A new Work and Pensions Committee report recommends that Jobcentre Plus (JCP) should continue to provide a public employment service for the unemployed but that it should be incentivised to get jobseekers into work.
The report, The role of Jobcentre Plus in the reformed welfare system, suggests that two key reforms are needed to achieve this:
- Their should be a more thorough and systematic face-to-face assessment of claimants' potential barriers to employment at an early stage of unemployment benefit claims.
- JCP's key performance indicators should be revised to incentivise claimants' off-flow from benefits into employment. Claimants leaving benefit due to benefit sanctions and other non-work related destinations should not count towards the achievement of key performance targets. As Universal Credit is implemented, performance measures should be further revised to measure sustained job outcomes.
The report argues against a ‘one size fits all approach’ to balance increasingly strict benefit conditionality rules with effective, in-depth employment support for those claimants who need it. To this end the report recommends the use of a ‘classification tool’ to categorise claimants into separate work streams, according to need for support, including a "no initial face-to-face signing on group". Universal Jobmatch should also be used to monitor claimants' job-seeking activity between Adviser interviews, freeing up more time for in-depth advice and support during interviews.
Finally the Committee says that the DWP should address, as a matter of urgency, the unacceptably high ratio of Employment and Support Allowance claimants to specialist Jobcentre Disability Employment Advisers (DEA). This ratio is currently over 600:1.
The report also finds that many claimants have been referred for a sanction inappropriately or in circumstances in which common sense would suggest that discretion should have been applied by JCP staff. DWP should launch a second, broader, independent review of conditionality and sanctions, to include investigation of whether the process is being applied appropriately, fairly, proportionately and in accordance with the rules, across the Jobcentre network.
The DWP has been slow to produce a comprehensive framework which sets out in detail how closer working arrangements with local providers can be achieved in partnership with local authorities.
“If the Government is to achieve its aim of better benefit support services under Universal Credit "than ever before", a comprehensive Local Support Services Framework must be published by autumn 2014 at the latest, to allow local authorities to design and commission services in time for the planned national roll out of the new benefit from financial year 2015-16.”
To read the report go to http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/work-and-pensions-committee/news/jcp-rpt/
Disability Rights UK's report 'Taking Control of Employment Support' proposes a radical rethink of support for disabled people into work. You can read this at http://disabilityrightsuk.org/policy-campaigns/reports-and-research/taking-control-employment-support