The Department

This is the website for The Department: How a Violent Government Bureaucracy Killed Hundreds and Hid the Evidence.

The Department is a new book by journalist John Pring, and is an account of his 10-year investigation into how the actions of a government department, spurred on by politicians and the outsourcing industry, led to the deaths of hundreds of disabled people, and how they covered up their role in those deaths. It includes new documents obtained from the National Archives that show how the violence inflicted on benefit claimants built slowly over the years until it exploded in the post-2010 austerity years. It also tells the stories of a dozen families whose loved ones lost their lives as a result of that slow bureaucratic violence, following years of dehumanisation and destitution. Ultimately, it is a story of a bureaucracy that ran out of control and a call for justice and accountability for those responsible.