Atos declare ex steelworker fit for work

Why did he need the ambulance and what was his diagnosis?

having had a brain hemorrhage multiple heart attacks and a collapsed spine.

My father had a brain haemorrhage and worked another 20 years on the docks. Plenty of people have heart attacks and carry on working after - I walk with a guy of 65 years old who has had a triple by-pass, he walks 20 miles 3 times a week. Can't comment on the collapsed spine, except to say that if he is in a wheelchair, plenty of people work in that condition.

How do you get declared not fit for work, do you have to be 6 foot under?

No. You get declared not fit for work when you are not fit for work.

I know a bloke who was blind who drove a bus. 





















































Everybody on it died.

I think the point may have been missed slightly.

Yes, many people work after these medical problems. However, they do normally have a long period of recuperation. A time in which you are not fit to work. I think the OP is saying how ridiculous it is, that he has been declared fit for work smack bang in the middle of his health crisis.

smack bang in the middle of his health crisis.

Where does he say this?

The article it comes from just sounds like sensationalist cr@p to me.

I would say needing an ambulance after these types of health incidents puts you in the bracket of unfit for work for a while.

DON't HELP dustybin find ways to beat the system!

Well shab they didnt say what the ambulance was for but he was rushed into hospital before the interview had even finished as they were concerned for his life.

His GP has declared him unfit for work if that helps

makes you wonder what actually happens when doctors saving his life and the GP declare him unfit and yet ATOS say he is fit what happens then?

Do they take the opinion that is most convenient?

Its going to tribunal either way, and Id have good money on it getting over turned

Well shab they didnt say what the ambulance was for but he was rushed into hospital before the interview had even finished as they were concerned for his life.

So he knew what to say to get the ambulance to take him to hospital! I once worked in a building that housed a Medical Boarding unit. We had a bomb evacuation one day due to a package being found in a toilet cubicle. It turned out to be a box of ice that somebody had been using to cool their hands prior to the medical....

His GP has declared him unfit for work if that helps

One of the reasons Medical Boards were introduced was because the GPs were doing what they were told. Answer this question honestly - if you wanted a week off work, could you convince your GP to sign you off? Of course you could.

This ATOS crap needs to be stopped sharpish. Paying them commission for everyone they declare fit for work is completely obscene.

Paying them commission for everyone they declare fit for work is completely obscene.

So you have seen the contract? How do you know this?

It was ATOS who called the ambulance shab

Shab, it's well known that to keep their contract, they have to meet targets for returning people to work. The same thing as commission if you ask me.

40% get over turned at tribunal apparently
For every 10 that decide to challenge 4 are deemed incorrect decisions, not great that is it?

How are we going to pay for the people that dont want to work db ?

And what system would you use to manage it ?

I have no problem with ppl not wanting to work, give them the minimum.

40% overturned at tribunal doesnt suggest to me that they are culling excess, those are almost statistics of coin tossing

hopefully it will get better now this new contractor (whoever they may be) will be working alongside ATOS. The government have finally realised that they are not fully up to the job, the appeals procedure has cost £60 million alone. The trouble is many of the staff are not properly qualified for the job, they go on a short ATOS course and then get issued with a certificate. I read one story where a chiropodist went and worked for them after passing, ok for someone with foot problems I suppose.

1.01 weighed in

nonsense Ibrahima Sonko, you asked my opinion of something not relevant (or are you suggesting those 40% overturned were wrong to be overturned?) and I gave an honest answer.
Im neither disabled nor out of work

people with chronic health problems have a low quality of life.........some civil servant who asesses them does not realise the reality............if u force that person to get out of bed at 7am.....make him queue for the bus in the piddling rain.......force him to do some low end meaningless job while enduring discomfort and pain, his quality of life will be a lot worse. we are a civil society. you cant decide to force unhealthy people to make their lives ten times worse because the healthy and wealthy feel sorry for themselves..............o poor bloody u i say........if u are healthy u dont realise how lucky you are.

I asked how you would control it ?

Their is no perfect way but under labour it was out of control.

