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DWP spent £50,000 trying to stop release of review into disabled man’s death.

10 replies

EddyF · 07/01/2025 22:40

Wtf? I’m so sad about this. It’s not a AIBU; I just wanted to share widely. It’s just devastating.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/jan/02/errol-graham-disabled-man-death-review

DWP spent £50,000 trying to stop release of review into disabled man’s death

Previous government spent almost £1m trying to prevent release of documents in 56 legal cases

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/jan/02/errol-graham-disabled-man-death-review

OP posts:
ThinWomansBrain · 07/01/2025 22:42

Misread the title as "DP"

OP posts:
TomorrowTodayYesterday · 08/01/2025 08:27

We're only getting one side of the story there so it's impossible to determine whether there is actually a case here.

My main take from this is, where were these family members when the poor guy was deteriorating? They've found time to sue the taxpayer and to go to the media to promote this... but didn't find time to help him or notice he was in such a bad way that he was down to 4 stone.

Mittens67 · 08/01/2025 08:48

I have read about this poor man previously on various disability sites. It was appalling and in response to the pp there really is no “other side”.
This man had severe mental health issues. The dwp stopped his benefits without any remotely reasonable understanding of his difficulties in complying with their demands. He starved to death.
As regards the comment about his family, well not everybody has a family who can or will intervene and even the most caring families can find it impossible to help family members with very severe mental health problems and contact may well have been cut by either side.
Also, dealing with the dwp is often a complete nightmare even for someone in good health let alone somebody who is seriously unwell. It’s communication channels are not fit for purpose with no email contact available, phone lines that leave callers on hold for an hour and then cut you off, and letters which go astray or only turn up months after the date they were sent.
If the dwp had nothing to hide they would not have gone to such lengths resisting releasing the facts of the matter.
This is not an isolated death at the hands of the dwp. Disability rights organisations have highlighted numerous other deaths where the actions of the dwp have been at the very least a significant factor.
Coroners involved have repeatedly raised concerns about patterns of behaviour by the dwp but these have been consistently dismissed and ignored.

Kentuckycriedfrickin · 08/01/2025 09:32

TomorrowTodayYesterday · 08/01/2025 08:27

We're only getting one side of the story there so it's impossible to determine whether there is actually a case here.

My main take from this is, where were these family members when the poor guy was deteriorating? They've found time to sue the taxpayer and to go to the media to promote this... but didn't find time to help him or notice he was in such a bad way that he was down to 4 stone.

A man with severe mental health issues died of starvation as a direct result of safeguarding failures inherent within DWP processes. There is no other side, there was a duty of care and that duty was neglected.

As for the family, if you read around the case, they did try to help but due to his mental health problems he cut them off. When they tried to contact intervention services, none of the services intervened. It's all right there in the report from the safeguarding inquiry.

A key finding from the enquiry is that multiple services - GP, DWP, local authority, etc - knew about his issues, knew he was vulnerable, and knew that his benefits has been stopped but none of them communicated this information one in order to build a full picture of his needs and provide support.

The DWP in particular failed to pass his details onto support services after incorrectly stopping his disability and out of work benefits, then when the inquiry was held they deliberately withheld reports that showed they were at fault. They specifically withheld copies of Mr Graham's work capability assessment which stated he was unfit for work, meaning that his benefits had been incorrectly stopped as he was actually entitled to them.

Kentuckycriedfrickin · 08/01/2025 09:50

The DWP is shit and not fit for purpose.

Around 2014, the same time all this was happening, I was briefly out of work after being unfairly dismissed while on maternity leave and had to sign on for contributions-based JSA to tide me over. I was told not to bother applying for jobs in the sector I was qualified for as "they don't like employees with small children because of the issues it causes with commitment to the role". I was directed to apply for dinner lady jobs despite me telling them I couldn't afford to live on a dinner lady wage - "but it's in the education sector which is what you wanted!". One afternoon I arrived to sign on, my appointment time came and went, I asked at the desk if I was being seen soon and was told yes, just running late. An hour later I was told that actually they had made an error and hadn't booked me in correctly so, as far as the appointment system was concerned, I had missed my signing on and a decision-maker would need to decide whether I'd get paid or not that week. I asked if they'd tell the decision-maker that it was their fault, not mine. "Yes, we will". Decision-maker sanctioned me for three weeks on the grounds that I should have realised I wasn't booked in correctly (despite me not having access to their appointment booking system...). When they did reinstate my JSA, they forgot to update the system so I didn't get paid. They then said it was too late to process a bank payment and I'd need to get a giro, the only place to get a giro from was a jobcentre twenty miles away and I had to go there at 4pm, it also wasn't guaranteed I'd get it that day as it was limited capacity, first come first served, and paid/issued at the discretion of the duty manager. We had bad snow one day too, over the top of my pram wheels, and I lived rurally, the car wouldn't start and the bus wasn't running. I rang the jobcentre to say I couldn't come sign on, they told me I was expected to walk. I explained I lived nearly 10 miles from the jobcentre and that I had no transport, I was told "I managed to get into work today, you can certainly manage to walk here if you want any JSA this week". I was again sanctioned for missing a signing-on apportionment but this was reversed when I told my health visitor about it.

This is the same DWP who told my double amputee, transplantee, heart failure patient father in law that he was fit for work.

Same DWP who took ten months to process his claim for PIP and paid out precisely £0 in the interim then decided he didn't have mobility needs despite his complete and utter lack of legs and also didn't have care needs as he'd managed to attend the assessment appointment unaccompanied.

LadyKenya · 08/01/2025 09:55

The DWP is not fit for purpose. It really needs reform, from top to bottom. The system is a mess! The amount of people who have been let down by them is totally unacceptable.

Mopsy567 · 08/01/2025 16:21

I find this really upsetting too. Not just that they grossly failed this poor man, but also the attempt to cover up (using taxpayers money!). That should never be allowed. How many other people are suffering because of the DWPs mistakes? Its awful.

Kentuckycriedfrickin · 08/01/2025 16:24

The cover up is the real kicker. The purpose of a review is to try and learn lessons so that the same sad outcome can be avoided for other people and they very deliberately tried to pervert that by withholding evidence.

TangerinePlate · 08/01/2025 16:27

@Kentuckycriedfrickin that’s shocking,I’m so sorry 💐

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