Criticism of the Work Capability Assessment thereby saving £7billion a year. A reassessment of long-term recipients was expected to start in 2009 but the start was delayed until 2011 while the test's criteria were reviewed. In 2012, the DWP's handling of its contract with Atos was the subject of a critical report by the National Audit Office (NAO). The Public Accounts Committee heard that in that year the DWP had paid Atos £112m to carry out WCAs. The chair of the committee told the BBC that the DWP got "far too many decisions wrong on claimants’ ability to work" and that this came at a "considerable
Incapacity Benefit and cognitive descriptors" but the DWP's own doctors were not convinced by the evidence presented. The department decided to set up an 'evidence-based review' to look in more detail at the proposed changes, which concluded that the existing criteria "produced consistent results on the whole" and that the WCA was already "an accurate indicator of work capability as compared with expert opinion". DWP ministers replaced Professor Harrington once he had submitted his third annual report in 2012. In 2013, "The Guardian" quoted Professor Harrington as saying: "I would have preferred to do a roll-out [the IB reassessment] in the second