News

STOP PRESS: You can now use our online form to take part in the Harrington review.

Professor Harrington, the independent reviewer of the work capability assessment for employment and support allowance, wants to hear from claimants as he gathers evidence for his third review. The latest call for evidence was issued on 12 July and will run until 7 September 2012. Emails have been sent to people who participated in the past, but anyone is welcome to contribute.

Professor Harrington says that he is particularly interested to discover if claimants have noticed an improvement in the WCA as a result of the changes that were introduced after his first review:

“​The first call for evidence obtained a vast amount of evidence about the fairness and effectiveness of the process;​ the second call for evidence was more focused, asking questions about specific conditions. This year’​s call for evidence has been designed with the claimant’​s experiences in mind and tries to establish if there have been improvements following my recommendations. I ask you to reflect back on a WCA that you may have had in the past and compare it to your most recent WCA experienc​e.”​

So, if you are by now a veteran of the work capability assessment, Harrington would especially like to hear from you:

“​I am particularly interested in three areas of the WCA process –​ communications, the face to face assessment and the decision making process. These are the areas where I think claimants will be experiencing the most change as my first year’​s recommendations take effect. I have therefore focused on these areas within the call for evidence and ask you to rate your experience of each. Please use the space at the end of each section to provide me with more detail about specific experiences that you may have had. There is also additional space at the end of the document should you require it.”​

You can download the full consultation document from this page on the DWP website.

Or you can simply download the .pdf file here