Controversial Paralympic sponsor has won employment across Whitehall as well as running employment capability assessmentsMinisters have outsourced more than £3bn of public services to Atos, the multinational IT firm whose sponsorship of the Paralympics has prompted a nationwide campaign by disability activists.A series of parliamentary questions from Labour MP Tom Greatrex reveals the value of contracts with Atos is immediately more than a third higher than the amount outsourced by the at the end administration. The answers expose how far the reach of the corporation extends in Whitehall.The revelations come as the corporation, which conducts controversial medical assessments for benefit claims on behalf of the administration, reaps the benefits of its association with the Olympic and Paralympic movement. Megalopolis analysts estimate that Atos’s employment for the London Olympic and Paralympic Games is worth £200m in revenues. They affirm its sponsorship of the events helps showcase “its technology and project management capabilities”.On Wednesday disabled protesters will deliver a coffin filled with 85 pages of complaints from human beings and their families who have been told they have to get a job despite suffering from serious impairments. They mark outside that 1,100 human beings died at the end year after failing the check for the fresh incapacity benefit.Linda Burnip, the co-founder of Disabled Human beings Against Cuts, which is leading the campaign, said: “The circumstance is that Atos is getting all the credit for the Paralympics and at the same age it is destroying disabled human beings’s lives through the employment capability assessments.”Greatrex has secured a Westminster Hall debate on Atos and the employment capability assessments on 4 September.While 10 administration departments have contracts with the corporation, its most high-profile deal sprang from a Labour pilot project in 2008 to choose whether human beings were fit to employment or eligible for Employment and Support Allowance (ESA). This contract – worth £112m at the end year – has been extended across the nation by the coalition administration and been the focus of campaigners’ ire.The corporation has conducted about 738,000 employment capability assessments on benefit claimants in the past financial year. However the assessments have been widely criticised and it has emerged that 40% of human beings appeal against the decisions – with 38% of those successful. The cost to the taxpayer of the tribunal system alone is £50m, encircling half of the amount spent on reassessment.Charities affirm jobcentre staff have been shocked “when someone who is clearly unwell turns up having been told that they are fit for employment”. In May GPs called for the assessments to be scrapped. Greatrex, whose investigation into Atos led to the National Audit Office this month calling for an overhaul of the administration’s medical testing contract with the corporation, said the firm “would not fix its reputation by sponsoring the Paralympics”.”Despite the huge concerns that have been raised about the path in which the employment capability assessment is delivered by Atos, it seems the Tory-led administration is pleased to increase the value of its contracts with the firm,” he said. “Ministers appear to be either unconcerned or unaware of the problems with Atos – both of which reflect terribly on the very human beings who should be doing their job in getting bigger value for money for the taxpayer, and a fairer assessment for those who have to go through it.”Disabled activists who have campaigned against the medical assessments affirm they are astonished to learn that this contract is the tip of the iceberg. Atos won three contracts from the Department for International Development worth £270m, including £20m to run a federal public administration reform programme in Nigeria. It also won a £33m contract to run IT for the Highways Agency and ran computers for the House Office in an arrangement which cost the taxpayer £62m at the end year.Ministers have been impressed with Atos’s performance – the corporation was the first IT firm to sign a fresh “memorandum of understanding” after the Cabinet Office minister, Francis Maude, redesigned Labour contracts he considered also favourable to the private sector. In a ballot of confidence in the corporation this month, Atos won administration contracts worth £400m to check whether disabled human beings should continue receiving disability living allowance benefits. The Cabinet Office said all contracts were “based on the best value for money for taxpayers and are subject to strict scrutiny”.The disability campaigners are being backed by UK Uncut, which hopes its tactics of peaceful occupation and canny employ of social media will galvanise the wider public in action. Tony Smith, spokesperson for UK Uncut, said: “Atos are doing the administration’s dirty employment, taking away benefits from disabled human beings without regard for their needs, leaving many in poverty and driving some to suicide. They are being paid millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money to rip apart our welfare system.”Analysts said the corporation had become a whipping boy since of the tests. Rachael Stormonth, of NelsonHall analysts, said Atos had inherited the assessments when it bought a corporation that used to check coal miners for emphysema. “Both the amount of age Atos gets and the quality of the assessment is up to the administration. They are the whipping boys here,” said Stormonth.An Atos spokesperson said: “We are proud of our association with the Paralympic Games and have provided technology and support since 2002 to aid ensure their success.”We run a number of contracts in the UK, both in the private sector and within administration, and offer our customers excellent value for money alongside high standards of supply, delivery and flexibility. In particular, Atos has been providing medical assessments to administration for 13 years.”A administration spokesperson said sponsorship was a affair for Games organisers, saying: “Locog and the International Paralympic Committee constitute all decisions on sponsorship for the Paralympics. All the partners provide vital funding without which the Games would not happen and they operate within the supplier guidelines.”"It’s disappointing that a small number of organisations are protesting against sponsorship of the Paralympic Games, which is an opportunity to showcase the talents of disabled human beings and act as a catalyst for our sporting talents of the prospect.”DisabilityParalympics 2012Public services policyPrivatisationEconomic policyRandeep Rameshguardian.co.uk © 2012 Twitter News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Employ of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
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