Recent figures have shown that seven out of ten people who appealed in court against decisions to stop their benefits were successful in their effort.
Across England, Scotland, and Wales, nearly 290,000 people won their appeal at a benefits tribunal between 2018 to 2021, which is an increase from half of all claimants winning their appeal between 2012 and 2018.
The majority of these hearings centered around Personal Independence Payment.
Under the Freedom of Information Act, figures released have also revealed that more than 1,000 people across the UK have died while waiting for an outcome to their court appeal.
The bereaved families who won on behalf of a deceased relative shared a common sentiment of fighting on in principle, and a heavy emotional toll.
Daphne Hall, the vice chair of the National Association of Welfare Rights Advisers , said:
“It is of course heart-breaking that people die without having resolution.”
The findings were taken from analysis performed by the BBC’s Shared Data Unit following Freedom Of Information responses from HM Courts and Tribunals Service and the Department for Work and Pensions.
Initial benefit assessments are carried out by private contractors Capita, the Independent Assessment Services (formerly ATOS), and Maximus, working on behalf of the DWP, who asserts that all their disability assessors are experienced health professionals, and that their work is continually monitored for quality.
Those seeking to overturn a decision about their benefits must complete a written challenge within a month of the decision being made, which is known as a Mandatory Reconsideration.
Those who are unsuccessful may take their appeal before a tribunal.
Mandatory Reconsiderations were brought in to make sure claimants received the right decision for their case without it having to go to court, however, many critics say the process is stressful, and does not give claimants adequate time to gather evidence in support of their appeal.
Will Johnstone, policy manager from the Rethink Mental Illness charity, said:
“The mandatory reconsideration process often causes significant distress to people who want to challenge benefit decisions, with the Department for Work and Pensions seeking to discourage appeals which they often go on to lose.
“Yet despite their poor track record and the negative impact on people’s wellbeing, the DWP persists in forcing people to take cases to court to get the correct decision”
A spokesperson from the DWP said: “We support millions of people a year and our priority is that they get the support they are entitled to as quickly as possible.
“The vast majority of PIP cases are not appealed and we continue to improve the service offered to customers, including through recent changes to our decision-making process.
“The PIP assessment process is carried out by experienced health professionals and considers how people are affected by their disability, rather than just the disability itself, and more than double the proportion of PIP claimants get the top rates of support compared to those who receive Disability Living Allowance.”
The COVID-19 pandemic had the effect of reducing the number of appeals heard at a tribunal.
The number of tribunal hearings dropped from about 160,000 in 2019-2020, to just over 100,000 in the 2020-2021 period. Daphne Hall said:
“There are a lot less appeals being registered – I think this is in part due to Covid but also in part due to the fact that more decisions are being turned round at Mandatory Reconsideration.”
Tom Pollard, who who was formerly seconded from the charity MIND to the DWP to be its senior mental health policy advisor between 2016 to 2018, said:
“There is a belief within the DWP that the high rate of successful appeals against disability benefit decisions, rather than indicating that the original assessments were flawed, is due to tribunals taking a more generous approach to applying the assessment criteria and being presented with new evidence in support of the claim.
“My experience is that tribunals offer a more open forum where people can describe how their disability impacts on their lives, with the expectation of being believed, in contrast to DWP assessments where narrow questions and a sense of being under suspicion can make it hard for people to give a full account of the barriers they face.
“Additional evidence that is often presented at tribunals, for example from someone’s health and social care professionals, could have been collected earlier in the process if DWP were more proactive in seeking it and if more support was available to help people through the application process, but the services that provide such support have faced huge cuts in recent years.”
Do you think the current system is fair? If you or someone you know has been affected by a decision regarding benefits in the past year, let us know what your experience was like.
