Reblogged from Michael Meacher MP:
It’s taken long enough, like 6 months, to coax the Minister responsible for
Atos under IDS, Mark Hoban, finally to come round to receiving a delegation from
those with deep and lengthy experience of Atos/DWP procedures over WCA. But it
look as though he is now prepared to see us soon after Parliament returns on 2
September.It has been a convoluted journey. First he tool exception to certain
words used by Prof. Peter Beresford in his foreword to the People’s Review of
WCA written by the Spartacus network, a report of more than 100 pages. That
caused me to apply for an Adjournment debate in the House to press the Minister
on why it was not reasonable to reject a delegation to discuss a carefully
drafted report of over 100 pages because of a single sentence that wasn’t even
part of it. The Minister however did not attend because his plane developed
engine trouble in Glasgow, but his junior minister read out his speech and after
repeated pressure seemed to agree to a meeting provided it was a ‘constructive
engagement’.
Still nothing happened, so I waylaid Hoban in the lobby and asked him why he
still hadn’t responded to my earlier requests. He said he wanted to hear from
Spartacus themselves as to what they were proposing. I therefore asked Sue
Marsh to write to him direct, which she duly did in a detailed letter, together
with a systematic background report which turned out to be the latest assessment
of the evidence 68 pages long. Still we waited another 6 weeks without any
reply, and I therefore stopped him again in the lobby and asked why we hadn’t
heard from him. He said he’d never received the letter! I was amazed, but
promptly sent him a copy of Sue’s letter plus the full accompanying report.
Again there was no immediate response, but this time after a week I confronted
him about it. He said he had received the letter, and added that he had now
‘fished the original out of the system’! I again pressed for an early
meeting, and he provisionally agreed to a meeting in September which I’m
confident will now take place.
It shouldn’t have to be like this, but this is certainly now an opportunity
we should grasp with both hands. As Sue herself said in her letter to him,
Spartacus “aimed to offer solutions to extremely complex issues and to provide
reasoned and helpful research. Our work is written by respected individuals
and academics who are all sick and disabled themselves and is based on real life
experience. We always hoped this would help government to make compassionate
decisions”.
