Complaints about the personal independence payment (PIP) assessment process rose by nearly 900 per cent last year – from 142 to 1,391 – apparently corroborating the results of a year-long Disability News Service investigation. The Department for Work and Pensions figures also show that the number of complaints about PIP assessments that were upheld rose by more than 700 per cent in the same year (from 67 in 2015-16 to 545 in 2016-17). The figures provide probably the strongest evidence yet to support the findings of the investigation carried out by Disability News Service (DNS) into claims of widespread dishonesty at the heart of the PIP assessment process. Labour’s shadow work and pensions secretary, Debbie Abrahams, said the “huge increase” showed that the healthcare professionals who carry out the assessments must be held to account. She said the figures were also “an absolute indictment of the Tories’ punitive assessments and the miserable effect they are having on people trying to
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