I dont know the answer but their has to be some sort effort by the people employed by their job title, you cant just stick your head in the sand labour like. their will be mistakes made but the answer isnt to just give everyone cash.

I have never believed that life was about slavery, its not about making people into drones for others to profit within a privatised culture.
There is a lot that could be done, but when the system is so endemic of only 'rectifying' one section of the problem then you are playing against a marked deck.
You are correct that there is no simple answer however, but man's greed has got in the way of everything

Agree with that.

I despise the fact that Britain is basically a franchise for  the rest of the world to skim off. we pay 25% on everything for the fun.

But you cannot have 3 families paying for 1 family that doesnt want to ever work.

Have to deal with what we have.

What I have a problem with is why is there an unequal struggle with ideologies?
The principles of Keynesianism bailed out capitalism, yet capitalism continually gets free reign to do whatever it needs while socialism gets mocked.
There are too many people with vested interests for integrity to come into play, money collected by the few while being unregulated is bad for economies.
At what point will people realise this?

The problem with socialism is that they cant do the maths, they want to please everyone and that is impossible.

What is needed is that government that owns 51% of every utility and employees top managers, but then the public would rage at those profits too.

I always find it funny when people knock russia or north korea.

"I always find it funny when people knock russia or north korea."

russia one of the most corrupt countries in the world.......
north korea........do i need to say anything

what u talking about lad?

The point before I go, is that like in this case, only 1 side of the problem gets 'addressed'. The 'shirkers' getting vilified and thats all.

bdj, i thought better of you.

Just because the other countries dress it as something else it is ok

You think russia is more corrupt than the uk ?

N Korea is a dictatorship, it would always look bad when you have the topless slut of capitalism doing a belly dance at its boarder, but that topless slag of excess only still breathes because of the actions of china manufacturing the endless crap and supporting the dollar.

yes russia is more corrupt than the UK...........russia is a cesspit of corruption.......ask any businessman who tried to do business there.......their institutions are bordering on evil

Shab seems to think there is no-one in the UK who through any form of illness or disability can't work.

I think you speak (write) from a very great deal of ignorance Shab.

The criteria for being found fit for work is an absolute embarrassment to any reasonable standard of civilized behaviour . In the words of one ATOS trainer " as long as you've got one finger and can press a button you will be found fit for work"

Shab , I remember you spouting absolute drivel about zero hour contracts , at least you're consistent in your breathtaking stupidity and heartlessness

ffs

Somebody on the politics forum, I forget who it was, says that ATOS get £620 for each one they declare fit for work.

And then tribunals get paid to declare them unfit.

Nice little earner on both sides for stopping peoples money while it goes on.

Shab, as much as I would like to waste time engaging you in discussion about why your opinions seem overtly right wing I would prefer just to cut to the chase and say you are a complete FUKKKKING WANNKER!

Somebody on the politics forum, I forget who it was, says that ATOS get £620 for each one they declare fit for work.

Does that make the politics forum the reference point of truth? If that were so, why wouldn't Atos find everyone unfit for work, so they would clean up?

And then tribunals get paid to declare them unfit.

Tribunals find some of them unfit. About 60% was quoted earlier. That means that in the borderline cases - which these are - they get it slightly more wrong than right. That needs to be improved.

Nice little earner on both sides for stopping peoples money while it goes on.

Their money doesn't get stopped. They still receive the rate of JSA, and all passport benefits, if eligible.

Shab, as much as I would like to waste time engaging you in discussion about why your opinions seem overtly right wing I would prefer just to cut to the chase and say you are a complete FUKKKKING WANNKER!

Engage me all you like - but the fact that you call me names says a lot about your depth of debating skills.

Shab seems to think there is no-one in the UK who through any form of illness or disability can't work.

I think you speak (write) from a very great deal of ignorance Shab.

I do believe there are many people unable to work. I don't believe there are 2.5 million people in that category. That's one person in 12 of the working age population.

