Department for Work and Pensions

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) is the British Government's department responsible for state pensions, and welfare including sickness benefits.

Biopsychosocial view
The September 2015 manual for Employment and Support Allowance disability assessors (released under Freedom of Information Act law) states:

"Psychological and social factors appear to be involved in perpetuating the symptoms of the illness. Factors associated with increased fatigue and severity of the condition include: a strong belief in the physical cause of the illness, a focus on bodily sensations and a poor sense of control over the complaints. Evidence suggests that patients with CFS/ME use more avoidance strategies to cope with the debilitating effects of fatigue. However avoidance strategies have been associated with more fatigue and more functional impairment, including greater psychosocial disturbance in CFS/ME".

PACE trial
The Department of Work and Pensions paid £90,000 in funding towards the PACE trial. Attorney Mike Godwin commented "It seems clear to me that the PACE trial will continue to be used to deny patients benefits. That sucks".

Malingering and illness deception
The Department for Work and Pensions provided funding for a Malingering and Illness Deception meeting in Woodstock, Oxford, UK, which formed the basis of a book by the same name, published in 2003. Attending the meeting, and acknowledged in the book, was PACE trial principle author Professor Peter D. White. Professor Michael Sharpe, a principle investigator of the PACE trial wrote the chapter Distinguishing malingering from psychiatric disorders, and Sir Simon Wessely, who was a center manager during the PACE trial and helped design it, wrote the chapter Malingering: historical perspectives.

Reports and publications

 * 2014, Personal Independence Payment Handbook


 * 2014, An Independent Review of the Work Capability Assessment - year 5


 * 2017, Employment and Support Allowance: Work Capability Assessments, mandatory reconsiderations and appeals: ESA-WCA outcomes to December 2016 (MRs to April 2017)


 * 2017, Personal Independence Payment: official statistics: data to April 2017

Notable studies and articles critical of the DWP

 * 2016, The moral economy of austerity: analysing UK welfare reform (Full text)
 * 2017, Blaming the victim, all over again: Waddell and Aylward’s biopsychosocial (BPS) model of disability (Full text)
 * 2018, Psychological tyranny prescribed by the DWP: preventable harm is government policy (Full text)

News articles

 * 2016, UN: 'Grave' disability rights violations under UK reforms


 * 2017, Government spending cuts have caused 'human catastrophe' for disabled people, UN committee says
 * Government welfare cuts


 * 2018, Visualising disability benefit appeals


 * 2018, ESA underpayment: Who is entitled to backdated benefits?
 * 2018, Charities call for action over benefits after 25,000 disabled people in Yorkshire launched appeals last year

Online presence

 * Twitter
 * Facebook
 * YouTube
 * Website

Learn more

 * Wikipedia - Department for Work and Pensions
 * 2014, Ten things to remember when filling in the Employment and Support Allowance forms - ME Association
 * 2016, A deeply dehumanising experience: M.E./CFS journeys through the PIP claim process in Scotland - Action for ME