There are currently more than 600,000 vacancies in the UK economy at any one time, and these new measures are intended to ensure that as the economy improves everyone with the ability to work has the support and the opportunity to do so. Those who fail to participate in the scheme will face potential sanctions that could see them lose their benefits for a period of time.
The Help to Work scheme will include:
- Attending the Jobcentre every day. The daily meeting with their adviser would include discussing the progress made in looking for work, such as the number of job searches or applications made, or new activity to improve their skills base. It is designed for claimants who would benefit from regular support with looking for jobs, including those who need to build motivation, momentum and engagement. Currently, a claimant only needs to attend once every two weeks.
- Community Work Placements. Claimants who lack work experience - and where this is felt to be holding them back from finding a job - may be asked to undertake a placement, which will also benefit their local community. This would include a range of roles in the voluntary and community sector that will give the claimant skills and experience within the work place. This could include gardening projects, running community cafes or even restoring historical sites and war memorials. The placements will be for up to six months for 30 hours a week and will be backed up by at least four hours of supported job searching each week to help turn the experience into full time employment.
- Intensive Jobcentre support. For jobseekers with multiple or complex barriers to work the Jobcentre Plus advisors will spend more time with the claimant looking at how to tailor a back to work support, with more flexibility to send people on intensive training schemes, ad hoc funding to overcome issues blocking a return to work such as initial travel costs or suitable clothes for a job interview, and referrals to work experience opportunities with local organisations.
The launch of the Help to Work scheme, part of the Government's long-term economic plan to help people into jobs, comes as figures from the Office for National Statistics show there are record numbers of people in work and long-term unemployment has fallen by 93,000 - the largest annual fall since 1998.
The Prime Minister David Cameron said: "A key part of our long-term economic plan is to move to full employment, making sure that everyone who can work is in work. We are seeing record levels of employment in Britain, as more and more people find a job, but we need to look at those who are persistently stuck on benefits. This scheme will provide more help than ever before, getting people into work and on the road to a more secure future."
Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith said: "Everyone with the ability to work should be given the support and opportunity to do so. The previous system wrote too many people off, which was a huge waste of potential for those individuals as well as for their families and the country as a whole. We are now seeing record numbers of people in jobs and the largest fall in long-term unemployment since 1998.
"But there's always more to do, which is why we are introducing this new scheme to provide additional support to the very small minority of claimants who have been unemployed for a number of years. In this way we will ensure that they too can benefit from the improving jobs market and the growing economy."
Most people move off Jobseeker's Allowance quickly, with over three in every four people ending their claim within six months. Less than three percent of people joining JSA have a claim which lasts for three years. People at risk of long-term unemployment get two years of help from the Work Programme, which has so far seen around half a million people start jobs since June 2011, with around 250,000 in work for six months or more. But for the minority of people who have been on Jobseeker's Allowance for a long time, after finishing on the Work Programme they will now move onto the Help to Work scheme where they will have to take up one of three different types of intensive support, depending on what is stopping them from finding work.
Jobcentre Plus advisers will work with jobseekers to decide which of the three options would best suit their needs. This will be based on an exit report from their Work Programme provider and discussions with the jobseeker about the particular barriers still stopping them from getting work. Help to Work will be mandatory and people who fail to participate could lose their Jobseeker's Allowance for 4 weeks for a first failure and 13 weeks for a second failure.
