Equality watchdog completes draft report into ‘unlawful acts’ by DWP

The equality watchdog has completed its draft report into allegations of unlawful treatment of disabled benefit claimants by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), two years after the inquiry was launched under the last government.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has told Disability News Service (DNS) that it has completed the draft report into possible “unlawful acts” by successive work and pensions secretaries.

Some of those unlawful acts are likely to have played a part in the deaths of claimants.

DWP has provided its response to the draft report, which the commission is now considering, the final stage before the report is published.

The inquiry, launched in May 2024, focused on events from January 2021 onwards, so there was concern at the time that it might not examine evidence relating to some of the most high-profile and disturbing deaths linked to DWP’s actions.

These include those of Philippa Day (September 2019), Jodey Whiting (February 2017), Michael O’Sullivan (September 2013), Roy Curtis (November 2018) and Errol Graham (spring 2018)*.

It is also likely to mean a focus on the actions of just three work and pensions secretaries: Therese Coffey, Chloe Smith (who was in post for less than two months in 2022) and Mel Stride, who was in post at the time of the general election in July 2024 and is now the Conservative shadow chancellor.

EHRC has previously said the inquiry would focus on DWP’s failure to anticipate and make reasonable adjustments for claimants with mental ill-health or learning difficulties during the benefit assessment process.

It has also been assessing whether DWP complied with its public sector equality duty, under the Equality Act, when “developing, implementing and monitoring” guidance on assessments.

Mark Harrison, a member of the steering group of the Reclaiming Our Futures Alliance, who has played a key role in pushing EHRC to investigate DWP’s actions, said: “My hope is that all those who have died at the hands of DWP ministers and discriminatory policies will get justice.

“We raised this continually with politicians and DWP senior staff, who ignored us.

“We also reported these violations of disabled people’s human rights to the UN committee on the rights of disabled people. 

“We have campaigned for the Labour government to scrap sanctions as they increase mental distress and leave disabled people at risk of starvation and homelessness.

“Unfortunately, they have carried on where the Tories left off, launching their own war on disabled people.

“We successfully repelled the cuts to PIP but were unable to change the regressive changes to universal credit.

“Once the report is published, we will explore all options to hold the current government’s feet to the fire to force them to comply with their obligations and duties in line with domestic legislation and international treaties.

“We owe this to the people who died unnecessary deaths and all those today experiencing the same injustices.”

DNS reported in 2024 how EHRC was first told by a senior member of staff six years earlier that it needed to launch an inquiry into deaths linked to DWP.

But despite being shown significant evidence that the work capability assessment process and the sanctions system were linked with multiple deaths of disabled people claiming benefits, the commission refused to act.

Instead, senior figures spent months discussing a proposal for an inquiry and asking for that document to be redrafted.

A former senior EHRC staff member told DNS two years ago that an inquiry was “never prioritised” by the commission when it clearly should have been.

If it had acted at the time, the commission could have accessed years of secret peer reviews (later renamed internal process reviews) that DWP carries out when its actions are associated with the death of a claimant.

Between 2012 and 2022, DWP carried out more than 250 of these reviews, each of them written by DWP civil servants with access to the detailed circumstances in which a claimant had died.

EHRC was prompted to look again at a possible inquiry in early 2020 after DNS reported on the death of Errol Graham, who starved to death after his employment and support allowance was wrongly stopped by DWP.

A few months later, the Covid pandemic meant EHRC had to put plans for an inquiry on hold and focus on health and social care.

It eventually launched its more limited investigation in 2024, and it is not clear how far back into DWP’s history the inquiry eventually ventured.

Although it ruled out taking evidence from the families of those who have died, it is believed to have heard from DWP whistleblowers, disabled people’s organisations, welfare rights advisers, researchers, and DWP staff.

An EHRC spokesperson told DNS this week: “In May 2024 we launched an investigation into the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), due to concerns that the department may be failing to make reasonable adjustments for disabled people with learning disabilities or long-term mental health conditions during health assessment determinations.

“We are also assessing the department’s compliance with the public sector equality duty using our powers under section 31 of the Equality Act 2006.

“We have served the department with our draft investigation and assessment report setting out our findings.

“In accordance with the Equality Act 2006, the DWP has the opportunity to make representations which we must consider before finalising the report.

“The DWP has provided representations which we are now considering.

“In line with section six of the Equality Act, we are unable to share any further details at this point.”

DWP said it would consider commenting once the report was published.