upcoming PIP mobility tribunal based on MH ruling

merah95

Hi

I have a tribunal coming up for PIP mobility (planning and following journeys) due to the MH judgement. I originally had 4 points total for this mobility question (planning and following journeys).

 

The dwp after they looked at my claim again due to MH judgement, they wrote the following (… means I’ve withheld personal information)

 

My decision

MH v DWP tribunal judgement, this relates to how overwhelming psychological distress is considered when assessing the ability of someone to plan and follow a journey. This change applies from 28 November 2016. The change in law affects those people who have severe anxiety but will go out most days as long as they are with another person. when they go out, they experience overwhelming psychological distress, and they are unable to manage the journey alone.

 

We looked again at your claim from … to…. In your PIP2 claim form dated … you said that you cannot follow any journey due to overwhelming psychological distress.

At your assessment on…whilst it is noted you attended alone …

The information you provided suggests that you have significant difficulty leaving your home most days. Although you sometimes go out the evidence indicates this is not on the majority of days. We are unable to make any changes to the original decision

 

My question to the forum is based on “overwhelming psychological distress” and ‘’if they could not undertake a journey at all.’’

 

I obviously went to my medical and the dwp and atos(or whoever) have used that as a marker for all journeys(remember I am challenging based on MH), but my main point at the tribunal is that I cannot undertake a journey at all which will be descriptor 1e which is 10 points and the standard rate of pip mobility.

So, my main question for the board is this, does MH account for “overwhelming psychological distress” with importantly ‘’if they could not undertake a journey at all.’’ Or does the MH judgement just account for “overwhelming psychological distress” with just the term ‘’they needed someone with them to follow the route of an unfamiliar journey’’

 

Because of the wording of my refusal letter from DWP including the judgement MH and the algorithm dwp use, it does not mention ‘’could not undertake a journey at all.’’, because of “overwhelming psychological distress”, instead my DWP refusal letter focuses entirely on ‘’they needed someone with them to follow the route of an unfamiliar journey’’

Just wondered if I’m being manipulated by the DWP and their algorithms as well as being dictated to regarding; but will go out most days as long as they are with another person. Rather than could not undertake a journey at all.

So is the MH judgement just for people ‘’but will go out most days as long as they are with another person’’

Thanks in advance.

yanni

Hi

The MH review concerned descriptors C, D and F.  

 C Cannot plan the route of a journey. 8 points

 D Cannot follow the route of an unfamiliar journey without another person, assistance dog or orientation aid. 10 points

 F Cannot follow the route of a familiar journey without another person, an assistance dog or an orientation aid. 12 points

 The Government tried to exclude people with OPD (overwhelming psychological distress)from these descriptors. However the courts deemed this was unlawful and so the Government had to reverse the decision and review all the PIP claims where the claimant may have met this descriptors if OPD had been taken into consideration.

 I think the DWP are saying that as you don’t go out on the majority of days you don’t meet the descriptor of needing someone with you on a familiar / unfamiliar journey on the majority of days. (Logically you can’t both be going out and not going out the majority of the time).

 Therefore  they have decided you don’t meet descriptors D or F and so they are not changing their original decision of 4 points.

 If you can’t / couldn’t go out even with someone supporting you then you don’t meet descriptors D or F (as having someone with you would not enable you to plan and follow a journey reliably)

 However, if you would / could go out if you had someone with you (even if you don’t actually have that support in real life) you may meet descriptor D or F. 

Your appeal needs to explain why you (would) need someone with you on familiar / unfamiliar journeys - how would they help you - reassure you, stay with you if you had a panic attack, talk to people to sort out any problems on route because talking to people makes you anxious etc. What would happen to you if you went out without this support? How would you cope if something unexpected happened on the journey? What happened the last time you tried to make a journey on your own? What were the consequences? Give some real life examples of the difficulties you faced.

 Note that descriptors D and F refer to A typical familiar / unfamiliar journey not ANY journey. This means if you can manage to go to the local shop on your own but couldn’t manage a bus ride to the nearest supermarket or somewhere else you (would) regularly go to, you can still meet the descriptor because the journey to the supermarket is A familiar journey you can’t follow reliably without another person.