Meeting of the Parliament 02 April 2014
I am glad to have been given the opportunity to talk about mental health issues here today. A number of members have looked at some of the positives that have happened in that regard in the past number of years, and long may that situation continue.
However, like Mr Macintosh, I think that a number of major issues are holding Scotland back from being able to improve its mental health. I think that the key to that is welfare reform. As Mr Macintosh has, I have heard at the Welfare Reform Committee many stories that are horrid, to say the least. Iain Duncan Smith has said that he is on a “historic mission”—as William Wilberforce was in his campaign to end the slave trade—to help people “break free”. I would not describe the welfare reform policies in that way. The welfare reforms are stripping people with mental health issues of their independence and dignity and, often, of their hope.
Donald McKenzie from Support in Mind Scotland said at the Welfare Reform Committee:
“The impact of ESA has been devastating on the mental health of claimants, who have been stressed and often traumatised by the process. They have been made to feel like frauds for suffering poor mental health, and have been disbelieved by the Atos staff carrying out the assessments. I believe that many medical examiners have little experience of mental health issues, do not take into account any additional evidence from other mental health professionals, and do not seek supportive evidence from GPs and so on. Our service users are baffled and angry that they are subjected to this distressing and stressful process when they are clearly unfit to work. The process itself causes deterioration in mental health and leads to further depression and anxiety.”
Later in his evidence, that gentleman said:
“My job should be about helping people to feel better about themselves in order to improve their mental health, but in reality most of my work is on benefits, in which I have to talk people down and dig into the dark corners to get information. A person who has made a recent suicide attempt will get 15 points and will get their ESA.”—[Official Report, Welfare Reform Committee, 18 February 2014; c 1247, 1270.]
That is a sad indictment of the Tory-Liberal welfare reforms. If Mr Hume is truly serious about improving Scotland’s mental health, he will have to look closely at his Westminster Government’s welfare reforms, which are having a major effect on people’s lives.
Inclusion Scotland has an informative news section on its website. One story, about a woman in her early 50s, states:
“The Mental Welfare Commission for Scotland said the woman ... took her own life less than a month after an Atos assessor gave her zero points in a work capability assessment and docked her weekly benefits by nearly 30%.
The MWC said it could find no other reason why the woman, named only as Miss DE, would kill herself at her home on New Year’s Eve 2011.
She had no history of suicidal behaviour, was hoping to return to work and was about to get married.
After an exhaustive investigation, including interviews with all the mental health professionals involved in her treatment, her GP, friends and local welfare rights team and the Atos and Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) staff involved in her case, the commission concluded the assessment was to blame.”
If we want to improve mental health in this country, we must stop those unfair work capability assessments.