Benefits and work newsletter September :- Support Group Appeals: Your Real-Life Experiences

IB to ESA support group without a medical
“. . . thanks once again to the fantastic guides on here, my migration from long term incapacity benefit with top up income support over to ESA has been straight forward & successful as I've been placed straight into the Support Group (the right group for me & also without a medical)”
Lyndsay

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Support group appeals:  your real-life experiences

Dear rob,

Getting into the employment and support allowance (ESA) support group has become desperately important to tens of  thousands of people.

It already offers protection from the pressures and sanctions of the work programme.  And from April 2012, if the welfare reform bill goes through unamended, it may be the only way for claimants currently on contribution-based ESA to get any further ESA payments at all. As one former soldier, now coping  with the mental and emotional effects of wartime service told us:

“If they do not see sense and place me into the Support Group, it really is a matter of life and death come April as I am already struggling as it is.”

In our last edition we asked you to tell us about your experience of appealing to be moved from the work-related activity group to the support group.  In Support Group Appeals: Your Experiences  (members only) we look at:

Benefits and work newsletter August 16th. Medicals - who gets called in?

ESA success and now DLA success!!!
I hope my post will give members & others a boost especially those with ME/CFS like myself & those with fluctuating conditions.

In July this year following reassessment I was moved from the WRAG to the Support Group with ESA (CB). Buoyed by this success I applied for DLA. The infamous 'brown envelope' arrived a few days ago & I was absolutely stunned to read I had been awarded both higher rate mobility & higher rate care for 4 years!!! without having to have a medical or my GP being asked for a report . . .

This site and everything it provides is close to being priceless. If I hadn't found this site by chance 18 months ago and made the decision to join & renew my subscription I would never have been as successful with my claims as I have.

B and W is quite literally a life saver - thank you so very much.
mayflower

Lots more feedback at the end of this email. 
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Medicals - who gets called in?

Benefits and work newsletter August Urgent call to action

Dear rob,
The usual newsletter will be out on Friday, after our August break.

However, we have just received several emails from organisations including Carer Watch and The Broken of Britain about what is claimed to be government attempts to stifle opposition to the Welfare Reform Bill currently being debated in the House of Lords..

There is no time for us to check out the accuracy of these claims – the deadline for doing anything is 3.30pm today - but as the issue is potentially an important one we are passing it on to you, unverified though it is.  There are several email addresses at the end of the article of people to contact.
Urgent call to action
After an incredibly constructive debate yesterday in the House Of Lords the government appear to be concerned about how many Lords had significant concerns about the Welfare Reform Bill, even those Lords who in principle supported the bill had major questions they wanted answers to.
For a bill of this size and importance, convention dictates that the next stage of the bill should be kept in the main chamber of the House of Lords for debate. It's particularly important the bill be continued to be debated in the main chamber as disability access to the smaller committee rooms is very limited and people will not be able to access the committee rooms to exercise their democratic right to observe the passge of the bill from the public chamber.