Saturday 28 January,  meet 12 noon at Norfolk Square

Join us in saying NO to Workfare!

As most people tighten their belts, Poundland announced another year of record profits, raking in £31.7m – a whopping increase of 34% – in 2010/11, and boasting of their ability to compete in ‘turbulent economic conditions’.

The shameless scroungers who run Poundland already rely on the state to top up miserable wages with tax credits and housing benefit, rather than doing it themselves from their ever-increasing profits.  Now they have leapt to gobble up another handout, in the form of free labour from the government’s workfare programmes.

Workfare does not lead to employment.  In fact it does the very opposite.  It is an assault on jobs, wages and conditions, and it affects ALL working people.

Brighton Benefits Campaign calls on Poundland to stop their reprehensible exploitation of the unemployed and the poor.  We will continue to campaign against Poundland until they abandon the use of workfare and instead employ people to do the work they need on a proper wage.

The government tries to divide us by pitting those in work against ‘scroungers’ who supposedly need to be forced into work.  But workfare is as much an attack on those with jobs as those without them.  What boss would want to employ a worker they have to pay, when the government will give them someone off the dole to do it for free?

The aim of workfare is simply to drive down wages.

the cycle of workfare

What can we do?

If you learn that a workplace near you is using workfare, let us know.  Brighton Benefits Campaign is campaigning against all forms of workfare and all those who profit from it.  We will be focussing on both the companies profiting from dole slavery, & the private providers of the work programme who are raking in millions in public money.

Write!  Challenge workplaces to reveal whether they are using workfare.  If they are, demand that they stop.  If they’re not, challenge them to publicly pledge not to use workfare.

Demonstrate!  No employer likes the pressure and negative publicity brought by a protest against them.  BBC will be organising regular protests against those using workfare.  Join us, or organise your own demonstration and we will support you.

Organise!  Only independent organisation can give workers the strength to keep workfare out of their workplaces.  If there is a union in your workplace, raise the threat of workfare at a branch meeting and invite your branch to join the campaign.  If there’s no union at your workplace, talk to your colleagues and start to build one.  For support in organising, contact Brighton Trades Council at brightontradescouncil@gmail.com

Know your rights!  If you’re unemployed, there are a number of workfare schemes, which have different rules and some of which you may not have to comply with. There are details about your rights at  http://www.boycottworkfare.org/?p=280.

For further advice and support, contact the Brighton & Hove Unemployed Workers Centre on 540797.

BBC Workfare leaflet

PUBLIC MEETING

7.30PM on THURSDAY 8 DECEMBER 

FRIENDS MEETING HOUSE, SHIP STREET BRIGHTON

ALL WELCOME

While David Cameron and his cabinet of millionaires live it up in their multiple luxurious mansions, they propose to hit those who have only one roof over their heads with an all-out assault on housing benefits and social housing.

The Government’s proposals include:

• Housing benefit to private tenants paid only up to the lowest 30% of rents in an area, rather than 50% as they are paid currently;
• Housing benefit levels not to increase in line with rents any more;
• New council tenants to have only 2 years security of tenure and this will include successor tenants;
• A resumption of Thatcher’s disastrous ‘right to buy’ policy, to sell off what council houses remain;
• Mortgage interest payments have already been slashed by half and are time-limited after two years of being unemployed

The government seek to divide and rule by claiming that these cuts are being made against ‘scroungers’ who are out of work, in the interest of those in work.  This is nonsense – in reality, 80% of those in receipt of housing benefits are in work.  Most people need to claim housing benefit because of low wages.

According to the Chartered Institute of Housing, 750,000 people across the UK will lose their homes because of the cuts.  They will throw households into spiralling debt and will ‘cleanse’ large areas of cities like Brighton of ordinary tenants on a low wage.

While the rich continue to rake in enormous bonuses and obscene profits, the Institute for Fiscal Studies has predicted that the living standards of ordinary people in the UK will decline until at least 2013/2014.  But rather than changing course, the government has begun to crack down on those who oppose them.  The families of those involved in August’s riots have been threatened with arbitrary evictions and other collective punishments, while the disgraceful Hove MP Mike Weatherley has led a campaign pressing for draconian new legislation against squatting, to further punish those who will be made homeless and to forestall effective opposition to the cuts.

We need to fight back now.  Only a large, determined, and organised campaign can force the government back and defend our wages, living standards, and homes.

housing meeting flyer

Starts 7pm on Thursday 13 October at the Friends Meeting House Ship Street Brighton.

Speakers include representatives of the Southampton strikers, local unions, NHS workers & Brighton Benefits Campaign.

Performance of Dick Whittington & His Work Capability Assessment – join in & shout at the computer!
Funeral procession for those who have died because of Atos. Wear black!
Leafleting & picket of Atos Healthcare testing centre in Upper North Street.

WHY TAKE ACTION AGAINST ATOS?

Atos Healthcare, a division of IT giant Atos Origin, is the private provider employed to administer the Work Capability Assessment for the Department of Work & Pensions, testing sick & disabled people who apply for benefit.

In 2005 Atos introduced a computer system to assess claimants’ incapacity to work. Almost immediately concerns were raised about assessments performed using the Logic Integrated Medical Assessment (LIMA) software. Advice agencies such as the CAB complained about the inflexibility & inaccuracy of the tests.

More recently the Harrington Report and the Work and Pensions Select Committee, found the Work Capability Assessment implemented by Atos Healthcare to be mechanistic and Atos’ ‘medical reports’ far too often did not reflect circumstances and discussions that had taken place during the assessments (Harrington Report, pp. 40-41).

