• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • About DNS
  • Subscribe to DNS
  • Advertise with DNS
  • Support DNS
  • Contact DNS

Disability News Service

the country's only news agency specialising in disability issues

  • Home
  • Independent Living
    • Arts, Culture and Sport
    • Crime
    • Education
    • Employment
    • Housing
    • Transport
  • Activism & Campaigning
  • Benefits & Poverty
  • Politics
  • Human Rights
You are here: Home / Archives for benefit assessments

benefit assessments

Lords committee led by Tory banker calls for stricter assessments and conditions for disabled benefit claimants

By John Pring on 23rd January 2025 Category: Benefits and Poverty

Lords committee led by Tory banker calls for stricter assessments and conditions for disabled benefit claimants
Listen

Disabled activists have questioned the “draconian” conclusions of a Lords committee that has told the government to impose stricter conditions, more assessments, and a more “rigorous” work capability assessment on claimants of out-of-work disability benefits. The calls by the economic affairs […]

Concern over scope of EHRC inquiry into ‘unlawful acts’ by work and pensions secretaries 

By John Pring on 23rd May 2024 Category: Benefits and Poverty

Concern over scope of EHRC inquiry into ‘unlawful acts’ by work and pensions secretaries 
Listen

The equality watchdog has finally launched a – limited – investigation into unlawful treatment by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) of disabled benefit claimants, including some who died, five years after it was first told to act.   The move […]

Capita admits sending recording of assessment to wrong claimant

By John Pring on 15th February 2024 Category: Benefits and Poverty

Capita admits sending recording of assessment to wrong claimant
Listen

A controversial outsourcing company is facing questions over its data security procedures after it admitted sending a recording of a disabled woman being assessed for a disability benefit to another claimant. Capita, which has faced repeated criticism over the last decade […]

Contracts reveal how companies should carry out benefit assessments over the next five years

By John Pring on 8th February 2024 Category: Benefits and Poverty

Contracts reveal how companies should carry out benefit assessments over the next five years
Listen

Key details reveal how four private sector providers have been told to carry out health and disability benefit assessments over the next five years, after being awarded £2.8 billion-worth of contracts by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). The contracts […]

Suspended sentence for benefits adviser driven to jobcentre suicide attempt by anger and despair with DWP

By John Pring on 1st February 2024 Category: Benefits and Poverty

Suspended sentence for benefits adviser driven to jobcentre suicide attempt by anger and despair with DWP
Listen

A disabled campaigner who tried to take his own life in his local jobcentre has described how “anger and despair” at the imminent reassessment of both of his disability benefits drove him to the suicide attempt. David Rollins, from Orchardson Avenue, […]

Activists raise concerns over human rights record of company that ousted Atos

By John Pring on 26th October 2023 Category: Benefits and Poverty

Activists raise concerns over human rights record of company that ousted Atos
Listen

Disabled activists have raised concerns about the human rights record of the outsourcing company that defeated Atos in the battle for a multi-million-pound disability benefits assessment contract. Disability News Service (DNS) reported last week that the government decision to award Serco […]

Disabled people’s trust in PIP assessments is ‘severely lacking’, says Tory MP

By John Pring on 7th September 2023 Category: Benefits and Poverty

Disabled people’s trust in PIP assessments is ‘severely lacking’, says Tory MP
Listen

A Conservative MP has told his own government that disabled people’s trust in the disability benefits assessment process is “severely lacking”. Elliot Colburn was introducing a debate on three parliamentary petitions that between them have been backed by tens of thousands […]

DWP tried to prevent Atos winning £338m assessment contract, court documents suggest

By John Pring on 10th August 2023 Category: Benefits and Poverty

DWP tried to prevent Atos winning £338m assessment contract, court documents suggest
Listen

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) tried to prevent its most controversial private sector contractor winning a five-year £338 million contract to provide disability benefit assessments, court documents suggest. Most of the successful bidders for five regional contracts to provide […]

DWP admits: We’re too slow, too inaccurate, too costly, and claimants don’t trust us

By John Pring on 29th June 2023 Category: Benefits and Poverty

DWP admits: We’re too slow, too inaccurate, too costly, and claimants don’t trust us
Listen

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has admitted to the public spending watchdog that its system of disability benefits assessments is too slow, too expensive and too inaccurate, and too many claimants do not trust how it makes decisions. The […]

DWP hands hundreds of millions more to firms linked to claimant deaths… but not Atos

By John Pring on 1st June 2023 Category: Benefits and Poverty

DWP hands hundreds of millions more to firms linked to claimant deaths… but not Atos
Listen

The government has awarded five-year disability assessment contracts worth more than £560 million to the outsourcing giant Capita, on the same day that a safeguarding review linked the company to the death of a young disabled mum. Last week, the safeguarding […]

  • Page 1
  • Page 2
  • Page 3
  • Interim pages omitted …
  • Page 5
  • Go to Next Page »

Primary Sidebar

On the left of the image are multiple heads of different colours - white, aqua, red, light brown, and dark green - all grouped together, then the words ‘Campaign for Disability Justice. Sign up to support. #OpportunitySecurityRespect’
A photograph shows an audience raising their hands in a BSL sign. The words say: 'BSL Conference 2025. The future starts with us. Leeds 17-18 July. Be part of shaping the future of Deaf cultures and identities. Get 10% off with BDA10'

Access

Latest Stories

‘Disastrous’ cuts bill that leaves legacy of distrust and distress ‘must be dropped’

Four disabled Labour MPs stand up to government over cuts to disability benefits

Silence from MP sister of Rachel Reeves over suicide linked to PIP flaws, just as government was seeking cuts

Disabled people receiving care were ‘ignored by design’ during the pandemic, Covid inquiry hears

Disabled activists warn Labour MPs who vote for cuts: ‘The gloves will be off’

GB News says it has nothing to apologise for, after guest suggests starving disabled benefit claimants

SEND inspections find services in just one in four areas usually lead to ‘positive’ outcomes for disabled children

Disabled MP who quit government over benefit cuts tells DNS: ‘The consequences will be devastating’

Disabled peers plan to ‘amend, amend, amend, amend, amend’ after assisted dying bill reaches Lords

Minister finally admits that working-age benefits spending is stable, despite months of ‘spiralling’ claims

Advice and Information

Readspeaker
A photograph shows an audience raising their hands in a BSL sign. The words say: 'BSL Conference 2025. The future starts with us. Leeds 17-18 July. Be part of shaping the future of Deaf cultures and identities. Get 10% off with BDA10'

Footer

The International Standard Serial Number for Disability News Service is: ISSN 2398-8924

  • Accessibility Statement
  • Privacy Policy
  • Site map
  • Bluesky
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Threads
  • Twitter

Copyright © 2025 Disability News Service

Site development by A Bright Clear Web