David Cameron + Incapacity Benefit + Basic Arithmetic = FAIL

David Cameron has announced that he wants to reassess every person on Incapacity Benefit to see if they are fit for work within three years of a Conservative election victory.  Let’s do some maths.  (No, wait, come back!)

I’m dreading this programme

The programme in question is Benefit Busters, which starts on Channel 4 tomorrow *checks clock* today.  Why am I dreading it?  Because I’ve seen the trailer.

Sometimes I think it would be nice

…if people could just do their damn jobs.
Sorry, everyone, I’ve got my grumpy hat on today.  Feel free to wander away elsewhere if you don’t feel like overhearing my Mutley-esque mutterings.
Today I got two letters in the post.  Neither was from the DWP, which means I’ve now been waiting for over two months to find [...]

The importance of heating

Right, this is the first post appearing as part of my new resolution to try and up the frequency of posts to this blog as a kind of self-help strategy.  I’m hoping my quality control doesn’t plunge through the floor too badly, but part of the plan is that I’m not going to spend as [...]

A psychotic edge

No, no, it’s ok, I don’t mean U2’s guitarist has started believing his underpants are receiving thought-transmissions from Rory McGrath.  (Although, frankly, it would explain a lot…)
The title to this post is a quote from the referral letter sent by Yvonne (the Nurse Specialist who has had the nightmare job of trying to psychoanalyse me) [...]

Incapacity benefit: personal capability assessment (PCA)

Ok, to start with, some disclaimers.  Please don’t treat anything I say as gospel truth.  If I say something in this, then as far as I’m aware it’s true, but I could be wrong.
If you’re applying for Incapacity Benefit (IB), or facing a re-assessment, then the single most important piece of advice is this: go [...]

Incapacity benefit update no. 1

I seem to remember that I said I would keep you up to date with the progress of my re-assessment for Incapacity Benefit, so this is the first progress report.  You can imagine some sort of exciting fanfare if you’re the sort of person who likes imagining exciting fanfares, or you can just go for [...]

ohshitohshitohshit

That was my reaction this morning when I saw a fat brown A5 envelope lying on the doormat.  I knew from the shape and thickness of the envelope that it contained the standard questionnaire that gets sent out to evil, malingering scum like me when the DWP feel that it’s time to harass us a [...]

You should read this

I’m reasonably certain that pretty much everyone who reads this blog also reads Mental Nurse and Mental Patient About Town, via whose links I found this, but in case not:
You should read this article from the New Statesman.  It covers some of the same ground to a post I wrote a while ago, which was [...]

Aethelread’s Adventures in Benefit-land

This is the second half of a post about the benefit system.  The first half of the post is here, and dealt with the issue in a fairly general way.  This half is going to deal more with my own experiences.  And, yes, you’re right, it is later going up than I said it would [...]