Page 135 - Reforming Benefits Decision-Making

5. Going forward the DWP and NHS should continue to work together to enable
sharing of medical information between them (with the appropriate claimant
consent and data protection in place). Once this is possible claimants should
no longer be required to provide any medical information. This means they
will only need to provide reports, statements or diaries from carers or family
members (para 2.26).

6. If assessors intend to rely on informal observations, they should tell the
claimants and give them an opportunity to explain why these may not
necessarily be an accurate reflection of their condition (para 2.29).

7. Assessment reports and decision letters should:

a) Respond to all the evidence provided by the claimant or obtained by the
HCP/decision-maker. This should include explaining why certain
evidence is being given less weight or not being relied upon.
b) Where a claimant’s own account of their impairment is rejected, there
should be a strong evidential basis for doing so which should be fully
explained.
c) Explicitly address conflicts between evidence (para 2.30).

8. A copy of the assessment report should automatically be provided to the
claimant along with the decision (para 2.33).

9. All health and disability assessments should be audio recorded on an ‘opt-out’
basis. Decision letters should make clear that a copy of the recording can be
requested. If an ‘opt-out’ basis is not possible, at a minimum the WCA and
PIP forms updated so that they include a tick-box for claimants to indicate
whether they want their assessment to be recorded, rather than having to make
a request separately to the assessment provider (paras 2.37 and 2.39).

10. Decision-makers should address contradictions between the HCP report and
other evidence and not merely repeat extracts or summaries of the assessment
report. They should express their own view, based on their own reasoning
(para 2.43).

126