Is the Help to Work project effective in getting unemployed back into jobs?

WITH the economy growing, we now have record numbers of people in work, and this month saw the largest annual fall in long-term unemployment since 1998. In the South East, employment is up 147,000 on the year and there are over 40,000 fewer people claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance.

Through our Work Programme we have seen around half a million people start jobs thanks to the tailored support we’ve given them. But we always knew that even after being on the Work Programme there would be people with multiple barriers to work who would need further support, which is why we have introduced Help to Work.

Help to Work will give Jobcentre Plus staff a range of new support options, to help people who have been unemployed for at least three years get off benefits and into work.

The 200,000 jobseekers we expect to benefit from Help to Work every year will be among the hardest to help, and our Jobcentre Plus Work coaches will build on the intensive support they’ve already had through the Work Programme.

Each person on the Help to Work scheme will be allocated to one of three support options, and they will be expected to participate, or face losing their benefits.

• Minister for Employment Esther McVey

For those with little to no experience of work – which is often a key factor in people not being able to get a job – taking part in Community Work Placements for up to six months could help boost their confidence, while giving them vital experience and teaching them new skills.

Organisations from the private, public, charity and voluntary sectors will provide these placements, which will all be of benefit to the local community.

Having motivation is another must for jobseekers if they’re to be successful in finding work, but that’s easier said than done for those who have been unemployed a long time.

For that reason another of our new measures will see claimants, identified as needing to engage more regularly with the jobs market, being required to meet with a Jobcentre adviser every day for a period of time to get support in looking for work. We will help with travel expenses for both of these options.

The third option will see people with often multiple and complex barriers to work getting intensive Jobcentre support. Here our Work coaches will have more time to spend with each person and can access other local support available, including training as well as ad-hoc funding to overcome issues blocking a return to work.

We’re seeing record levels of employment around the country, and across the South East the number of people in jobs has increased by 41,000 over the last three months.

We want to make sure everyone with the ability to work has the opportunity to take advantage of the improving jobs market and growing economy. We want to give people who have been living off benefits for many years the tools they need to turn their lives around, rather than confine them to the scrapheap like the previous system did.

NO - Peter Turville, adviser, Oxfordshire Welfare Rights

THE Government’s own research shows that the Help to Work scheme, which is aimed at the long-term unemployed, ‘has had no significant effect on employment outcomes’. Similarly the Work Programme, which is aimed at a wider range of claimants, has been repeatedly criticised for failing to meet targets for the number of people helped back into work.

Claimants are just as likely to find work through their own initiative.

The schemes have a crude ‘one size fits all’ approach and are not tailored to individual needs, particularly to those with disabilities, mental health conditions or other barriers to finding work.

The courts have considered it doubtful that Jobcentre staff have the necessary qualifications or training to meet the needs of such individuals or that Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) processes comply with the Equality Act.

At the same time there has been a huge increase in the number of claimants having their benefit wrongly stopped (sanctioned).

About one in five unemployed claimants can now expect to have their benefit sanctioned.

For example, a 19-year-old who was sanctioned for not applying for a job as an HGV driver (the minimum age for an HGV licence is 21).

MPs found that ‘Jobcentre staff are referring claimants for a sanction inappropriately or without using common sense’. The DWP use a ‘guilty until proven innocent’ approach to imposing sanctions which can leave claimants without money for weeks.

Nationally, Citizens Advice report a 60 per cent increase in people seeking advice about benefits sanctions. Food banks report imposition of sanctions are a significant cause of the increased demand for food parcels. At the same time Oxfordshire County Council has closed the ‘Oxfordshire Support Fund’ to which people whose benefit had been stopped or delayed could apply for emergency assistance.

Government Help to Work schemes are failing to help many people back into work and cost the taxpayer millions. The sanctions regime looks more like a way of punishing the jobless generally rather than the small minority who wilfully fail to comply with the strict rules for receiving benefits.