Welfare-to-work programme 'fails to find work for 70% of claimants'

Rochdale Jobcentre

Nearly 70% of participants on the welfare-to-work scheme remain out of work after two years on the programme.

In particular, the Work Programme is not working well for people with more complex or multiple barriers to employment who need more intensive help, says the Commons Work and Pensions Select Committee.

The committee said nearly 70% of people who had completed their two-year attachment to the scheme had failed to find sustained employment.

The programme is run by providers who offer support and training to people on jobseeker's allowance (JSA) and employment and support allowance (ESA). The providers are paid on the basis of the number of people finding and staying in work.

The commmitte recommended changes that would create an employment support system which is set up better to address the challenges of the contemporary labour market, and equipped to help into work people who have been distant from the labour market, and inadequately supported, for far too long. The "complicated and less than effective" payments model should be changed when the current contracts expire in April 2017.

People with drug and alcohol addiction, illiteracy and innumeracy and the homeless should be better served, the committee said.

A separate, specialist scheme for people with "substantial disabilities" would also help the government meet its goal to halve the employment rate gap between disabled people and non-disabled people, the MPs added.