This case in question must be the most egregious possible.
The guy was old, an ex steelworker (no doubt lost that job as thatcher closed down industry, my grandfather worked his whole working life in the rolling mills, they certainly ain't shirkers and would put the most poncified stuck up Tory city boy to shame) had numerous serious health issues enough for the GP to flat out disagree with ATOS AND was ATOS believed his life was in danger DURING the interview so much so THEY stopped the interview and called for an ambulance.

Still passed him fit.
I think the above evidence is evidence enough of what the tactics are.

I think the above evidence is evidence enough of what the tactics are.

Tactics is indeed the issue here. Let me put another possible scenario up for you to consider. Given that we don't know the facts of the case, we cannot know where this case actually sits in the spectrum of possibilities.

One one side, the guy has had serious health issues, some of which may remain, and was so ill in his medical he had to be carted off to hospital. So he should remain on the sick.

If he were still very ill I would agree with you. I also think Atos would too.

But the other side of the argument could be this. He has had health issues in the past that he has largely recovered from, which still affect his health but not so much. Being a redundant steelworker, he might well be in receipt of an additional redundancy payment that is on-going, and would stop if he were ever to find a job (my father in law was a miner and got that from 1984 until he retired 15 years later). So that payment, plus his extra for incapacity benefit (and maybe DLA too) is a BIG position to defend. So the guy goes into the medical with a lot hanging on to him being found unfit. He has to do anything to get through. Anything. What better way than to need an ambulance during the medical? How can anybody dispute he is ill if that happens? So he feigns some illness, and Atos call the ambulance to cover their ass - they don't want somebody dying on their patch - the PR is bad enough already. Atos then find him fit for work - presumably at a new medical, or off the original medical if they had done enough of it to be able to come to an assessment [which, if you think about it, could explain the sudden 'illness' when the claimant realised he was done for].

I have worked in the benefit system for 15 years, 6 years at the front line. I have seen it all. Until you have interviewed a heroin addict who is clucking in front of you and telling you every lie in the book to get what they want, getting increasing louder and violent when they realise they are not going to get what they want, you will never understand. An ex-colleague told me recently that one of his claimants was told she had to look for work as her child had reached the age threshold for requiring her to now start finding work. She was not happy and said the only way out was to get pregnant. 3 months later, this single parent turned up to report pregnancy. With people around who do that, a little performance in a medical to pretend you are ill is nothing.

The DWP doctors never used to let you know the result of an examination.

It comes by post.

I would assume that ATOS works the same way. 

If if does, then this man had no idea if he had failed or been passed as fit for work.

Regardless of your views on this case, I would find it slightly eye-popping that a French company are deciding that people should work!!

I think the DWP decide Billy, ATOS just collate the info

My original point shab was to ask, what does one need to be to be declared unfit?
You suggest that it might be some elaborate hoax, that the GP may be corruptible and that his very real health problems may not impinge on him working, he might be defending a pension after showing willingness when young to graft......all conjecture that you use against what may or may not be total integrity.
Thats a lot of supposition to guess whether somebody is fit or not, might the probability suggest it more likely that ATOS are simply getting it wrong?
40% suggests so doesnt it?

atos are the biggets bunch of ^^^^ers

twice ive had serious run ins with them.

once they tried to wind me up on a phone assesment...i replied with a verbal blast any tourette sufferes would have been shocked at.

the second time they lost my records but miraculously found them when i threatened to sue them.....well it was stuff i needed for a tribunal.....

My original point shab was to ask, what does one need to be to be declared unfit?

They should be unfit if they are not able to do any job. That means that if this ex-steelworker can sit in a chair all day, has reasonable eyesight and hearing and use of at least one hand, then he could work in a call centre, for example. The woman last week who claimed she was unfit, yet had brought up 3 children could work as a domestic help - she had done it for her own children but was too ill to do it for a job?

You suggest that it might be some elaborate hoax, that the GP may be corruptible and that his very real health problems may not impinge on him working, he might be defending a pension after showing willingness when young to graft......all conjecture

I'm saying that it is a possibility. We don't know the facts. In all of these cases, why doesn't the publication, or a trades union, or somebody, publish the full facts of the medical condition of the person and of the Atos medical - why do we always just get their sad story? If they want sympathy, show full disclosure and let us all see what exactly is going on. Does it not worry you that this has never happened?

the probability suggest it more likely that ATOS are simply getting it wrong?

