DWP: You couldn't make it up (oh, they did)

[LurkingHusband]

linky

The Department for Work and Pensions has admitted using made-up stories from fictional claimants to demonstrate the positive impact of benefit sanctions.

A DWP leaflet featured one welfare claimant, "Sarah", who said she was "really pleased" a cut to her benefits had encouraged her to improve her CV.

But after a Freedom of Information request by website Welfare Weekly, the DWP said they were not real claimants.

The stories were for "illustrative purposes only", it added.

Under the sanctions system - introduced by Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith - people can lose benefits for anywhere between a few weeks and three years if they fail to meet the government's requirements for jobseekers.

Stephen Timms, Labour's acting shadow work and pensions secretary, said: "You couldn't make it up - but it seems Iain Duncan Smith can. The only way he can find backers for his sanctions regime is by inventing them."

The leaflet features the apparent stories of two sickness benefit claimants, Sarah and Zac.

"Sarah" - whose story features alongside a woman's picture - says she failed to complete a CV despite agreeing to do so on her work "action plan".

"I didn't have a good reason for not doing it and I was told I'd lose some of my payment. I decided to complete the CV and told my work coach," she says.

Sarah says her benefits were cut for two weeks, but now she is "really pleased with how my CV looks" and it will really help her find a job.

Zac, meanwhile, says he let his work coach know when he was going to miss a meeting and because he did so, "my benefit payment hasn't changed".

According to Welfare Weekly, the response to its Freedom of Information request from the DWP said the images used were "stock photos and along with the names do not belong to real claimants".

The DWP later said in a statement: "The case studies were used for illustrative purposes to help people understand how the benefit system works. They're based on conversations our staff have had with claimants.
"They have now been removed to avoid confusion".

The system of benefits sanctions - introduced under the coalition government - has been accused of having a detrimental impact on some claimants.

Earlier this year, the Commons Work and Pensions Select Committee called for an independent inquiry into the way the sanctions were applied, saying that in some cases they were causing food poverty and "severe financial hardship".

Mr Timms added: "Instead of fabricating quotes pretending the system is working, [Iain Duncan Smith] should scrap unfair sanctions targets for jobcentre staff and do more to protect vulnerable people from facing benefit sanctions."

Learning disability charity Mencap accused the DWP of "unacceptable" behaviour and of misleading the public by giving them "an unrepresentative view of the sanctions regime and its impact on disabled people"

[Isitmebut]

A government 'spinning' its policies, go figure.

But considering its successes in getting people back to work since 2010, this does look both clumsy and lazy for not attaching real names to real situations, even for those "illustrative purposes".

[jeronimoh]

Hasn't IDS blocked the release of data showing how many people have died as a result of benefit sanctions?

[Isitmebut]

Jeronimoh .... I wouldn't be surprised if IDS personally did it, in the Library using the Candlestick and Gove as an accomplice, which might explain any government cover up. Hmmmm.

And there lies the problem, it is very difficult to pin DIRECT blame on ministers/policies when they are implemented by a rather large army of public sector workers/local authorities with there own decision making processes and finally, the actions of those affected themselves i.e. the claim itself or not taking medications etc.

Apparently it is still different to hold those politicians/spin doctors to account for taking a country to war using a made up/dodgy dossier of supposed Weapons of Mass Destruction, when hundreds of thousands died, and still dying.

[Isitmebut]

.....last para should be "Apparently it is still difficult to hold polititcians..."

[magoria]

He can't have done it in the library they have all had to be closed!

[Isitmebut]

Thats right magoria, in many places the libraries went before the local authorities trimming back the the 'fat' - either in management or the 'non jobs' accumulated over 13-years..

Councils have advertised for a ‘future shape programme co-ordinator’ – ironically to oversee spending cuts – at £70,189 a year; a ‘wellbeing officer’ at £34,500 a year; and a communications waste strategy officer at £35,055.

Assistant Director Supporting Communities; up to £90,000 – Liverpool.

Head of Participation and Partnership; £42,197 – Hertfordshire .

Climate Change Officer; £38,556 – Braintree.

Nuclear free Local Authorities Secretariat, Policy & Research Officer; £37,543 – Manchester City Council.

Walking Coordinator; £31,935 – Islington.

Access to Nature Officer; £19,126 – Charnwood E. Midlands.

Also when the libraries go before the likes of that lot, it makes anti deficit reduction POLITICAL point as well.

[Icimoi]

But why do you assume that all those jobs are pointless? I haven't checked them all but, for example, communications waste strategy: this is about reducing waste and co-ordinating with other local authorities, for example to save money by bulk contracts. I'd put money on the fact that that saves much more than the salary being paid. The participation and partnerships job seems to be the title of the person in charge of the department which meets the council's care and educational statutory responsibilities to young people, including in particular those who are or have been in care and those with disabilities and SEN. It's therefore pretty essential. The climate change job is about providing help in energy efficiency for homes and businesses, encouraging alternatives to the car for travel, stopping water waste etc: again, precisely what councils should be doing.

The Nuclear Free job involves identifying nuclear hazards and taking steps to reduce and eliminate them; pressing for existing binding international agreements to reduce and eliminate nuclear weapons to be fulfilled; helping government find the most publicly acceptable ways to manage the country's nuclear waste legacy;promoting safe and sustainable alternatives to nuclear power; ending avoidable nuclear waste transportation within the country and to and from the country. Shall we just ignore nuclear hazards in order to save a bit of money?

