Urgent Tribunal Statement of Reasons

Hi Ragnar,
I'm sorry that you found lockdown especially difficult.
If I understand you correctly,you were staying with friends during lockdown and because you hadn't sufficient medication with you, you used a friends.I think you then said that you had difficulties persuading the doctor to give you another prescription when back home. This is now in your GP notes, and you feel this will now prejudice your case if you send the notes in.
Firstly, you do not have to send the notes in, and if you do,then you can annotate. It is your choice whether to send in the medical evidence, but without any form of medical evidence it may be more difficult to prove your case. Rather than focus on what is written, which of course may seem more damning to you than to someone else, work out what it says about your disabilities, and how this evidences these.

Your claim for PIP shows to me that you have significant disabilities, but unfortunately you haven't explained what these are. Is the problem with the medication all to do with your disability/illness? Is your behaviour explained by your health condition?
Firstly everyone had difficulties in lock down, did you need to stay with your friends or did this situation just arise?
What was the friend's medication for, was it legal, or illicit drugs?
Maybe your anxiety was increased by lockdown, and this made your behaviour more erratic than normal? Alternatively, maybe pain was the issue?
These are examples of where you can use the comments in the GP notes to support rather than negate your claim.
Alternatively you send in the GP notes and say nothing. If asked anything you just say that it was a lockdown problem and that made you to act out of character.

I know that the tribunal deal with all manner of people. I personally have represented people who have been in prison, drug addicts and people who have done things that they are not proud to admit to doing. The tribunal listened carefully to all of these and still awarded benefits. So, try not to worry, and please do not give up on obtaining PIP.
I hope this helps.
LL26

Hi Ragnar,
Honesty is by far the best policy! I always advise clients that they have to tell the truth, as trying to cover things up never works, and then you worry more about being discovered later. Also you potentially run the risk of perhaps gaining benefit under false pretences, which could amount to be fraud.
So you say it how it is. As I said in the previous post, the things that you are worrying about are all likely to be connected to your health condition and be evidence of this.
Please also think about the role of your adviser. It is very difficult to advise and represent someone when every day some new, and possibly very negative information arises. It becomes a nightmare for the adviser and makes the case become less and less winnable. If the Tribunal sense you are 'hiding' information then they will also tend to consider that generally you are being untruthful so they could decide that they can not believe anything thing you say.
On the other hand, if you put everything before the adviser and then tribunal, you will not need to worry about remembering what you have or haven't said, and it will make the hearing a lot less difficult.
If you haven't done so already write a statement (or ask your adviser) to explain all the health problems you have and how these affect the way you can/can't do the PIP descriptor activities. A heartfelt statement often sways even the hardest tribunal members!
Try not worry unduly. Good luck with your appeal!
LL26