A large number of those tested are told they are able to work, but many have the decision overturned on appeal. Yet even those who win their appeals are dragged back within a few months for another test. Small wonder that some have decided to commit suicide rather than continually go through this cat & mouse process. Seriously ill & even dying people have been called for assessment, & the recommendations of family doctors & specialists are apparently ignored.

In addition, twelve doctors working for Atos face being struck off for improper conduct, and other members of Atos’ staff are under investigation over allegations of obscene criticism of benefit claimants.

Over time sick & disabled people & their supporters have grown more militant & more vocal in their condemnations of Atos. In return Atos threatened legal action against the Internet hosting companies of three websites – ‘Carerwatch’, ‘After Atos’ and ‘Atos Register of Shame’, attempting to silence those claimants and their small organisations who have had the courage to speak up.

It’s time for a more human medical assessment & the abolition of Atos’s mechanised methods. Time for the dismissal of Atos and the return to a professional medical service, publicly run, and not for profits!

more information at
http://brightonbenefitscampaign.wordpress.com/2010/05/08/employment-and-support-allowance-a-new-harsher-test/

JOIN US IN THE FIGHT!

The original post Atos objected to can be found at
http://johnnyvoid.wordpress.com/2011/02/15/atos-mach-frei-atos-origin-team-up-with-gas-chamber-firm/

AN OPEN LETTER TO ATOS HEALTHCARE

Lisa Coleman
General Manager for the DWP Contracts
Atos Healthcare
4 Triton Square
Regent’s Place
London, NW1 3HG

Dear Ms Coleman,

We the undersigned individuals and groups are seriously concerned by the fact that Atos Healthcare, the provider of the Work Capability Assessment for sickness benefits, has threatened legal action against the Internet hosting companies of three websites which circulated letters from sickness benefit claimants – ‘Carerwatch’, ‘After Atos’ and ‘Atos Register of Shame’ (now relaunched as ‘A### the Truth’).

These websites have given members of society who are often isolated and have traditionally found it difficult to take joint action, the chance to come together and share their experiences. We find it unacceptable that a large IT company, which receives £100m per year for their assessment of claimants, has deployed their legal department against individuals or small organisations who dared to circulate people’s comments and concerns about their treatment at Atos’ hands.

As acknowledged by both the recent Harrington Report and the Work and Pensions Select Committee, the Work Capability Assessment implemented by Atos Healthcare was found to be mechanistic and Atos’ ‘medical reports’ far too often did not reflect circumstances and discussions that had taken place during the assessments (Harrington Report, pp. 40-41). In addition, ESA claimants have now been told that twelve doctors working for Atos face being struck off for improper conduct, and other members of Atos’ staff are under investigation over allegations of obscene criticism of benefit claimants.

Atos Healthcare has given assurances that the shortcomings identified by the Harrington Report are being addressed. Yet many claimants are still experiencing the distress of poor and rushed medical assessments based on Atos Healthcare’s computer programme.

Amid growing concern that Atos Healthcare is failing to raise its methods and professionalism to acceptable standards, the company is now attempting to silence those claimants and their small organisations who have had the courage to speak up. At a time when we see that major corporations such as News International are able to use the threat of legal action to hide their wrongdoings, it is important that Atos’ actions are brought to account.

It is also the case that government bodies are unable to sue for libel. Atos’ argument is that they are taking legal action to protect their business reputation, but in this case they are performing the work of the DWP, and receiving public money for doing it.

For these reasons, we ask that Atos withdraw all threats of libel action, that they publicly guarantee that they will not in future use the libel laws to close down criticism of their practices, and that they make a public apology to those individuals and websites which they have tried to silence.

Yours truly

Brighton Benefits Campaign
Brighton & Hove TUC Unemployed Centre
Caroline Lucas MP
Amanda Sebestyen Writer
Paul Smith Atos Victims Group
Holly Smith (President) Brighton and Hove Trades Union Council
Brighton Keep Our NHS Public
Brighton Stop the Cuts Coalition
Brighton Disabled People Against Cuts
Ipswich Unemployed Action
Disabled People Against Cuts
False Economy
Southampton United for Pensions and Public Services
National Coalition for Independent Action
Redhill Coalition Against Cuts
Lewes Stop the Cuts
Art Uncut
DLA Help Group
The Broken of Britain
WinVisible (Women With Visible and Invisible Disabilities)
Suffolk Coalition for Public Services
Queer Resistance
Newport Trades Union Council
Cornwall Anti Cuts Alliance
Cornwall Disabled People Against Cuts
Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group

Brighthelm Gardens, Queens Road, Brighton

Rally 3pm at the War Memorial Fountain in Old Steine

On September 6 and 7 Parliament is due to vote on the NHS white paper.  If this is passed it will be a huge step towards privatisation and the break up of our public health service.

On Sunday 4 September Brighton Keep Our NHS Public & Brighton Stop the Cuts Coalition campaigners will be taking part in a mass petition of our city.  Groups will be organised on as many streets as possible to talk to people about what this Bill means, and to ask them to sign a petition and get involved in the campaign to save the NHS.

If just 100 people volunteer we can be positioned at over 30 places round town, which will have a good impact, get the campaign in the press and help expose the governments plans. We can only do this if we get enough volunteers, so get involved and bring your friends!

So that we can provide enough materials, please email brightontradescouncil@gmail.com if you are able to help or add your name to the facebook event at http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=152272458187468

For more information about the government’s Bill and what we can do to get it scrapped, please visit http://www.keepournhspublic.com/index.php

Brighton Keep Our NHS Public
brightonkonhsp@gmail.com
Contact: 07788 744120

Save Our NHS! Keep Our NHS Public!