And so far as I can see, the Islington Walking Co-ordinator job was a fixed term job advertised in 2010 for a one-off project aimed at developing procedures to encourage walking for health. Likewise the Access to Nature job was a one-off project advertised in 2010. So both jobs were short term and have presumably gone already. Interestingly, for both, you've chosen to quote the figure at the top of the salary range. Why not the other end?

[squidzin]

So...

Overpaid managers at DWP fiddling stats, and creating useless leaflets full of lies and propaganda.

Hmm. NHS Overpaid managers fiddling stats creating leaflets and spreadsheets reporting lies and propaganda.

Hmm EDUCATION. Overpaid managers fiddling stats and creating needless leaflets full of...

Huh...

RE DWP Mind you, they will not be able to find a single genuine citizen grateful for the benefit sanctions suddenly propelling them into a dream career because there are err... NONE.

[Osolea]

Would anyone really have thought those were real people in the first place?

Isn't it quite normal to assume that they'd use actors or models for this sort of thing?

[SwedishEdith]

It's not using actors or models that's the problem, it's that the quotes are completely made up as well.

[Isitmebut]

Quotes 'made up' on the potential getting out of the home social and health benefits, what a totally unrealistic possibility - what a bastard.

[Fantasyland]

No the quotes IS IT ME were along the lines of you should be happy that you are sanctioned and you are more likely to find work by being sanctioned.

The quotes were nothing to do with getting off benefits just people looking happy they have been sanctioned , who on earth would give a positive quote about being sanctioned?

Not everyone has a choice to just get a job and come off benefits

[SaskiaRembrandtWasFramed]

Yes, I was under the impression the quotes were extolling the joys of being sanctioned, which doesn't seem to be something real people would say. Call me cynical, but I'm guessing being left destitute isn't an experience people talk of in positive terms.

[Iliveinalighthousewiththeghost]

Yes just as if someone would advocate themselves being sanctioned . People are really going to say things like Glad they sanctioned me, made me look harder for work, well they would on planet IDS. Meanwhile here in the RW. It wouldn't happen.Sanctions are the work of the devil, evil wicked corrupt mean act on the poor disabled sick lone parents and the vulnerable, yes those who can't fight back..
The UN can though and I am Delighted they are looking into IDs treatment of welfare claimants.
Not even criminals are treated with this much contempt. I mean they eat 3 square meals a day. Their food doesn't come from a food bank, does it!

[CFSKate]

"I recently spoke to a woman with a rare disease, which keeps her bed-bound for days, even weeks at a time. The DWP told her that she was fit for work. When charity workers involved with her case came to check on her, they found bottles of urine stacked around the bed and piles of half-eaten ready-meals, which the woman had been consuming cold. She had been unable to reach the kitchen or the toilet. Caseworkers told her that her illness wasn??t that bad: because she was bed-bound for only three to 14 days at a time, she probably wouldn??t starve and she could technically survive lying in her excreta for that long."

link

[PausingFlatly]

Oh god, that link...

Thanks, CFSKate. I needed to know.

[CFSKate]

www.theguardian.com/society/2015/sep/16/disability-un-investigation-uk-government-violations-human-rights

[BigChocFrenzy]

If Cameron wants to modernise Thatcher's speech when she entered No. 10, here's my suggested update for him in 2015:

Where there was food - may we bring food banks,
Where there were secure jobs - may we bring redundancy, zero hours & nmw.

Now where there is homelessness - may we bring spikes,
where there is sickness - may be bring a painful death,
where there is hopelessness - may we bring total despair ....

[CFSKate]

It is believed to be the first time that a coroner has blamed the work capability assessment (WCA) process for directly causing the death of a claimant.

[Isitmebut]

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9963012/900000-choose-to-come-off-sickness-benefit-ahead-of-tests.html

900,000 claiming sickness benefits under Labour never bothered to turn up to be medically checked, since then !00,000's of assessments a month, 100,000's of thousands found fit to work - while some say 1,000's have died on wrong assessments - but this was the first time a coroner could directly attribute 'the system' for causing a death.
www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/depressed-man-killed-himself-as-a-direct-result-of-dwps-fit-to-work-ruling-coroner-finds-10510305.html

Clearly one is too many, especially looking at the medical case of Mr O'Sullivan assessed by a doctor, and deeper signs were probably missed e.g. 10-years out of work, 60 years old (I know that feeling), had mentioned suicide and possibly told that he had to start a new career in 2012-2013 just as the job market began to pick up, with probably not the faintest idea what to do – and cumulatively it was sadly all too much for him.

Just as a personal aside, I think that I should start a new career as an interest to get me back 'on the streets' and I have nowhere near Mr O'Sullivan's pressure, but get very angry/depressed with myself for not sorting myself out.

Too many take their own lives, especially men who can feel that their families might be 'better off without me', and of course don't fully understand the permanent emotional damage that they will leave behind.

No doubt some ideologically stunted folks out there will be so pleased that they have their first coroner proven death due 'to the Tory system' that they refuse to accept had to replace no checks - and a medical unemployed long term car park while in the 2000's we apparently created 3 million jobs for other people - but we have to remember that this case is not a number, or a precedent, it has a name and remains the O’Sullivan families loss. IMO

[StitchesBurstinBath]

another damning indictment of the contempt this Goverment has for the people of this country.IDS what a fucking twat.