ATOS are a private profit making company who carry out medical examinations on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). They are currently recruiting more staff to help meet Government targets to force more people off disability benefits and Employment and Support Allowance (formerly Incapacity Benefit) to reduce the public debt problem caused by banks gambling in the financial markets. The process is driven by cost cutting not objective medical opinion. The most vulnerable in society are being made to pay for the greed of others and the inevitable fluctuations of capitalism. There are plans to extend these distressing and anxiety inducing tests to those who will be entitled to the replacement for Disability Living Allowance in a further effort to deter people from claiming benefits and reduce costs.

Medical professionals with no experience of mental health problems, for example, are only given a matter of days training before making assessments of claimants. They are paid substantially more than NHS doctors and nurses for leaving their ethical concerns at the door. ATOS claim that they do not make the decision as to whether someone can work and have their benefits reduced, but that the decision is made by the DWP from their report and that performance targets are based simply on the number of claimants seen in a day. However they admit that if a medical professional passes all claimants for disability benefits it will not go unnoticed.

We will be giving out leaflets advising claimants on how to deal with the medical examination:  http://www.edinburghagainstpoverty.org.uk/node/5