Recommendation 75

The DWP’s preferred approach for administering disability benefits in the UK centres on a contracted-out assessment process, involving face to face assessments to gain information and assess a claimant’s capability for work to determine the level of entitlement. The Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work, Justin Tomlinson MP, told us that the ‘face to face assessment builds your case and it explores things.’179 The Minister did mention that these assessments ‘cause anxiety’180 for claimants, who often also have to collect and provide a range of supporting evidence. He highlighted that there was an upcoming health and disability Green Paper that ‘will look at the ability to gather supportive evidence’181 because a claimant is ‘more likely to get that through a paper based review than a full traditional face-to-face assessment.’182