It is quite possible, even quite probable, that Atos have got it wrong. However, without the full facts of this case, neither of us can say that they have or have not.

The media are focused on the wrong issue.....there aint no EFFING jobs so what does it matter???

Id love to know the facts shab, Id love even more to see the 'algorithm' that they use to determine what constitutes ability to work divided by quality of life, Id say there is a duty to make it be known, it is up to some sort of regulation to force this info, the individual doesnt have this information all they can give is the evidence of their side, and such as in this case imo the evidence is damning.

...and for what it's worth, I don't think the likes of ATOS would reveal such information without being forced.
They would likely contest a review through arbitration but when they lose 4 out of every 10 I'd suggest they just get on with the next.
Where is the examination of tactics/ideology here?
Is it ok to have terrible statistics in the pursuit of bulling the disabled or vilifying the poor?

this is a well written piece on the whole subject of how the government are, as usual, targeting the weakest groups of society:

http://www.campaignforafairsociety.com/2013/03/dr-simon-duffy-on-full-facts-where-to-find-them/

Ooops, this is the link to the original report:

http://www.centreforwelfarereform.org/library/by-az/a-fair-society1.html

Sorry Badger but that is another load of leftie cr@p. I read this far ...

The truth is:

Disabled people and people in poverty did not cause the current debt crisis, and targeting them for cuts will not solve the crisis.

So the author doesn't know the difference between debt and deficit. Good start. Targeting them will not solve the problem of the deficit on its own, but will help.


Social care is not being protected, it will be severely cut, for it is the major activity of local authorities.

Maybe true, but it will force the Local Authority to target to the most needy. Remember that the DLA money that people get is not beer money - it is to pay for services that they need.


Benefit fraud is rare and disabled people and people in poverty commit much less fraud than other citizens

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA. What planet is this guy on? Obviously never been near a benefit office in his life.

Would you say benefit fraud accounts for 40% of the total paid out shab?
If you don't then we have a problem don't we?

As far as the total amount of fraud committed by a sub group I would suggest the ppl in poverty doesn't come anywhere near the amount wormed out of the system by entities within the private sector after self regulation was imposed.
Just look at the list of immoral actions from insider trading to PPI miss-selling from price fixing to inflated bonuses as well as corrupt Libor settings etc.....and this list is so long I can't start to do it justice, and these are the ones that have come to light.....how many more exist?

I heard a statistic on the BBC recently. The total figure of money that has thought to have avoided the correct taxation by individuals is in the trillions of pounds worldwide, a figure that reportedly would solve world poverty numerous times over.

Who do you think has squirrelled this money away shab?
The poor....the disabled?

If Stephen Hawking can still work then some of these claimants should be ashamed of themselves.

Shab
04 Aug 13 17:42   
My original point shab was to ask, what does one need to be to be declared unfit?

They should be unfit if they are not able to do any job. That means that if this ex-steelworker can sit in a chair all day, has reasonable eyesight and hearing and use of at least one hand, then he could work in a call centre, for example

You've obviously never heard an irate cockney on the phone.

Get the impression there is a lot of resentment towards people on benefits, some of it comes across as jealousy ( I wish I didn't have to work syndrome) and the other is scapegoating because they are hacked off with their own life's. Basically their hacked off so blame minority groups.
  A microcosm of what happened in Nazi germany in the 1930 s where the Jews were scapegoated and blamed for all Germany's problems.
    Those with a clear head can cut through the BS and see what's going on.

well shab, I'll take the considered views of a respected academic in his field over your distorted vision of reality all day long

I have seen people taken off sick who are not fit for work

I have seen people left on sick who are

TBH it all comes down to how well you can Act and Lie imo

The people they get off sick, tend to be the most vulnerable, they cannot defend themselves

We live in a society which places greed above all other values ( and sex of course)
and encourage self interest..we have very few other values

So should we be surprised at the result, look at what the banks did to us

I don't know the answer
anyway no one would pay me for it if I did..I'm greedy as well

so basically people ..will do whatever brings them in most money
be it work, live on benefits or sick..

