 people over 65 diagnosed with cancer between 1991-2010 survived for more than 10 years.
NHS England acknowledged that it needed to deliver better services to people in the over-65 age group.
Woman told to find work is in a COMA
A mentally ill woman forced on to the Coalition’s Work Programme is in a coma – but is still being sent letters by benefits assessors.
Bipolar patient Sheila Holt, 47, was sectioned in December after being taken off Income Support. Days later she had a heart attack and fell into the coma.
This weekend, Miss Holt, of Rochdale, Gtr Manchester, was sent a letter by Atos to ask why she was not working.
Local Labour MP Simon Danczuk said: “I am in favour of welfare reform but trying to bulldoze through changes in a reckless and insensitive way is not the right way to go about it.
“This Government is causing a huge amount of damage and I have no doubt that Sheila’s story is being repeated in towns and cities up and down the country.
