Campaigners and MPs have called for the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) form letter to be scrapped after it emerged claimants appealing against a fit-for-work decision were left near-destitute after their GPs refused to provide "fit notes" because they were advised they did not need to.
He adds that the changes the government is making for people who wish to challenge a fit-for-work decision will give them the opportunity to submit more medical evidence and resolve any disputes with the DWP without having to resort to a lengthy appeals process.
Under Green's predecessor, Iain Duncan Smith, it attracted notoriety for its harshness and there were high numbers of successful appeals against fit-for-work decisions.
There have been over 600,000 appeals against fit-for-work decisions in recent years, clogging up tribunal courts and costing the taxpayer over £60m a year.
It has been dogged by administrative delays, which have often left claimants stressed and penniless, and there have been hundreds of thousands of appeals against fit-for-work decisions in recent years, about four in 10 of which have succeeded.
This group of "hard-to-reach" clients attracts higher success payments, so the choking off of this potential income stream (because of the huge backlog in appeals against fit-for-work decisions) is beginning to hurt primes financially.
Judge Robert Martin, president of the social entitlement chamber of the first tier tribunal told the committee that introducing MR would be justified only if it led to a more rigorous appraisal of fit-for-work decisions.
One GP, responding to the survey, wrote of his discomfort at witnessing what he considered to be a "deluge" of "aberrant" fit-for-work decisions: "The last few months have been among the most depressing and disturbing times in my many years as a GP".
Of CAB's 20 interviewees, just two had the original fit for work decision overruled at MR stage.
The Authors assert that their OWP claim is fit for judicial decision because it "will not change based upon the particular procedures that [the University of Michigan] ultimately employs to identify orphan works". Appellants' Br. 13.