The situation would be helped if there were more jobs available

Unusual for ebulgery to lose the plot - but here he surely has!

Society does certainly NOT place greed above all other values - merely individuals within it, and not may at that I propose.
The majority merely wish to live comfortably with their own perception of quality of life.
'People' in general do not do whatever brings most moeny - very far from it!
Have you been unwell over the weekend Ebulgery?

rickibobby is right on the money and blades your wasting your breath ,they just dont get it,

Shab has done well on this thread imv.

He stands up for the ordinary job seeker actively seeking work. He stands up for the principle that there should be some tests in place to discriminate between people who should be excused this requirement on incapacity grounds ( to seek work, they don't necessarily have to find it ) and those who should not. He stands up for the principle that there should also be an appeals process, although to read some of the responses, you'd think that having an assessment process followed by an appeals process makes you some kind of murdering nazi.

he stands up for a corrupt policy designed to attack the weakest groups in society, added to which he sounds a proper cant imo

Oh dear, Mr Badger opposes not the implementation ( which is being done by a less than desirable for-profit IT company ) but he opposes the 'corrupt policy' behind it. Is this for real? Does he really mean that. Does he really believe that the last government should not attempt to DISCRIMINATE between people who claim to be incapacitated and those who actually are, and we should take the claimant's word for it. That we should allow what started under MaggieT where GPs can tell people that they will never be employable again, ever.

That's what he's actually saying if he opposes the 'corrupt policy' behind it.

For information: the weakest group in society is the working person earning just enough not to qualify for any means-tested benefits. They don't have advocacy organisations. And even if they did, they wouldn't have time to ask for help from them. Because they're busy. And the government taxes them 20% income tax, 12% national insurance, 13.8% employers national insurance ( which the worker pays for but doesn't see on his top line ), and then has 20% of most consumption taken off him to boot, or more if it's petrol or a glass of malt after a tough day.

the weakest people in society are those who have a low quality of life because they have health problems.

We can't always agree Ivor I am sad to say
..but a good thing I would say, we need a variety of opinions

It is certainly a society of consumerism if not greed, so everybody seeks more money at just about the expense of
everything else to buy these things

People in different positions in society have different perceptions

Sadly for some people benefits or being sick is their main source of income
..you may not like it, but I believe that is the truth of it

and I stay say they are probably taking the wrong people off sick

still

it is not those on sick who have got us into the economic mess we are in

The basic problem here is this

nobody can actually tell with complete certainty whether someone is actually unfit for work
or whether they are just feigning they are unfit for work

If we could determine this with certainty there would be no problem, would there

So we either have a system that ensures all those unfit for work don't have to work,
but will include some feigning sickness

or we have a system where nobody gets away with feigning sickness
but inevitably some people genuinely unfit for work will be passed fit for work

so everybody has to take their choice

Ibrahima Sonko   

02 Aug 13 21:09   

bdj, i thought better of you.

Just because the other countries dress it as something else it is ok Cry

You think russia is more corrupt than the uk ?

If you had ever been or had business in Russia, you would be embarrassed by your lack of knowledge here. We have our forms of corruption, but they are something else entirely. I have never bribed a policeman in the UK; it was a weekly occurrence over there!

brain dead jockeys
Date Joined: 14 Jun 05
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02 Aug 13 20:26
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people with chronic health problems have a low quality of life.........some civil servant who asesses them does not realise the reality............if u force that person to get out of bed at 7am.....make him queue for the bus in the piddling rain.......force him to do some low end meaningless job while enduring discomfort and pain, his quality of life will be a lot worse. we are a civil society. you cant decide to force unhealthy people to make their lives ten times worse because the healthy and wealthy feel sorry for themselves..............o poor bloody u i say........if u are healthy u dont realise how lucky you are.



Spot on.