The Scandal of DWP Silence

/ jaynel62

We know from  the official DWP report that between January & November 2011 10,600 disabled people either in receipt of or awaiting benefits died.

Since then the DWP have, despite numerous requests refused to release further updates; we can only speculate their reason why, as we can only surmise just how many more disabled people have since lost their lives?

It is well documented how the ‘Scrounger‘ rhetoric have adversely affected disabled people  and those who are chronically ill, and even Esther McVey – Minister of State for DWP stated she “would not disagree” when it was put to her in October 2013 that “ hundreds or even thousands of people who had died sooner than they should have done, or had a much lower quality of life over their last few weeks or months because of their experience of the WCA.”.

From this we believe it is safe to presume there has been an increase in the number of annual deaths of disabled people in 2012 & 2013; given the loss of life in 2011 was 10,600, even a 2% increase per annum would result in  12,720 in 2012 and a startling 15,264 in 2013. That would give a overall figure of 38,564 deaths over the 3 years the Coalition has been in Government.

Is this shocking statistic what the DWP don’t want us to know?

44 thoughts on “The Scandal of DWP Silence”

  1. I believe there are two ‘live’ FOI requests currently on this issue…hope we get a response soon….and I hope that the deliberate silence isn’t buying them time to cover up the magnitude of the death toll 😦

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  2. Well said Jayne. I’ve got an awful feeling that the death rate figure may be even higher than your conservative estimate.
    He’s up before the work and pensions committee today regarding the debacle that is Universal Credit; here’s hoping Anne Begg and Glenda Jackson manage to ask him about WCA mortality statistics too!

    Kind regards as always X

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  3. Pingback: The Scandal of DWP Silence | Welfare, Disabilit...

  4. Reblogged this on Vox Political and commented:
    Jayne speculates on the possibility that deaths of people receiving or awaiting incapacity benefits have risen – and even a small percentage rise produces shocking numbers.
    Of course, I have a tribunal hearing pending, after which I hope the DWP will be ordered to release the figures; one of my contentions is that the department’s refusal to release them in the past had no legal basis.
    Hopefully, it’s only a matter of months until we get proper numbers.

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    • Wishing you good luck from all of us for the tribunal. This is competing with the PIP scandal (6 months minimum to establish a claim), which is undoubtedly causing additional anguish, pain, poverty and death before getting entitled benefits.
      Jayne, glad you’re keeping the profile of this issue high. One death would be a scandal, but 10’s of thousands goes beyond a tragedy, and into the realms of crimes against humanity. We can only hope that the next government are not only NOT this bunch, but that the evil machine that the DWP has become is totally demolished and replaced with something fit for purpose. MPs like Glenda Jackson and Michael Meacher, and of course the wonderful Dennis Skinner give me hope that Labour can & will do the right thing. If course, their “one member one vote” policy would be a good place for us all to get involved, as did our grandparents and those before who fought for the Welfare State, and we have to fight again to restore it.

      We need the Bullingdon bullies exposed and disgraced to the wider electorate for the class based war on the poorest, for bringing death to our own people. We may then begin to hope for a better Britain, and a return to the consensus politics of the Welfare State, and not the savagery of Flashman bullies and their sociopathic corporatist values.

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  5. fogive me for scamming some of your content im posting not for the modern term of sympathy as that will not make me well will not help my child ect ect …I AM POSTING BECAUSE I HAVE BOWEL CANCER and i have been found fit for work lol ..I a. posting for reality to your words my dear as a witness . I face a dreadful death my child god my child im all she has …i’ll tell it how it is till im gone x

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    • Hi debs, so glad you posted again. I have been hunting for your last comment on another blog but could not find it but have been thinking about your situation a lot. You have fought this before and won so you are a survivor and can do it again if only to piss them off. What worked before? There is a fantastic self healing prescription on Dr Lissa Rankin’s Mind Over Medicine site. It’s a fantastic book and there is a brilliant healing meditation you can download and use every morning. This may help with the stress. Then over on the Thrive site you will find lots of ideas for helping with the cancer itself. Yes, posting all the time to us will help but do it to your MP as well. Do you have someone who can be your advocate and fight your corner with the DWP to make sure you don’t get sanctioned? Do you have family or a close neighbour to help with the arrangements for your child? Keep us posted and good, good luck.
      Lovexxx

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    • Debbie God bless can I help?Is there nobody to help your daughter? I am in Scotland but even if it’s only a listening ear or advice would like to help.

