Criticism of the Work Capability Assessment the "written" guidance contained in the 255-page instruction manual issued to all assessors: The foreword to the WCA Handbook states: On 22 July 2013, the DWP announced that all Atos WCA assessors would be retrained, as part of a "quality improvement plan" that followed "a DWP audit which identified an unacceptable reduction in the quality of written reports produced following assessments." In 2006, the New Labour government set out its plans for welfare reform: over the course of a decade, it expected the deployment of the WCA to shrink the number of people on out-of-work sickness benefits by one million,
Criticism of the Work Capability Assessment points after the tribunals had independently assessed their claims. A 2012 study of 28,000 tribunal hearings analysed the reasons for overturning the DWP's decisions: In 2013, the Work Programme firms responsible for training people in the Work-Related Activity Group said that, despite the modifications that had been made to the test since 2008, they still had "ongoing concerns about the accuracy of the WCA". Professor Dame Carol Black advised the government on back-to-work policy between 2006 and 2016. She said of the WCA: "I don't think anyone thinks it has been a success". Conversely, the DWP has said that a