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  6. I hope that we do get the figures of the number of disabled and long term sick that have died due to the WCA and who had also been wrongly assessed as being fit for work! We need those numbers to go public before the election, we also need them to be spread around the media as this is serious!
    I feel the number is going to be a lot larger than anyone expects and this is the reason why they won’t give out the number – they have no right to keep that figure from us, so it must be high enough for them to be scared! I think it will be enough for them to lose the election AND be tried in court for crimes against humanity. I know it all takes a long time but I so want IDS, Fraud and McVey to be punished NOW – but I have to be patient which is rather hard to do when you are being called a scrounger, or told to get out of the wheelchair each time I go into town! I’m more or less housebound as it is – now I will have to go completely housebound because I can’t take it any more!
    I pray every morning and every night for those who are responsible for the deaths and the suffering of so many people, to find out just how we have to suffer and try to live like us but in a world of silence – that’s what they need first – their voice and I want it taken from them!

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  10. if they ever get out thenthere would be a public outcry against them but they manipulating the news the bbc 4and 5 tv so getting any sence of truth out to joe public is like hitting that brick wall you bet there is someone there collecting these figures but until they show themselves then we are knackered but I can tell you one of my lifelong long friends who had worked up till about 15yrs befors his death had gone to atos found and placed in the wrag but sadly died about 12hrs before his meeting to see whot work he could do yet another one to add that growing number of deaths through this evil lot of very greedie people jeff3

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    • Jeff. I heartily agree with what you say about TV coverage. Tonight on Channel 5 there’s a discussion program about benefits. I thought it was another piece of sh*t like Channel 4’s Benefits Street but, with Owen Jobnes and Jack Monroe, it might be worth watching to see if they can get the truth over to the publi.

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  14. Pingback: The Scandal of DWP Silence | jaynelinney | kickingthecat

  15. Reblogged this on Britain Isn't Eating and commented:
    Even when we do get the figures out of them I doubt the Tory press would even publicise them. We need to ensure that the National press cant ignore the amount of deaths caused under this coalition, our blogs and social media will help do that, thanks to everyone for allowing us to share.

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    • Then we will have to take it to the streets, in every town & village. We will have to make sure that there is no-one who has not seen the figures, (we just can’t make them grow a conscience). I will put up a banner on the front of my house, which is in a village on a bus route. Could we all do this? It only needs an old sheet, or a piece of cardboard, and a part-used tin of paint (free from the recycling of you know the guys, or neighbours). I’m housebound, mainly, but I can still try & get the message out.

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  20. Thanks for this Jayne Linney. Very much appreciated.

    The fact is that the British medical profession should be the institution keeping tabs on the health outcomes of any doctor-patient interaction, whether they take place in the NHS, private medicine or at the DWP and Atos. It is responsible for regulating and governing the ethical conduct of doctors and the organisations they work for.

    As we all know though, there is no way to medically report, register and record harms and deaths of patients subjected to the DWP’s biopsychosocial medicine upon which the unethical and unscientific ESA regime rests. The GMC, NMC (Nursing & Midwifery Council) nor the CQC (Care Quality Commission) seem to care less about the unethical and criminally fraudulent activities of health professionals working for the DWP and Atos.

    The evidence of medical harm and unethical conduct of health professionals at the DWP and Atos is vast and overwhelming yet the British medical profession allow it to continue unregulated, unregistered and unexamined.

    I am often struck by the vast amount of effort that is put into debunking and discrediting the relatively benign treatment known as homoeopathy on the part of many British medical professionals. Yet these same champions of medical science and ethics are absolutely silent about the pseudo-science of biopsychosocial medicine which is responsible for the very real deaths of tens of thousands of patients with hundreds of thousands more terrorised and traumatised by it with no end in sight.

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  22. Hi again Jayne, I thought you might like to see this, a freedom of information response from the ministry of Justice today:
    https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/199055/response/494719/attach/html/4/Final.xls.html

    The 2011 document says they don’t include those waiting for appeal I don’t think anyway. The figures released today however do, at that link, up until December 2013 (68 in total – 11 in 2010, 22 in 2011, 11 again in 2012, then 24 in 2013). If the figures who’ve died waiting for appeal have stayed relative to the other figures, then it appears that what we all presumed was right. As you’ve said in this post. There has been an increase in deaths since 2010. I’m not sure of that in % terms though, plus we don’t know of course if those figures have stayed relative to the other figures.

    All the best as always

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